The simple answer is because of his vision for the subject matter that he photographed and his ability to translate it to paper in a totally analog era. Also Ansel was an excellent self promoter and worked his ass off to practice his art, craft, and life style.
There is really no digital equivalent to what Ansel did with a large format film camera.
If you want to see some of his work you will have a good opportunity to look at one of the largest assemblies of his work since his death and perhaps during his life at the Booth Western Museum in Cartersville, GA this fall.
Some of Ansel's coffee table books were printed so well that they approach the quality and luminance of his original prints. In some cases even better.
There is no Ansel plugin available for PS. My recommendation is if you are interested in high end B&W prints to eek out the best quality that you can with your digital tools and then purchase a film camera and learn to shoot and print with real B&W film. That should keep you busy for several years.
donbga wrote:
There is no Ansel plugin available for PS.
OMG, wouldn't that be neat?
My recommendation is if you are interested in high end B&W prints to eek out the best quality that you can with your digital tools and then purchase a film camera and learn to shoot and print with real B&W film. That should keep you busy for several years.
Don Bryant
As much fun and sophisticated as the new digital cameras and Photoshop/Lightroom are, I wouldn't trade my film and darkroom days for anything. That said, to me the best part about the digital world is the freedom to experiment without the cost and time lag. Oh yeah, making those camera setting notes! I absolutely love EXIF!
SteveLL wrote:
I shoot in RAW so when I do my post processing I'm starting with a "digital negative". I then process it in CS2 or maybe DPP and then CS2, during which I convert it to B&W. I have no "conversion button" and the method and details of the conversion will vary from photo to photo.
Isn't that more or less what many of us do - take the picture in RAW and then arrive at a result? The critical difference as it has been explained is that Adams was able to visualise the result he wanted and then set everything up to make the picture as visualised.
Also as a non-American I see landscape after landscape copying what Adams did 70 years ago with much less success despite having better tools.
