Zone System Is Dead.

[Aswald]

This is a very interesting article. In a lot of ways, I am experiencing the same. With film especially.

 

"The biggest misconception resulting from the zone system is the suggested correlation between tonal values in a scene and tonal values in your print or scan".

 

http://www.johnnypatience.com/the-zone-system-is-dead/

[flysurfer]

Yep, and at least here in Germany, this ain't new at all. I have been reading this for many years: Expose film for the shadows, expose digital for the highlights.

[Tom H.]

Yep, and at least here in Germany, this ain't new at all. I have been reading this for many years: Expose film for the shadows, expose digital for the highlights.

If you're good at the zone system, I'm sure you can do great things with it. But for 95% of the people, the rule above is more than enough for film and digital.

 

I generally shoot all my film at 2/3 of a stop overexposed and metered for the shadows, and will push another stop in development if I'm not sure I gave it plenty of light. Exposing 2 or 3 stops over with film is no big deal...

[Aswald]

It's interesting that even with digital, the ETTR (expose to the right) technique works. That's not to say that we can clip the highlights, as many have misunderstood.

[flysurfer]

It's interesting that even with digital, the ETTR (expose to the right) technique works. That's not to say that we can clip the highlights, as many have misunderstood.

 

 

Indeed, it's a common misconception, since you expose critical highlights to the right, which often results in an underexposure of the overall image (which is rectified during RAW conversion). That's how the DR function works, and it's how photographers with ISOless cameras work to maximize dynamic range. Nikon even has an ETTR exposure metering mode (highlight priority) in some of their ISOless DSLRs. It's something that I also want Fujifilm to offer in future models, so I discussed it with the product planner of the X-T and GFX series.

Edited October 16, 2016 by flysurfer

[MSW]

Indeed, it's a common misconception, since you expose critical highlights to the right, which often results in an underexposure of the overall image (which is rectified during RAW conversion). That's how the DR function works, and it's how photographers with ISOless cameras work to maximize dynamic range. Nikon even has an ETTR exposure metering mode (highlight priority) in some of their ISOless DSLRs. It's something that I also want Fujifilm to offer in future models, so I discussed it with the product planner of the X-T and GFX series.

And while they are at it please make a menu option to base the viewfinder histogram on raw values rather than jpeg.  This is because there is some ability to EBTR (expose beyond the right) if you are going to post process a raw file -- but it is pretty much hit and miss guess how far beyond the right you can get away with

[flysurfer]

And while they are at it please make a menu option to base the viewfinder histogram on raw values rather than jpeg.

 

 

Sure.

 

it it is pretty much hit and miss guess how far beyond the right you can get away with

 

 

Not really. I know my sensor and my RAW converter, so it isn't much of a problem for experienced users. 

 

RAW histograms are nice, but they still wouldn't show what your RAW converter can recover. RGB histograms are more important. Hopefully, we will get those in the GFX (I was told that it will happen).