Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/12/26

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Subject: Re: [Leica] zones
From: Martin Howard <howard.390@osu.edu>
Date: Sun, 26 Dec 1999 19:35:54 -0500

Rod Fleming wrote:
>  
> It's funny that so far no-one has mentioned what all of this is actually
> about- and that is one of the great axioms of photography-
> 
> Expose For The Shadows And Develop For The Highlights
> 
> That's all any zone system, Ansel's or Jim's, is teaching you to do.
>

Well, almost.  As I understand it, the "expose for the shadows and develop
for the highlights" rule of photography is really just a convenient
mnemonic for what is the real truth:  Exposure controls negative density;
Development controls negative contrast.

"Playing around" with these two and matching them to a known paper to
reproduce the subject brightness in the scene is what it's all about.

Right?

M.

- -- 
Martin Howard                     | 
Visiting Scholar, CSEL, OSU       |    What boots up must come down.
email: howard.390@osu.edu         | 
www: http://mvhoward.i.am/        +---------------------------------------