The Devil came home with me today (several) Mortensen Books)

Bill Burk · Aug 30, 2014

They'll take away my Group f/64 card for sure now...

In Half Moon Bay a small church is holding a book faire this weekend.

Was in the neighborhood, walked in and headed to the Coffee Table books section. Thought I might find some photography related books.

What I found blew me away. I couldn't carry all I would have liked, so had to put back some things that I'm sure I'll regret.

But what I came home with was over a dozen old smelly books. Half a dozen by William Mortensen.

Pictorial Lighting
The New Projection Control
M. on the Negative
Print Finishing
Outdoor Portraiture
The Model

I don't know how I will approach these, but it will be fun reading.

cowanw · Aug 30, 2014

I will be interested to read what your impressions of his exposure and developing suggestions are .

Jim Jones · Aug 30, 2014

Ansel Adams would agree that his books can be smelly although he would probably have been more pungent. The Model has some good advice. I don't remember learning much from The New Projection Control, but the various editions of Lootens on Photographic Enlarging and Print Control along with books by Adams from Mortensen's era have some information that remains valid today.

Bill Burk · Aug 31, 2014

He goes against everything Ansel Adams taught. I am starting to see irreconcilable differences.

In four of these books, he says "expose for the light-area and develop for the shadows".

Alan Johnson · Aug 31, 2014

I have both Mortensen and Adams books on the negative.
Studio portraits and Landscapes were their respective specialities.
IDK if there was only one grade of paper available in their time, I think they were both concerned with fitting their range of tones to the paper.
Of course the method of doing this is different for portraits and landscapes, perhaps they strayed into each others territory.

mesantacruz · Aug 31, 2014

so lucky!!! i've looked for the model at garage sales, etc, never found it. i love the guy regardless of what others think.

removed account4 · Aug 31, 2014

be careful about admitting to owning these books bill...
there are some that take hating him and his techniques
and words and way of doing things to a new level ...

personally i think he was a genius, but you knew that already

cowanw · Aug 31, 2014

Bill Burk said:
He goes against everything Ansel Adams taught. I am starting to see irreconcilable differences.

In four of these books, he says "expose for the light-area and develop for the shadows".

At first glance, but then I realized that mostly what Mortensen was concerned with was a specific type of lighting that gave a 7 derivative negative, which was used in a portraiture setting. Even his outdoors was only shot when he could get the lighting he wanted, i.e.. low contrast, which he expanded with extended development. Doesn't that sound like a zoney.
In the face of only looking for one type of contrast and exposure are they really all that irreconcilable?
The unblinking eye article
http://unblinkingeye.com/Articles/Mortensen/mortensen.html

Mortensens method is one of slightly underexposing a subject with a very low brightness range and giving very full development to the resulting negative. According to Mortensen, his 7-D technique produces a superior negative because even with normal exposure and development (the number 5 negative) the high values are shoved over into the peak of the curve (the region of overexposure)

the 7-D procedure is in line with the sound pictorial practice of giving the fullest rendering to those parts of the picture that are most interesting. The greatest interest in a picture lies normally in the lighter areas of the principal subject.
This is the part I was interested in hearing what you think about after you are done the reading.
Cheers

Bill Burk · Aug 31, 2014

cowanw said:
This is the part I was interested in hearing what you think about after you are done the reading.
Cheers

It's turning my stomach, sorry. Underexposing a scene of short brightness range and developing to gamma infinity...

I can't get past the visceral reaction just yet. I can't read more than two pages without a severe thought.

I told you this would be fun. Haven't had this much excitement from a book in years.

aRolleiBrujo · Aug 31, 2014

An excellent find, speaking fondly of books, and reading in general of course. However, I searched the mentioned person, and his style is very intriguing. -americo

Update, Whoa! I, uh, didn't expect to see what I saw, yikes! I like monsters, and what not, but the rest are rather too risque for me! xD

cowanw · Aug 31, 2014

Bill Burk said:
It's turning my stomach, sorry. Underexposing a scene of short brightness range and developing to gamma infinity....

But isn't that exactly what you are suppose to do?

From

http://people.goshen.edu/~marvinpb/zone.html

ZONE SYSTEM SHOOTING AND PROCESSING

If the light is very flat, like a very overcast day, underexpose and overdevelop for better negs. Set the camera to 200 when you are using 100 speed film. This will expose the shadows okay if the lighting is very soft and gray. Process the film 20 percent longer to increase the density of the negatives in the highlight areas and improve the contrast range.

