Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Clayton Jones"
<cj@c...> wrote:
  IMO, all of those guys were saying the same thing,
> each from his own unique perspective.  I read Ansel and Minor and
> Phil, and all of them left me with my head spinning and feeling
> deflated. 

I thought Ansel and Minor both communicated very clearly, and very
"practically," using it in 8X10 and 35 in 1969, and I was definitely
not technically oriented... 

Many teachers popularized/commercialized versions of Zone System, a
good thing. My world included a half dozen Minor White students and a
few Ansel Adams students so, being inclined to pigeon-hole, I formed
views about why certain people gravitated each way. But mostly it was
accident and convenience: Minor's teaching students moved in droves to
California for lifestyle reasons, and Ansel drew students to
California from all over the US.

Some say (I believe strongly) that Minor and Ansel both did more by
teaching than by with photographs, and Minor certainly regarded his
teaching his main calling...and his students often believed they had
the same calling.

Minor's focus was primarily on teaching of emotionally significant
photographs, not on darkroom or view camera technique...he
assumed/demanded students produce what was necessary technically... 
teaching of Zone System wasn't near the center of Minor White's work. 

 Then I discovered Fred's stuff and suddenly it all made
> good practical sense...

All the young photographers I knew in the 60s/70s were using Zone
System and personal variants. The only confusion I recall had to do
with the distinction between 35mm and sheet film...some tried to apply
formal Zone System to 35mm and others (photojournalist-inclined) met
their needs better the way most 35mm shooters do today, with subtle
chemistry (eg modified Rodinal and other commercial chems, pyro, D23
on and on).

>  Not everyone learns the same way 

IMO the very best resource is peers...including this and other Yahoo
Groups and Photo.Net and others.

(why
> did Minor feel it necessary to reinterpret what Ansel said?).  

Ansel developed Zone System WITH Minor one Summer at San Francisco Art
Institute...they both used variations independently before they came
together. Minor's students were different from Ansel's, focused on
different aspects of photography...less mountains, more psychological
imagery, less rocks and wood texture, more people and wrecked cars :-) 


Minor emphasized meditation techniques, and Weston certainly had that
orientation...never heard of that kind of teaching from Ansel..any
recollections along that line with him or with Picker?

> 
> I was always amazed at how angry others could get when FP's approach
> didn't match their own dearly held concepts, when, in truth, they were
> all doing essentially the same thing.  

Some see Zone System as a religion and consequently as a way to
distinguish themselves from their peers, while others see it simply as
a tool. 

The dozen or so *commercial studio photographers* that I knew during
the Seventies in San Francisco all used some form of Zone System, and
most had learned it either from peers, directly from Kodak, or from
Minor (who did after all work from Rochester). 

Djon

> Regards,
> Clayton