How many zones is your standard

[robc]

I'm wondering how many zones people use for their standard processing. That is: when you do your film speed and dev time tests, do you use a ten zone system, a nine zone system, an eight zone system or some other number. For clarity, by ten zone system, I mean where zone X would be paper base white when printed. A nine zone system would make zone IX paper base white when printed etc.

Currently I use a ten zone system but have often thought that is too many so I thought I'd start a little poll on this just to see what others are doing. I realise that each persons choice will be determined by the type of subjects they photograph as a norm and the lighting conditions they favour but never the less it may be interesting to see the results of the poll.

Thanks.

[lee\c]

I use zone 0 as max black and zone IX as paper base white.

lee\c

[Ralph Barker]

IIRC, Zone IX, by definition is white with no detail.

[Brian Ellis]

You can of course use any number of zones you like, 5, 8, 13, whatever. However, using the 10 zone system that Archer and Adams used allows a one stop exposure change to correspond to a one zone change, which to me keeps things nice and simple. In that system Zone X is paper white if by "paper white" you mean a white that shows no substance or texture (to use Adams' terms).

[robc]

IIRC, Zone IX, by definition is white with no detail.

I beleive that AA changed his zone system to use zones 0 thru X, making zone X paper base white. Earlier writings used a shorter range of zones, 8 or 9. Possibly this was done for simplicity of teaching so that one zone was one stop of exposure. The last version of "The Negative" uses zones 0 thru X.

But if you are always using N+ development then it makes sense to use zone IX or zone IIX as your norm for paper base white.

[Capocheny]

I use zone 0 as max black and zone IX as paper base white.

lee\c

Likewise!

Cheers

[Mike H.]

I use IX for pure white in most cases: 0 I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX. That gives me 10 zones for personal work.

IF, I need to demonstrate the zone system with a "middle gray" as Zone V, then I use X for pure white, and that gives me 11 zones with V in the middle. 0 I II III IV V VI VII VIII IX X.

Make sense?

[robc]

not many votes...

I wonder what kind of light conditions warrant standardising on zone XII.

[phil sweeney]

I understand the definition of the zone system starts with defining the zones on paper. However, we use zones for the subject brightness range (SBRs) measured for exposure. Since I know my negative will fit my paper I only think of zones in terms of SBRs and the negative. So following the concepts in BTZS my standard zones are I through VIII as final negative densities. Zones (for me) are more about the language of exposure (like math is the language of physics), than zones as visualized on paper. Its funny that folks have different views on the zone system, yet rarely do people use the term scale discussing film. AA did. Once we know the scale of the film (i.e., the density range that fits onto our paper), out next job is to capture SBRs and develop to fit that scale. That is the zone system to me. Because of my view I could not vote in the poll.

[Ralph W. Lambrecht]

AA's system goes from Zone 0 to X, for paper balck to paper white. Zone IX, however, is so close to paper white that there is little, if any, difference.