# The Zone System for Digital



## gavinseim (Nov 15, 2011)

I just thought I would post as I've been working a lot on exposure and zones in the past year. The key part of the Zone system (the Zones themselves) are incredibly powerful and apply fully to digital. Once I really started applying it in my work, I was amazed that this beautiful approach is not the standard for exposure.

Anyways I did an in depth of it on my journal, looking at examples and what it gives us in practice. Once you really start visualizing and using the Zone system, you never see light the same way again. 

Pardon my enthusasm, but it's an amazing feeling to really know what you're going to get before you click the shutter... http://f164.com/the-zone-system-for-digital/10/2011



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## StenSture (Mar 15, 2012)

Now, that was one good idea. I used Zones back in the day, but I never thought of it in my digital work (my rather poor excuse is being quite the beginner at this digital stuff.) Thank you Gavinseim, for this tip!
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## RikkFlohr (Mar 15, 2012)

I think the reason it is not standard is because of the non-linear way data is stored by Stops in a digital capture. When was the last time an expert espoused Zones vs ETTR (Expose to the Right)? Just one man's opinion...


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## Sean Needham (Mar 19, 2012)

I enjoyed the article, and in quite a lot of things what I do, I still use a form of this method if the image gives me time to take it as such!

I don't think it's a dead technique, just one that's fallen by the wayside a little what with the way that a lot of 'information' has become 'easier' to target a wider denomination of audience group.


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## OldFrank (Mar 22, 2012)

I used the Zone System back in the darkroom (smell like a pickle factory) days with 35mm BW films. I recently started playing around with it in LR, PS for BW work. One thing we have now that wasn't easily available in the old days is the ease of assigning RGB numbers to the zones. I did have an exposure meter for the enlarger, but that was only useful after raw processing (chemicals).


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## keithz829 (Apr 20, 2012)

The Nik Silver Efex Pro 2 plugin is very helpful for seeing what zone a particular tone is in, and you can see graphical evidence when adjustments are made.


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