By exposing within two stops of the darkest shadow (zone system rule) there will always be some light to expose a bit near the front surface of the film's emulsion (film allows for this much latitude). In a low contrast scene this will leave the highlights somewhat underexposed, but even so, the developer will, if allowed to work long enough continue to work on the exposed particles until they darken the negative sufficiently. The shadow areas of the film do not continue to develop during these extended times because the effected particle are all near the surface and do not require any amount of time for the developer to soak down to them. This is why longer developing increases contrast.
or am I really out to lunch?

Bill Burk · Aug 31, 2014

cowanw,

Doing what Mortensen says is going to work. I can see where he is going with it, but tight control on exposure is required.

He had tight control of exposure, he adjusted his lights expertly.

With gamma infinity development, the high contrast will make highlight details better separated than normal, but also your results will be more sensitive to errors in (highlight) exposure placement.

So I think it's a plan that will lead to frustration more often than good photographs.

cowanw · Sep 1, 2014

Bill
Thanks for your thoughts. It made me laugh a little cause I thought that "a plan that will lead to frustration more often than good photographs" was a pretty good description of my experience with trying out the Zone system testing.
I had a second thought, but with no data whatsoever; did the materials of 1930 give different results as to what we might predict with today's films and yesterdays techniques.
Regards
Bill

RalphLambrecht · Sep 1, 2014

cowanw said:
I will be interested to read what your impressions of his exposure and developing suggestions are .

being comfortable and familiar with the Zone System, I see ortensen's take on film processing with great scepticismbuthis advise on composition and image design is solid and valuable.I'm a big fan of his images.however, I wouldn't hang any of them in my housejust like his approach to photographic art.

Bill Burk · Sep 1, 2014

RalphLambrecht said:
being comfortable and familiar with the Zone System, I see ortensen's take on film processing with great scepticismbuthis advise on composition and image design is solid and valuable.I'm a big fan of his images.however, I wouldn't hang any of them in my housejust like his approach to photographic art.

I feel exactly the same way. Setting aside his unconventional approach to sensitometry, there is good information.

He also has a wry sense of humor, the first 60 pages of Mortensen on the Negative is fun reading. He took two pages to explain why it is hard to choose a camera.

Alan Johnson · Sep 1, 2014

RalphLambrecht said:
being comfortable and familiar with the Zone System, I see ortensen's take on film processing with great scepticism

He appears to have conducted his debate with Adams without producing many landscapes to the formula he proposes in "Mortensen on the Negative"
p239 "One must pick a day on which the sun is veiled by light clouds........if the day is too gray there will not be enough direction to the light to produce crispness and modelling"
p272 "Development to gamma infinity (under conditions of correct lighting and exposure} secures the fullest possible separation of the latent half tone gradations in the light area....."
Is there a technical flaw in his method?

cowanw · Sep 1, 2014

Alan Johnson said:
He appears to have conducted his debate with Adams without producing many landscapes to the formula he proposes in "Mortensen on the Negative"
p239 "One must pick a day on which the sun is veiled by light clouds........if the day is too gray there will not be enough direction to the light to produce crispness and modelling"
p272 "Development to gamma infinity (under conditions of correct lighting and exposure} secures the fullest possible separation of the latent half tone gradations in the light area....."
Is there a technical flaw in his method?

I think that gets to the core of what I have been thinking. One could equally say that Adams did not bring a whole lot of portraiture to the debate.
One was speaking to the needs of photography in general and the other to the specifics of low contrast portraiture.
Was there a flaw.. yes, if one does not obey the lighting guidelines.
Perhaps their debate was more somewhat based on misunderstanding of what they were each actually talking about.

Bill Burk · Sep 1, 2014

Alan Johnson,

Mortensen chooses flat lighting, FIG. 109. A sample landscape p.214 is a good example. For this scene, slight underexposure and development to gamma infinity would technically work.

His logic regarding highlight detail being maximized at gamma infinity is technically reasonable too. Because the film is developed to high contrast, there will be separation of tones in the highlights, so long as you are careful not to overexpose.

