Ansel Adams: Technique & Working Methods Video Lecture - Photography

- [Voiceover] Techniques is 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.
- [Voiceover] Rice, the
Tessar, the Triplet,
Protar, Ektar, Ekstar,
the Confidant, the Ektonon, the Cooke,
C5, K2, X1, G, A,
the long, the wide, the normal.
- [Voiceover] After we
have composed our image
on the ground glass, we, of course,
think of the total 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.
- [Voiceover] SEI, ASA, f-stop, t-stop,
reflectance, incidence,
brightness, intensities,
strobe, wink, flash, bounce, natural.
- [Voiceover] Darkest shadow,
eight candles per square foot.
Light on wet sand, two thousand
candles per square foot.
Place shadow on zone one,
high value will fall on zone nine.
Normal minus development indicated.
(flute music)
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 attain them in the negative.
The negative looks
adequately sharp all over.
Shadow densities exactly
on the right zones.
A little camera flare helped
the shadow density as expected.
Dust brushed off the negative.
Here goes POI test exposure.
One, two, three,
four, five, six.
The image is coming up
quite well-balanced.
Here's the final print.
Shadows come through as expected
and the high values are okay.
- [Voiceover] There is nothing
mysterious about technique.
It's surely nothing in itself
except as a means to an end.