I know you specifically asked about Photoshop so this may not be relevant, but...
If you shoot in RAW then there are a number of presets available in Lightroom for converting to black and white or monochrome images. Here are some examples:
Original colour image (with a simple curves adjustment to boost contrast)
L to R: Grayscale, B&W Low Contrast, B&W High Contrast
L to R: Antique Grayscale, Antique Light, Selenium Tone, Sepia
All of the above where done with a single click (although IMO, most of them could do with some further tweaking).
Dave P.