Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/02/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]>I'm curious, among this group, who uses the zone system of >exposure/development/printing? Either formally or informally, color or >b&w. > >Which spotmeters are good - accurate, rugged, easy to use, reliable? > >Thanks, > Tim K tim k, i use a kind of informal, idiosyncratic zone system for exposure. here's how i do it: - - read a f****** h*** of a lot about the z.s., skipping all the graphs - - forget all except what i find *practically* (i.e. in praxis) useful - - use it! for me, this boils down to exposure technique, as i: - - don't have the patience to test all aspects of my *system* (i.e. each camera body with each lens, with each brand of film i use at each film speed, not to mention which paper's i print on and through which enlarger lenses) - - don't shoot large format and thus find impractical for my purposes z.s.-style development (i.e. n +/- whatever) - - want to enjoy photography and not spend too much time worrying about details that said, i find the fundamentals of the z.s. of great value when determining exposure. it is a system beautiful in its simplicity in that it relates the gray 'zones' of the print to the controls of the cameras - leicas, mind you! - that i am already using to make pictures. the grays are thus related to f stops and shutter speeds and film speeds and everything's groovy. in other words, i use it to 'previsualize' (to use that word) the tones in the print at the moment of exposure - just as i do aperture and shutter speed for relative sharpness and blur - thus giving me more control of the printed image, and helping me to achieve it. here's my m.o.: - - find the thing you want to emphasize in your image - - figure out which zone it should be (for this one, i use 'classic' examples of things and the zones they tend to be and relate to that) - - push the button on the camera (on the m, there's only one) to take a reading of the scene - - compensate accordingly - - shoot that's it. for me, the rest is all hubub and stuff, fit only for hopeless hobgoblins with their big ol' boxey cameras and unique negs! yo! guy