Zone System practicality with roll film?

When I took a class on zone system in college, the one Greg was talking about, we would all shoot fom hand wound film, that came from the same canister. Each roll would only have 12 or so exposures on it. We would then shoot gray cards to determine what our true ISO was. We were shooting ISO 400 film, but some cameras the true ISO would be 800, others as high as 1600. Mine was right on 400. Then we would develop to see what gave us a maximum black and a shade just above white. We would then calculate this as being our development time. Mine was as follows. 68 degree water. I think I was using microdol, may have been t-max (it was a liquid syrupy). 9mins, 30secs agitating 10seconds for every minute. This would give me very impressive negatives with every zone accounted for as long as every zone was in the photo which generally was the case.

Probably didn't make any sense, took me forever to grasp it, but I'm glad I did.

Z

Thanks for posting Zack. Are you saying that I should fire a test roll with my Bessa R and adjust my developing time to fit my camera and what kind of lighting conditions did you test under?

Hi Z :) I wish there was a class around here I could take on it. I mean, I understand the basic concept of it but, I'm not quite grasping the full application of it :confused: Okay, it's time to finally sit down and read "The Negative" :o

I remember the developer it was HC-110 in a 1:64 dilution. If you are buying film over the counter then things can get a little tricky, but if you are hind winding your film then you have a little more precision. If it was a contrasty day then I would decrease my development by 25%, if it was a dull day then I would increase my development by 25%. You are developing for the shadows and exposing for highlights. I would usually shoot a grey card at the beginning of a roll so I knew what my zone 9 was. My zone 9 was a little darker than the white paper. My zone 1 was a little lighter than pitch black. It takes a lot of testing, but it taught me what my photo was going to look like before I ever took the photo. It also kept me from using enlarger filters, because they simply weren't needed anymore.

Z

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Originally Posted by zrfraser

I remember the developer it was HC-110 in a 1:64 dilution...

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Coincidentally what I'm using right now :)

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Originally Posted by zrfraser

...You are developing for the shadows and exposing for highlights...

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I thought it was the other way around, "Expose for the shadows, develop for the highlights" :confused:

you are right....it was late....just got done with long paper...need more sleep in my diet.

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Originally Posted by zrfraser

...need more sleep in my diet.

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I know exactly how you feel :cryin:

I've been following this thread with Great Interest. It had never occurred to me that different cameras may expose the film diffrerently - but that's really going to be due to the optical properties of the lens, right?

I've also always wondered how accurate the shutter speeds are from one camera to another. Is 1/500th of a second on my Nikon FM really the same length of exposure as on my Mamiya? There's got to be a margin of error there...

There are a lot of variables to consider, not only optics and shutter speeds but also your film developing and even more so print developing. Individually each step may only be off a hair but, in the end all those hairs add up. I found an interesting article if you're interested:

http://www.edbuziak.workzsites.com/p...stem_2_p1.html

Tons of things matter. When I was Zone testing my camera for the first 6 weeks or so all we shot were grey cards and test charts. The meter has a lot to do with the headache. Meters on different cameras meter differently. My Maxxum 70 will meter differently than your F100, or AE-1. The trick is to find what your camera meters at. My camera metered ISO 400 on Tri-x, and Neopan 400. Other students cameras would meter at 320, some 200, others as high as 800. Of course we were looking for optimal print value or a print with all zones incorporated.

Quite interesting really, something I would reccommend for everyone.

Z

While I can't do full testing as I don't have the ability to make prints as of yet, I have a couple bricks of Acros on the way and some gray cards. Going to try and get my meter dialed in with my Rolleicord. I know the speeds have got to be a tad off. Will be interesting to see how the speed testing turns out.

Most of the variation from camera to camera is in the meter. Shutter speeds can be off, but that usually just means the camera needs a good CLA. This is why it's helpful to use a hand held spot meter if you're doing zone system. You can use the same meter with each camera and get the same results. I don't think there will be significant variation in the f-stops from one lens to another. That's not something that will go out of calibration unless the lens has serious problems, like gummed up aperture blades.

Remember that large format lenses have the shutter built-in. From an exposure stand point, each lens is a different camera.

buy a bulk loader and make some cannisters of 12 exposure, this might make using the zone system more economically viable

I agree with skyman. When I was doing testing we only shot on 10-12 frame rolls of tri-x, if not then you are going to have a lot of wasted film