Zone System film development

Shaps said:

A lot of good information here. But I did not see this point: the whole reason for using a zone system is to get a good print on the first exposure in the darkroom. But the first step in developing a zone system for yourself is to determine the density range your enlarhing paper has with a particular developer and time. You then test and test until you figure out what your expsure and development times are with a given film/developer settings to get a N expsure. Then you continue testing for N+1, N+2, etc etc.
Of course after all this testing you may still have to dodge or burn some areas until you get a print you are satisfied with.

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You're right that Zone System is a tone reproduction system intended to fit subject luminance range through film characteristics to paper characteristics, hopefully to arrive at a full scale print.

And Paul Howell is also right that departure from normal is encouraged and taught.

Thinking about it, AA trained to be concert pianist, although he read music as a pianist he was taught to bring his own style and interpretation to each work. Phil Davis taught drawing at Michigan State school of architecture. He taught future architects how to draw a realistic rendering of an existing building or how a building will look after completion. It might be a bit simplistic but Phil Davis played the score as it was written, while AA the score was just a starting point. Although I took the Minor White Zone System class in the 60s as an Air Force photographer then later working for the wires, I played the score, little room for impervious. When shooting LF sheet film I only use the ZS about, maybe 40% of the time.

MattKing said:

Actually, if anyone takes to heart the "visualization" emphasis part of the Zone System, then they are well ahead of the game.

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Honestly I think Ansel's three-book series transpires this spirit better than his ancestors which often elaborate a lot on the technical part. The chapter about roll-film development in "The Negative" was an eye-opener in this regard: Develope for proper medium contrast and do the rest with paper-grades in the darkroom. The long linear upper-curve of modern emulsions helps a lot with this. Low-contrast scenes still benefit quite a bit from N+ if you dedicate a whole roll to them or carry a seperate rollfilm-back.

Minor White and Phil Davis' (Beyond The Zone System) were of the opinion that the ZS and BTZS were not suitable for roll film. In the 90s Carson Graves wrote The Zone System for 35mm Photographers which does a good job of adapting visualization and adjusting development time to achieve the visualized scene. The downside is that the photographer has to pick the one frame that she/he is going to develop for. The other option to expose each frame for Zone III then develop for Zone VII and use VC paper to finalize the tones.

To me the main value of the system is the intellectual connection between the adjustments on the camera and the densitometry of the negative. Once understood you can make educated decisions about the translation of brightness into density. The magic of film becomes a controlled process accessible to the educated mind. The adjustment in development is just one more step on that path.

If visualization is not important to you and you shoot sheet film, and you want a technical approach that takes into account the E.I of your film and developer, filter used, and the scene brightness range, BTZS may be just the ticket.

I agree. But this isn't to say Phil Davis' book isnt't a worthwile read. During my ten year time off from exposing film I got rid of most gear but not the literature (knowledge is more important than gear) but his book is now on the table in my house and I'm scrolling through it together with many other publications and sure @RalphLambrecht 's excellent book is also among them!.

A Phil Davis book I like is called "Photography" and is a course textbook, covering "everything".

I'll need to find a copy.