Digital BW, The Print

Todd Flashner wrote:

>
> >>> And to add to that, the zone system was invented by Ansel (and Edward
> >> Weston?)...
> >>
> >>
> >> I know Minor White was one of the zone pioneers too, and perhaps the best
> >> photographer of the group (IMHO).
> >>
> >> Todd
> >>
> >
> > Sorry Todd....
> > Yes great photographer and yes used the Zone system to the Nth degree, but
> of
> > a
> > different era and age than Ansel and Edward.  I do not believe he was part
> of
> > it's invention, too young. ;-)
>
>
> <http://www-tech.mit.edu/V105/N57/nudewh.57a.html>
>
> Excerpted from the link above (emphasis mine):
>
> Dreams with a memory- Minor White remembered
>
> Minor White was one of the most influential, inscrutable, and
> interesting photographers of all.
>
> *With Ansel Adams he developed the Zone System*, an engineering methodology
> which (in the primitive days of guesswork photography) allowed a
> photographer precise control over the appearance of his image.
>
> Todd

Todd,
I fear that the above is a bit of revisionism.  While I agree that White
probably helped perfect the Zone System, the below from Ansel's autobiography,
off a website on the 'simplified Zone System'.....
******************
The history of the zone system, or was Ansel Adams the sole inventor? Here's
what Adams says in his Autobiography. The setting is the Art Center School, Los
Angeles, 1940. "With the
cooperation of Fred Archer, instructor in photographic portraiture, I set out to
plan a way by which the students would learn the 'scales and chords' to achieve
technical command of the medium. It took several weeks in refinement before I
could teach it to the students. I called my codification of practical
sensitometry the Zone System."
*****************

I still believe Ansel 'invented' the Zone System, I guess I was wrong about
Weston, but I thought I remember something in the history about Weston and Adams
perfecting it...ah well..

Harvey Ferdschneider
partner, SKID Photography, NYC


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