Ansel Adams was born in 1902 and died in 1984, he was a famous photographer, he was famous for his black-and-white landscape photos. He mastered lighting techniques and perfected exposure.
Ansel was born in San Francisco, California, in 1902, but he spent a lot of his time in Yosemite National Park, which deeply influenced his photography and love for nature, Yosemite national park was one of his driving factors to wanting to become a photographer.
California’s “Yosemite National Park”
The Zone Chart
Ansel created a chart called “the zone chart” it is used to help control exposure and also contrast, photographers even nowadays still use it to help visualize and adjust exposure to get the right details in the highlights and shadows.
The system has 11 segments with 0 being the darkest and 10 (X) being the brightest.
Here is an example of the zone system being used.
All of Ansel Adams photos are taken in black and white, this means that you can apply the zone system to all of his photos, here a few of his famous photos.
Aspens 1958 analysis