Digital BW, The Print

Todd Flashner wrote:

>  on 2/8/02 12:57 AM, SKID Photography wrote:
>
> > 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
>
>
> Harvey,
>
> So what are you saying? You could believe that Adams invented the Zone
> System with Edward Weston, and you can believe that he did it with Fred
> Archer, but you can't believe he did it with Minor White who was his
> assistant at the time? I don't get it.
>
> I'll stick with my memory of history, and the sources that back *it* up. ;-)
>
> Todd

Todd,
I gave you a quote from Ansel Adams himself.

Believe it or don't.

Harvey Ferdschneider
partner, SKID Photography, NYC





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