Digital BW, The Print

Guy, you and I evidently do understand these matters similarly. Ansel
was almost a sensualist too, while young :-)

I certainly do NOT always get "exactly" the print I envision (that's
only theoretically possible to the digitally preoccupied). I don't
think "exact" is a virtue, for that matter. I do reliably get very
close approximations, just as you and I did in the darkroom, and
occasional happy surprises that may less available to people who play
the game the way you now seem to recommend. 

Some of us are raku-people
 http://www.alfargaleriaazul.com/eng/cour.htm 

Others are Meissen-people http://www.jdweedco.com/china/china5.htm

Djon :-)


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, guy washburn
<guido02474@y...> wrote:
> Djon,
> 
> I certainly place my self in the sensualist camp but I
> find it deeply curious to work on b&w prints without
> looking/working with b&w files before printing. Unless
> you previsualize using the same algorithm that the
> QTR/gimp uses, it is unlikely that you will ever get
> the exact print you envision. Of course no one but you
> knows that so your secret is quite safe. In a way it
> is more like the result of wet dark room work where
> the fruits of your labors are only seen in the
> developer not on the easel where most of the
> manipulation occurs -- perhaps this is the attraction,
> the role of chance? I don't like the amount of wasted
> paper it took to make a wet darkroom print sing. With
> softproofing using qtr_matte prints just match. From
> raw file score to symphony finished print with more
> control than we ever had in a wet darkroom (though we
> wave our arms less now). Does an inkjet print have
> Buddha nature? It does if the artist has skillfully
> presented his vision and  shares it's meaning.    
> 
> Peace,
> 
> Guy
> --- Djon <westsidemaurice@y...> wrote:
> 
> > Steve, there are/were two divergant Zone System
> > tendencies. 
> > 
> > One emphasized number assignment, the other
> > emphasized
> > previsualization. Two sides of the same coin, appeal
> > IMO to two
> > fundamentally different kinds of personality. 
> > 
> > You're right that Zone System doesn't simply mean
> > "previsualization,"
> > but previsualization is central to it. 
> > 
> > Post-processing that's not the result of
> > previsualization is (IMO)
> > outside Zone System, a matter of manipulation (not a
> > negative IMO).
> > 
> > I happen to resonate more with what I understand,
> > from several of his
> > students, to be Minor White's angle on Zone System
> > rather than Ansel
> > Adams'. 
> > 
> > I think Minor's angle emphasized previsualization
> > more than Ansel's.
> > Minor's students were printing masters but they
> > didn't seem very
> > interested in densitometry and were obviously drawn
> > to strongly 
> > emotional images more than to beautiful rock and
> > water with subtle
> > tonal scales. Like Weston, a better printer early on
> > than Ansel, Minor
> > appealed more to sensualists.
> > 
> > From small dealings in the Seventies with Ansel and
> > his students, and
> > from following his books and later work, it seems to
> > me that he grew
> > more technically than visually with age, the
> > opposite of Minor's growth. 
> > 
> > In Ansel's last (perhaps) book project he focused on
> > quantitative
> > technical matters (scanning and lithography). This
> > is honorable, an
> > extension of his angle on the Zone System that he
> > began with Minor White. 
> > 
> > Minor, on by contrast, was a Zen practitioner who
> > photographed people,
> > content, and meaning...a different side of the brain
> > with different
> > passions, employing a different angle on the Zone
> > System. Ansel was
> > also a fine people photographer who could make
> > eloquent connections,
> > but some forget that in their enthusiasm for
> > numbers.
> > 
> > Minor's Zone System game seemed to make the image he
> > wanted to make. I
> > think Ansel's was more a matter of process for its
> > own sake...workflow.
> > 
> > ++++ Photography and printmaking are part of a
> > continuum and that this
> > is sometimes forgotten by people at the extremes of
> > the continuum. 
> > 
> > Djon
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com,
> > Steve Kale
> > <stevekale@b...> wrote:
> > > Firstly I did not assert that pre-visualisation
> > was no longer relevant.
> > > Secondly, the Zone system has nothing to do with
> > black and white per
> > se - it
> > > is merely a system for determining appropriate
> > exposure when such
> > exposure
> > > can not be significantly "altered" post shutter
> > release.  All the Zone
> > > system does is provide a rigorous framework for
> > determining middle
> > exposure
> > > and an understanding as to how the rest of the
> > elements will be
> > exposed as a
> > > result.  
> > 
> > 
> > 
> 
> 
> 		
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