In 1973 or so, I saw an Ansel Adams photography exhibit at the Ft. Lauderdale Fine Arts Center. What I was doing there escapes me now. They didn't serve cold beer and there weren't any spring breaker bikini-types around. Maybe I just needed to use the restroom?? I had never heard of Ansel Adams at that point but my walk though his photo exhibit really impacted me. I had never seen such amazing print quality or exact exposures. The images were singular and very much matched my pathetic sketches in my long ago lost dream book. Back then there was no Googles so I went to the library and tried to find out all I could about Ansel Adams. I found out very little about him because back then he was not famous, not rich, and scrambling to make a living shooting commercial stuff, as well as making amazing fine art photographs. I left the library and went straight to my little apartment and took out my several notebook files of negatives and stacks of 8 x 10 prints and destroyed all of it. I learned from the library that Ansel invented and used something called the Zone System and had several books available on his system. I was determined to somehow get the books (no amazon or kindle back then), study them, and start all over again making fine photographs.
(to be continued)
Ansel Adam's car with his vanity plate ZONE V
©bobpolli
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