Zone System

A Simplified Zone System
By:Norman KorenThis tutorial on the Zone System, written by Norman Koren, will be of primarily interest to newcomers to photography who use negative film‚ either colour or B&W. Even experienced transparency users will find it of interest as a review of an often misunderstood topic.‚ Michael Reichmann
Why Negatives?
Most professionals work with color slides instead of negatives because clients demand them. Why? WYSIWYG! What you see is what you get; it's easy to judge the quality of slides, and when they're good, they're really beautiful. It's difficult to judge anything from a negative, and prints from camera or drug stores rarely do justice to the information on negatives.
Why then would a serious photographer choose to work with negatives? Because negatives can capture a much larger exposure range than slides. (SeeWhat exposure range can film capture?, below.) You can make excellent images in difficult lighting that would defeat slide film. Modern ne...