How to Make a Video Black and White

Are you looking for ways to make your video look like old films? How to make a video black and white? This post from the free video editor - MiniTool MovieMaker gives you 6 black and white video editors.

Color determines the tone and feel of videos, and color editing and adjustments have always been a hot topic in video editing. People always need to edit the clip’s color for different purposes and to express motions.

Sometimes, you want to create an old-fashioned look for your video, but how to make a video black and white? Here are 6 methods to help you achieve it.

How to Make a Video Black and White on Windows & Mac

In this section, we’ll give you 3 black and white video editors for your desktop computer.

#MiniTool MovieMaker

MiniTool MovieMaker is a free video editing software application for Windows PCs. It’s designed to help everyone especially beginners quickly make video from images, video clips, and music. To help you create eye-catching videos, this video editor provides a set of effects and tools.

Filter is a key feature of MiniTool MovieMaker and this app offers various filters to create a professional look for your video. For instance, it offers some Instagram-like and artistic filters to make cinematic videos and some black-and-white effects to make your footage look like old movies.

Apart from that, MiniTool MovieMaker has a library of transitions and motion effects. It also allows you to add text and stickers to decorate videos, crop, trim, rotate, flip, and reverse videos, change video playback speed, choose the correct aspect ratio, and more.

Benefits of MiniTool MovieMaker:

Free to access to full functionality.
Export videos up to 1080p for free and without watermarks.
Support many popular media file formats.
A user-friendly interface and easy operations.

Here’s how to make a video black and white using MiniTool MovieMaker.

Step 1. Download and install MiniTool MovieMaker on your PC.

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Step 2. Launch MiniTool MovieMaker and close the promotion window to access the main user interface. Click the Import Media Files button to browse for your video and upload it into this application. Also, you can directly drag a video from your computer storage.

Step 3. Drag the video to the timeline. Here are 3 ways you can add a B&W effect to a video.

Option 1: Apply a Black & White filter effect

Select the clip on the timeline, go to Filters at the top, then choose the LUT tab on the left, scroll down and you can see several Black & White filters. Click the download button to download the filter and click + to apply it.

There are several different black and white filters and you can download them all and try them one by one before finally choosing the one you want.

Option 2: Adjust the clip’s saturation

In color theory, saturation refers to the intensity of the colors in an image. As saturation increases, colors appear purer. As saturation decreases, colors appear more washed out or pale. Highly saturated images have vivid, rich, and bright colors, while low-saturation images tend to be gray. Therefore, you can decrease the clip’s saturation to make it black and white.

Select the clip on the timeline and drag the Saturation slider under the Basic tab to the left until the video appears in grayscale.

Additionally, you can adjust the brightness and contrast of your clip to make it more story-telling and outstanding.

Option 3: Add the B&W Film effect

MiniTool MovieMaker also offers some 3D LUT effects, and it includes a B&W Film effect. To do this, also click the clip on the timeline, expand the 3D LUT menu on the right, and choose B&W Film from the list.

Step 4. Optionally, you can continue to edit the video as you like. After that, click Export to open the export window, choose the output path, or click Settings to edit some parameters like resolution, bitrate, frame, etc., and finally, click Export to export the black-and-white video.

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#Adobe Premiere Pro

Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the best video editing apps for Windows and Mac that shouldn’t be ignored, especially for professional or amateur film editors. This application provides comprehensive editing tools from basic to advanced and effects.

This video editor also offers powerful color correction and grading tools, including various presets that can be directly applied to the clips to change and adjust the color. Also, it can create a black-and-white video.

Here’s how to make video black and white in Premiere Pro:

Step 1. Open Adobe Premiere Pro on your computer.

Step 2. Click File > New Project to create a new project and click File > Import to import your video. Then, drag it to the timeline.

Step 3. Click Color at the top or click Window > Lumetri Color, you’ll see several different options, and expand the Basic Correction option.

Step 4. Drag the Saturation slider to the left to decrease it. To make a better result, you can slightly decrease the shadows and increase the highlights and contrasts.

Also, you can go to Window > Effects, then click Video Effects > Image Control > Black and White to add the B&W effect to the video.

Step 5. Once you’re satisfied with the result, export the video from Premiere Pro.

#DaVinci Resolve

DaVinci Resolve, a cross-platform and free video editing software application without watermarks, is also a great tool to turn your video into black and white to make other professional looks.

DaVinci Resolve has 5 dedicated pages for specific tasks. For instance, the Color page allows you to manipulate the clip’s color in creative and artistic ways, greatly affecting the mood and tone of your video.

