A. T.

That's exactly what my plans are. I shoot predominantly digital color and I want to really get into black and white film and it just so happened that I found this amazing camera. And yes, I am currently reading "The Negative".

Robert Ley

An understanding of the zone system is useful knowledge to have, but unless you are going to develop your own film it is really not of a great value. The zone system as others have stated is a system to expose and develop B&W film so that ideally you can print your negative with a particular grade of paper.

To really enjoy your new Hasselblad you should learn how to develop your own film. It is not rocket science, I have been developing my own film since I was teenager and with a modest investment in basic darkroom equipment you can develop your own film and maintain control of your images. You needn't enlarge your images, scanning will work just fine.

mwsilvers Loc: Central New Jersey

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

The equipment needed to develop film will pay for itself rather quickly. It takes around 30 minutes, "dry to drying," depending on developer and other chemical requirements, plus an hour or so to set up and knock down. The stuff you need will fit into a small closet or cabinet.

For 120 film, many good scanners are available. Camera scanning can be even better, if you have that stuff I outlined, above.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

The "triangle" has been around, just not called "triangle".
In the past, they talked of SS and F-stop and which ASA*/ISO speed film to use in certain circumstances. Also, how to "push" film to a higher ASA/ISO or "pull" it as if it was a lower ASA/ISO.

https://thedarkroom.com/pushing-and-pulling-film/

I for one am grateful for digital=no chemicals, the fumes and my asthma did not play well together. Also, the year I taught basic photography at the High School level people knew I was teaching photography by the way my clothes smelled. Even a knee-length lab coat couldn't keep my cloths from smelling like the film and paper developer chemicals. And my hair. Leave work, get home, walk straight to shower and then put on clean clothes.

Timmers Loc: San Antonio Texas.

This triangle thing is an invention of the digital people, there never was and there truly is no need for a triangle, it is an invention of digital. I was a friend of Ansel Adams, I assure you, there was no 'triangle' in his time, if fact there is no need for a 'triangle' today, it only muddies your understanding of the relationship between the two major components of exposure, the time (shutter and the lens (diaphragm). In fact, before the adjustable aperture, there was a fixed opening called a water house stop and if exposure were a 'thing' back then, the only variable would be duration (shutter) which was how long the cover on the front of the lens was removed to allow light into the camera to expose the light sensitive material on the glass surface.

Historic point. When Kodak was beginning to make sense of 'exposure', the scientist/technicians who were experimenting with exposure had a basic camera body outfitted with a fixed diaphragm (opening for the lens and a fixed position for the length the lens to film plane. Exposure was made by varying duration (time). This of course was done at the sea coast (sea level being understood as one of the natural variables) and the other variable being that of time of year (seasons), summertime. This produced the famed Rule of 16,even though the tests were made with a relative f of 22 for the lens/camera. The purpose of this was to establish a reference exposure device so that Kodak Research Labs had an absolute device to establish the 'speed' of emulsions year round in a laboratory with reference to the sun and nature conditions. The use of foot candles is a grand reference for artificial conditions as indoors and by devices like a flash bulb or incandescent lamp, but natural conditions are a totally different beast.

This all leads one to get a heads up about exposure and the reality of the two systems of photography, the original being what we 'old school' boys call analogue and what has emerged as 'digital'. To understand this difference you need to understand certain basic realities of the analogue world of photography. So lets help you out with that. Fact one, the STANDARD exposure for analogue materials is 1/50 second. This has to do with the morass of what has to do with reciprocity factors in exposure. It means at room temperature (68F) the exposure should be at 1/50 second. When you vary to far in either direction, then you will have a change in the relative sensitivity of your emulsion ( for more detail on this effect look to Schwarzschild Effect and Reverse Schwarzschild Effect).