Here is an experiment (in terms I am comfortable with) that you could perform with available materials to get a negative Mortensen would have liked:

Prerequisite: 3 stops subject brightness range (important shadow to important highlight). Studio lighting or if outdoors, choose subject accordingly by moving into shade, using reflector or fill flash or wait for clouds to give you this limited range.

Film: TMAX-100
Developer: D-76 straight
Time: 48 minutes
Temperature: 68-degrees F
Agitation: 5 seconds (3 inversions) every 30 seconds for first 12 minutes, then 5 seconds every minute thereafter.
Contrast Index (expected): 1.2
Exposure Index: 200
Metering: Place important highlight on Zone V, verify important shadow falls no lower than Zone II because any less will be totally black.

Alan Johnson · Sep 1, 2014

Bill,
It's a good experiment but to use the pure method of Mortensen on the Negative,with the correct lighting and gamma infinity development he advocated bracketing to get the exposure right.Borrowing from Adams zone system was not his thing.

Bill Burk · Sep 1, 2014

OK I understand the symbolic need to choose a neutral language for metering instructions.

This doesn't change anything except the wording.

Strike the "Metering" instructions and replace with:

Metering: Meter the important light area of your subject and use that reading.

Bill Burk · Sep 2, 2014

Alan Johnson said:
Bill,
It's a good experiment but to use the pure method of Mortensen on the Negative,with the correct lighting and gamma infinity development he advocated bracketing to get the exposure right.Borrowing from Adams zone system was not his thing.

Bracketing will help with this experiment.

He also advocated developing by inspection. So plan on that too.

cowanw · Sep 3, 2014

Bill Burk said:
He also advocated developing by inspection. So plan on that too.

You seem a bit biased: If you don't develop by inspection, how else are you going to know when to stop development. Developing to gamma infinity is such a highly variable end point.

Bill Burk · Sep 3, 2014

I can't deny being biased, but even though I don't believe in Mortensen's technique, I can imagine trying it out.

It would give me an excuse to use extreme development times I have worked out, and I have Infrared Viewers so I can develop by inspection too.

Developing to gamma infinity is actually pretty easy. In my family of curves for TMAX 100, I found relatively little gained contrast index going from 24 minutes (1.0 CI) to 36 minutes (1.1 CI) to 48 minutes (1.2 CI) in straight D-76 at 68-degrees F.

Developing by inspection you can plan on leaving film in for 48 minutes, but notice at 12 minutes that the negative looks pretty good (developed normally at that point) and you can stop whenever you want.

Alan Johnson · Sep 4, 2014

Attached-Bracketed Tri-X developed Xtol 1+0 2hrs.
The separation of the mid tones is much better at ISO 3200.
But Mortensen did not discuss the case where there is a big gap in brightness, eg, sky and land.

cowanw · Sep 4, 2014

I get the impression that Mortensen's technique is being looked at through the filter of the Zone System.
For example Bill writes for a 3 stop brightness range "Place important highlight on Zone V, verify important shadow falls no lower than Zone II because any less will be totally black. " which harkens to the Zone system interest in shadow details. But in a 3 stop brightness range there are no important shadows at all.

Adam notes "But Mortensen did not discuss the case where there is a big gap in brightness, eg, sky and land. "
Mortensen had no interest in sky and land nor landscape, only portraiture of limited tonal range expanded to separate higher tonal values, that is to say he only wanted to talk about N plus development. All other photographs taken with other exposure situations were not applicable.

Michael, as I read it, Mortensen's technique is precisely N plus development. Yet your zealous post suggests that the differences between results (Mortensen vs N plus expansion) should be grossly apparent in the prints. I am genuinely interested in understanding what it is that really different between the principles of Mortensen's 7D negative and Adams N plus development.

I am neither a Zonie or a Mortie, and will be easily overwhelmed if the discussion should turn technical,but to suggest that Mortensen's technique yields prints that look worse than similar short tonal range prints made with the Zone system, ignores the evidence of the eyes.

It is tempting to take Mortensen word for word, as we lack information on how to interpret some of what he said. For example" While Mortensen admits that his technique results in slightly less than normal exposure, he is adamant that this “does not mean underexposure” How do we decide what that means?

On the other hand, we have decades and thousands of photographer reinterpreting the Zone System and it is unlikely each and every poster here of this system is referring to the same thing.

The Devil came home with me today (several) Mortensen Books)

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