Asa T. Newhall

Transcription

[MUSIC PLAYING] Techniques are simply a means of bringing about in the print the image as visualized by the artist before he operates his shutter. The justification for technique is being able to do what you want to do when you want to do it. [NARRATOR] Zeiss, the Tessar, the Triplet, Protar, Ektar, Xenar, the Componon, the Ektanon, the Cooke, C5, K2, X1, G, A, the long, the wide, the normal. [ADAMS] After we have composed our image on the ground glass, we, of course, think of the tonal values of the print. And that means that we have to evaluate the brightnesses of the subject. We do this by the use of exposure meters. We can take average readings or instant light readings. Or best of all, we can take photometric readings of small areas of the subject. [NARRATOR] SEI, ASA, F-stop, T-stop, reflectance, incidence, brightness, intensity, strobe, wink, flash, bounce, natural. [ADAMS] Darkest shadow-- 8 candles per square foot. Light on wet sand-- 2,000 candles per square foot. Place shadow on zone I. High value, will fall on zone IX. Normal minus development indicated. I keep a record of everything-- film, lens, filter, lens extension, lens aperture, shutter setting, above all, where I've placed important values on the exposure scale and what development I will use to retain them in the negative. The negative looks adequately sharp all over. Shadow density is exactly on the right zone. A little camera flare helped the shadow density as expected. Dust brushed off the negative, here it goes for a test exposure. One, two, three, four, five, six-- the image is coming up quite well balanced. Here's the final print. The shadows come through as expected, and the high values are OK. There is nothing mysterious about technique. It's really nothing in itself except as a means to an end.