Of curse there is no need to compensate for Schwarzschild Effect if you can super cool your emulsion to near absolute zero. What! Just understand that any and all emulsions have a what is referred to as a reciprocity factor, and for most films in the world of photography that was established as a STANDARD by Kodak at 1/50 second duration at the STANDARD of Room Temperature (68F).

The second one is a real curve ball, ready. Because people want great looking snap shots and you the maker of prints and thus film and you want them people to use your product (film and paper/service) it is better to work from an over exposed film image that an under exposed film frame. So THE universal practice of under rating your film by one full stop was adopted as standard practice by ALL film makers! TRUTH, all B&W films and most if not all color print films are UNDER RATED by ONE FULL stop! Kodak Tri-X is NOT ISO 400,it is really EI 800. Please note the coding, ISO is the marketed speed of Tri-X from Kodak as ISO 400, under strict testing Tri-X film from Kodak tests out as EI (Exposure Index) of 800 by most tests. Now of course there are variables and that is why one runs tests on the system. That system is YOU, your intended camera, lens, film processing, even printing(our darkroom.

This is why you are in fact been 'sold a pig in a Polk' sort to say.

Read Ansel's Zone System. Learn it. It is a syntax for photography, and that is all it is. It i vary necessary, in fact it is critical to YOU as a visual understanding for learning photography. If Ansel Adams was talking to you he would tell you this. You MUST learn the syntax of photography, it is the language of photography. There are a lot of people on the HOG who are quite literally Photographically Illiterate. Not because they don't know Zone System, but Zone System can help you and they to be come literate in the seeing of photography. Reread Adams book, he harps on and on about visualizing. He is visually literate, yes. That is why the Zone System was developed, it is a why to become photographically literate.

Are people becoming more photographically literate? The answer is YES. How do I know this? I began noticing about two years ago and this past 6 months there has been an explosion of this phenomena. People are choosing to drive a cars that are 18 percent gray. Yep, Zone 5, it is the mid point on the photographic scale. Oddly enough it is the mid point that a photograph should be surrounded with. Wonder why I said tat most HOGs are not photographic literate, why YOU are probably not photographically literate? Your screen on your computer NEEDS to have it's background default zone at a neutral 18% gray. So why is the screen that you and I are looking at that moment is surrounding this communication displayed by a slightly lighter that 18% in GREEN? Yes, you guest it, it is wrong.

When you work in Photoshop the screen needs to be 18% gray. At the Sunset Center for the first exhibition of photographic prints, Ansel saw that the walls were painted neutral gray, 18% gray.

It is an entire way of 'seeing' a way of thinking. It is cultural and it is intellectual. It appears that this seems odd to many, even that it is a bit over the top to make such a statement. Here is a heads up. What would you or anyone you knew thinks of a major museum tat presented the work of their collection or a group of artists all shoved together and covering every square inch of the showing spaces walls from a few inches above the floor and to the vary top of the wall in say a few inches from the top of the wall close to the ceiling? Laughable would be a normal response. Poor expatiation practice you would say? That was exactly how all art work were done in the past. How did it charge photographer was asked by his fellows (The English Linked Ring of Great Britain) to mount the yearly show of work. That was Frederick H. Evans of The Linked Ring and he agreed but had a restriction. He and hia associates would mount the show, but he would select the show and he would do it without any interference and he would do it in the manner he knew it was best. The leadership agreed. The show opened just how he had created it. What did it look like? Walk into any 'modern' museum or Gallery of today and you will see precisely how Frederick H. Evans mounted that show back in that century. Every museum in the entire world of any note changed the way that art was exhibited with in two years.

Our culture is changed by our actions. Ideas that are critical are always embraced when the stakes are at their height. Think about that question that is asked over and over of children and sometimes in our adult lives, "What single event, invention or tool has altered the human race?" Just over 150 years ago there was something that changed the entire human race, it was photography. To be illiterate of photography is more a disaster for a modern human being tan being illiterate of the written word.

