Shadows and light
Years of experience; that’s what I have to offer the community.
This afternoon, on one of my hunting trips to find milk. I had to react to the strong shadows around me. Heavy clouds, with sunshine. Squinting, during the minutes of travel. And when the storekeeper asked what was new, I had to tell him about something from an earlier era.
Specifically (speaking as one photographer to another), I began to reminisce about the Zone System. He was too young to have ever heard of such a thing, so I tried to break it down into essentials: shadows and light. That which inspired the great works from the masters (think Ansel Adams, although I’m certain that Da Vinci had some experience).
I hadn’t mastered the system; my dreams of owning a view camera were thwarted by my limited budget, but I did read and imagine. So, as a mentor I did the next best thing: I sent along a link to the related Wiki page. Go ahead. Smirk. Few among us have the time to read a full book on something that might be of passing interest. I did mention that the fundamentals of the System (shadows and light, remember) were still important in the present, digital age. Not everything can be fixed in post-process.
And now I have an urge to return to my roots. No, not with a developing tank and a few rolls of Tri-X, but at least to move beyond the “point and shoot” model that has taken over our world. We still need those deep black and white images of yesteryear.
