Ahhhh....The Zone System!

Just when I was beginning to wonder 'when did photography become so darned technical?', along comes an article to remind me that it has ALWAYS been that technical.  Only recently with the advent of digital cameras and PhotoShop have we been led to believe that photography is relatively easy...the camera and the software do it all, right?

Nay, nay!  Photography has ALWAYS been about light...understanding light, reading light, and transferring it through the lens, onto film--or a sensor--and then to the print.  Enter The Zone System!! Created by Ansel Adams as a system to understand how to read light, how to expose for the image your mind sees, and how to process the film--or the file--properly, and then transfer that image onto a print so that the end result is exactly what your mind visualized.  That was what Ansel was all about--pre-visualization--the ability to look at a scene and know in his mind, with careful planning and execution, what he wanted the end result to look like. 

 The Zone System...VERY technical stuff here, I warn you.  But if you really want to understand 'photo' (a light) 'graphy' (a process of writing, recording or representing), then you must understand The Zone System. I'm not an expert by any means--(photography also means 'try, try again!'), but I have a good enough working knowledge of it to know that it is essential to my craft to always strive to utilize it and to improve my understanding of it.

So I encourage you to read the article, research other articles on The Zone System, study images of  'The Masters' (Adams, Weston, Cunningham, etc.) and then get out there and get in the zone by practicing and applying what you have learned.

Good Luck!  Feel free to email me with questions or comments!