It's always a hard choice, but I usually end up going with color. Except this time. I'm always shooting in color, but when I went to upload this to Instagram, I went with B&W.
Do you prefer B&W in this case? And why? I have my own theories, but I'm curious what you all think.
Both were shot with my Fuji XT-20 with the 27mm f2.8 "pancake" lens. Very little post-production (other an removing the color in the top one) and cropping out a car that was on the left.
We were in Pittsburgh's "Strip District" (which has nothing to do with strip clubs--get your mind out of the gutter, people!) when it started to pour down rain and we ducked into a little sandwich shop.
I go through this a lot myself. For me it makes it hard once you have seen the color version. There's definitely an impact with B&W that you can't achieve with color. But I believe that our minds crave color, and so once we see it in color, it makes it harder to appreciate the impact of B&W.
Anyway, with this picture I prefer the B&W. With the majority of the picture out of focus, the B&W takes advantage of that and brings attention to the in focus drops, while color seems to be distracting. Just my two (actually 0.2 with my voting power) cents worth.
Very smart observations! Thanks, Onza.