dmacmillan wrote:
What was the question? Oh yes, which of the enlargers mentioned would be a suitable choice for Juan. It looks like he picked up the Durst.
That leads to some other questions. Juan, why are you interested in using an enlarger to make your own prints? What kind of photographs do you take?
If you haven't developed film and made prints before, let's crawl before you walk. Let's also keep things in perspective. Extensive knowledge of the Zone System is not necessary to make wonderful, properly exposed, developed and correctly printed photographs. Millions of stunning images were created before there was what we call the Zone System and hundreds of exceptional photographers have made stunning, iconic images since with little or no knowledge.
From a practical standpoint, when I was using a large format camera and taking images using the Zone System, the huge majority of my film holders would come back from the field marked normal exposure, normal development. If you're doing general photography, there will be very few photos where you cannot correct using normal methods to get the correct exposure and contrast. Yes, it is necessary to understand what a correctly exposed and developed negative looks like, but there are far simpler ways to achieve this than the Zone System.
The irony is that I graduated from the very school where Fred Archer and Ansel Adams codified the Zone System. The first half of the college major was split roughly between gaining technical knowledge and working on aesthetics. It was only in our third semester did we start to delve into the technical principles of the Zone System and started to apply it in the darkroom. In other words, theres a time and place for such things. Day one is not that time. Learn the fundamentals and have fun first....Show more →
Exactly the point I was trying to make in my post above, thanks dmacmillan!!
The Zone System is like verb conjugation--you don't really know how the language works until you learn it.
Yes, but I can speak perfect English, put sentences together and even write a novel without ever even knowing what verb conjugation is.
In the same way a beginning darkroom novice does NOT need the Zone system at THE START. Sometimes I think people here just like showing off their expertise and knowledge at the expense of the OP who asked a simple question about enlargers and how to start.
As I said, it was designed as a teaching tool, and as such, as Adams and Picker have set it forth in their books, it's a straightforward and simple process to understand what happens from exposure to print.
There is nothing arcane about the Zone System, although perhaps some folks have tried to make it so, which is what you're doing right now.
marko1953 wrote:
Sometimes I think people here just like showing off their expertise and knowledge at the expense of the OP who asked a simple question about enlargers and how to start.
It's more a case of trying help people from throwing money at problems they don't fully understand yet and giving them a road map based on personal experience down the same road.
The Zone System isn't very difficult to grasp in concept — expose for the shadows, develop the film for the highlights — and as Doug said when shooting outdoors 90% of the shots will fit the "normal sunny day" development baseline I suggested to make learning how to make a decent print 1-2-3 simple.
Peter Figen wrote:
I went to the same school as Doug did, but I had spent years making black and white prints before going there and had made thousands of really great prints - all without ever formally using the Zone System.
I was location scouting in the Pasadena area yesterday and driving up Santa Anita Blvd toward Chantry Flats, there were several photographers, including one young person with an OmegaView 4x5 shooting a portrait. "Ah", I said to myself, "there's an Art Center student". Some things never change.
Thanks for the memory! There's nothing like trying to get a nice portrait with a view camera. It gives you some appreciation for those who came before who did gorgeous portraits with 4x5, 5x7 and 8x10 cameras.
Peter's mention of his experience before attending school points out that Art Center students weren't neophytes. We all had to submit a portfolio demonstrating proficiency and creativity. Yet, once at school, nothing was presumed. We all started at square one.
RDKirk wrote:
As I said, it was designed as a teaching tool, and as such, as Adams and Picker have set it forth in their books, it's a straightforward and simple process to understand what happens from exposure to print.
There is nothing arcane about the Zone System, although perhaps some folks have tried to make it so, which is what you're doing right now.
Well, you made me pull out my copy of "The Negative".
My wife is a college professor. She teaches Nursing, both at the undergrad and graduate level. She uses textbooks as teaching tools, yet she doesn't use graduate level textbooks in her introductory nursing courses for those who are in their first semester of nursing school.
Only a few pages in "The Negative", Adams is discussing H&D curves. This is wonderful and useful information, but not the best starting point for someone who has never loaded film on a stainless steel reel. I heartily recommend the Adam's books to all interested in photography, even if they only shoot digital, but not as basic introductory reading.