Now for a little political message. I absolutely love our system of government here in the United States of America, I would never change a single thing. Proof positive that the people are in control of this great nation and the proof to all other nations of the world that we have the best government is found that we have idiots running our government. The proof is the idiots sent a man into space and not one of all the idiots thought to give that man a camera. He did not have a camera, until his wife asked him to take a picture of the Earth so she could see what the Earth looked like from outer space. The world of Human Beings got a photograph of our planet because a house wife had her husband take a snap shot of the earth from outer space with the family point and shoot camera and friends, it was NOT a Kodak camera nor on Kodak film (GAF film, Kodak competition). That is what is right about America and it is not the idiots running the place.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_H._Evans

User ID

Theres PR and theres photography. The overlap between the two enhances the advertising rate for this forum.

User ID

Noticing the ABSURD length of this post, I went to a movie instead ;-)

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

"Out of tune and bad action" You are describing my old upright piano. I have been playing keyboard instruments since I was 8 years old. Lessons were not my idea but it turned out to be my favorite hobby. Well,I do have that old crate tuned every now and again and it sounds halfway decent.

So...I occasionally stop in at the local Steinway dealer and sit down at the Model D concert grand that is on the showroom floor. The action is phenomenal and the tone is magnificent- it's inspiring! My performance? Not so much!

If I ever win the Lottery, I'll buy a Steinway and go between $70,000 and #150,000- a bit less than a Hasselblad!

E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada

If you do not inted to process film, you will not be able to employ the Zone Syste in its traditional form as written in Adam's literature.

I understand that some folks considered the Zone System a way of life, perhaps a religion, cult, or something similarly extreme That is not my philosophy!

When I signed up for the workshop, studied the books, and applied the methodology, my goal was not to dedicate my life to the process. I wanted to gain more control over my medium and apply certain aspects of the system to my commercial work.

As for Hasselbalds- the vario C- models are no precious jewels to be kept in a padded showcase- they are workhorse cameras. The Zeiss lenses, both vintage and modern are excellent. I have used the system from 1970 right up to the time I transitiond to digital.

srt101fan

I admit to ignorance of "advanced" cameras. Please enlighten me on how these cameras changed ISO values without changing the film. Or was that a bit of sarcasm that just went over my head?

Ahh, the Triangle thing.... How could such a simple mnemonic device create so much hate, discontent and gastrointestinal disorders among grown men! (Women are probably much more tolerant of such things)

MJPerini

I remember when I first got the Hasselblad system, I had been using Nikons & View cameras before that so I was used to good lenses, but I distinctly remember putting Hasselblad negatives in the enlarger and the bigger I printed, the more detail came out. ..... I also really loved the square.
It was also pointed out above that you do need to do your own development so that you can do plus and minus development (which is true) In practice that hasselblad makes that MUCH easier because you can load 3 magazines with TriX and mark them for development Minus, normal, Plus.
You also have to do lots of testing to determine the normal film speed of your system and how much development equals N-1 or N-2 NN, N+1 etc. Ansel mostly standardized on TriX and HC110 in his roll film days . Things like the Ph of your water can affect development.
but do have fun with it.
I will leave you with a quote from a very fine photographer whose name escapes me for the moment... He said "Digital photography is the full flowering of Color Photography, B&W was already perfect with film"
There is a lot to that, Ctein -recognized as one of the true masters of Color DYE Transfer printing gave it up because he could exceed his best results with Digital capture and an Epson pigment ink jet printer.
This is not to say that you can't make excellent B&W prints with Digital, you can but you can't really surpass the best conventional or Platinum prints. ( but you can make very good BB&W prints EASIER with digital)
Good Luck enjoy the journey

Retired CPO Loc: Travel full time in an RV

HA!!! Have you ever known any Women!!!???

A. T.

Okay, thanks for the information. I'll have to look into that to see what is needed. The investment is not the issue, it's the space needed for the development.

srt101fan

Maybe I haven't paid enough attention? 🤔