Apart from that, DaVinci Resolve offers a set of editing functions and effects that you may need, from basic tools like cropping to advanced options like video stabilizatio n.

How to make a video black and white in DaVinci Resolve? Follow these steps:

Step 1. Run DaVinci Resolve on your computer.

Step 2. Right-click on the Media Pool and select Import Media to open your video and add it to the timeline.

Step 3. Click Color at the bottom of the screen then a Color Wheels window appears at the bottom left corner.

Step 4. Go to Saturation and bring it down to remove all colors from this video. If you want more color controls, click the RGB Mixer button, select Monochrome, and the video becomes black and white. Also, you can adjust the Blue Output, Green Output, and Red Output to adjust the color you want.

Step 5. After that, go to the Deliver module (a rocket-like button) at the bottom to open Render Settings. Change these settings, then click Add to Render Queue > Render to export the video.

How to Make a Video Black and White on Android/iOS

How to make a video black and white on Android or iOS? CapCut can help you. It is a free video editor for making amazing videos on your smartphone, and it also has a desktop version for Windows and Mac.

This app provides rich editing tools and effects to help you create professional-looking videos. For instance, it allows you to crop, flip, trim, and rotate video, add stickers, add overlays, change video speed, apply filters & effects, and more.

Also, CapCut can help you make a black-and-white video. How to make a video black and white with CapCut? Follow the steps below:

Step 1. Download and install CapCut from the Play Store or App Store.

Step 2. Open the CapCut app on your phone, click New Project to select the target video from your phone gallery, and tap Add to open it.

Step 3. Click Effects at the bottom, then choose Video effects, switch to the Basic tab, scroll down to find the To B&W effect, and tap this effect to add it.

Also, you can click the Adjust tab at the bottom, then choose Saturation, drag the slider to the left to bring it down, and click the checkmark button.

Step 4. To export the video, hit the arrow icon at the top right and click Export to export the video.

If you want to make a video black and white with CapCut on a PC, follow the steps:

Step 1. Open the CapCut desktop app and sign up with your account.

Step 2. Click the + Create project button at the top to enter the edit page and click Import to upload your video.

Step 3. Add the video to the timeline. Click Filters at the top, then select the Mono category on the left, and then you’ll see some effects, including BW 1, BW 2, and BW3. Download one of these black-and-white effects, and click + to apply it.

Then, drag the right edge of the BW effect track on the timeline to make it match the video.

Step 4. Click the Export button in the upper right corner to export the video.

How to Make a Video Black and White Online

This part will give you 2 online black and white video editors, Canva and Clideo.

#Canva

Canva is a useful tool for making social media posts, presentations, posters, videos, logos, etc. As a video editor, Canva enables you to add filters to video, adjust color and light, change the video playback speed, crop and flip videos, draw on the video, add text, and more.

Here’s how to make a video black and white in Canva.

Step 1. Go to the Canva website in your web browser.

Step 2. On the home page, click Create a design and choose Video.

Step 3. Select Uploads on the left, then click Upload files to open your video from your computer, and add it to the timeline.

Step 4. Click the Edit video option, under the Effects tab, and choose a Mono filter. Also, you can go to the Adjust tab and decrease Saturation to make the video black and white.

Step 5. Click Share and then choose Download to download the video as an MP4 file.

#Clideo

Clideo is an online editing platform to edit your videos. You can use it to cut, resize, loop, crop, compress videos, add subtitles, etc. This online video editor also offers some filters to choose from and it can convert your video to grayscale.

Step 1. Navigate to the Clideo website and log in.

Step 2. Click Tools, select Filter Video, and then click Choose file to upload your video.

Step 3. Choose the Grayscale or Moose filter.

Step 4. Click Export to export the video.

Final Thoughts

How to make a video black and white? The most traditional way is to decrease the clip’s saturation, and you can also use other color tools such as brightness, highlight, contrast, and more to create a perfect look for the video. The second method is to apply a black-and-white filter or grayscale effect to remove all colors.

This guide explains 6 detailed methods to turn color videos into black and white. Choose one way and create your unique vintage video. And finally, if you have any questions while using MiniTool MovieMaker, you can contact us via [email protected] for help.

About The Author

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Position: Columnist

Cora works as an editor at MiniTool for many years, writing articles about video editing, video conversion, and screen recording. She also writes articles about Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat, and Twitter. During her spare time, Cora loves reading, traveling, and watching movies.