Quinten said:Whow, quite some info in here. And I've read about the zone system but it's always hard to judge the reflection from a scene you are looking at. Above that I was confused about the 18% gray these meters measure. I figured 50% gray would be right in the middle of the film.
Anyway I might try developing a bit shorter as well to get rid of those highlights!
Thanks for all your replies!
Quinten
esanford said:They usually sell on Ebay for a few dollars... If you can't find a copy....
Quentin,Quinten said:Above that I was confused about the 18% gray these meters measure. I figured 50% gray would be right in the middle of the film.
Lee L said:Quentin,
Your spot meter interprets whatever it sees as being 18% reflectance, i.e. medium gray, and it's up to you to slide that up or down the scale of tones from black to white to where you want that particular object placed along the scale. That, and the capacity to change the dynamic range to some degree with development and choice of paper and paper developers, is the basis of the zone system.
Lee
FirePhoto said:before someone catches my error, I reversed things in my first paragraph: Zone I is black, Zone X is white. Sorry!
One f-stop in the Zone System is equal to one Zone with "normal" development and printing. If you vary from "normal", the Zone System allows you to predict how much to compress or expand the dynamic range of the film to fit the subject and get everything you want onto your print. This compression or expansion is done with appropriate choice of filters, film, pre-exposure, developers, developing time, paper, paper grade, paper developer, etc. In other words, all the variables in the process.Quinten said:Above that: one step in the zone system is not the same as one f/stop???
"It has nothing to do with zones. The number of stops from black to white depends on the total gradient of the film and paper and upon nothing else. A hard negative of a given scene can be printed on soft paper and a soft negative of the same given scene can be printed on hard paper and you would end up with the same scale of tones. A hard negative printed on hard paper may have only three stops from black to white, and a soft negative printed on soft paper may have neither black nor white."
fhovie said:Can there be anything simpler than exposure and development?
I always though it was pretty straight forward - and then - I bought a step wedge, a spot meter - started using different developers - an now a densitometer - wow. Is there anything more complicated than exposure?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?