Boy, did I get Anthony fired up!
The source of my information has been both in involvement and other
sources.
For the involvement and the 256:1 lighting comes from shooting in a
indoor basketball arena. The Salt Palace in Salt Lake City, Utah. The floor
(secondary source of illumination) was hardwood decking. However, the
"paint" area was either dark blue or red. The goal was to be able to print
the players (both black and white) such that the shadow areas on the black
payers did not become a black hole. In addition, I did not want the white
shoulder straps to wash out. Of course the primary light source was from the
ceiling high intensity lamps.
When I started shooting for the Utah Stars, my negatives were very
ordinary and almost unprintable on even #1 paper including pulling the
print. At that point, I made measurements with my analogue Pentax spotmeter
and measurements off a grey card to measure the intensity of the light
sources (primary and secondary).
The negative quality I demanded was a negative where the base would
"just" print black and the highlights would gently start to wash out on the
toe portion of the paper's curve. The paper at that time was Kodak's
Kodabromide. This paper has been discontinued probably longer that most of
the readers have been involved in photography.
Now for the hard sources. The Ansel Adams series of books served be well
in the sixties and was my introduction into black and white photography. At
that time I mastered 35mm Spotmatics, 6X9 Horseman 970 and 4X5 an old wood
field. My favourite emulsions were Panatomic X and Tri-X for 35, Plus X or
Verichrome Pan for the 6X9 and Tri-X professional for 4X5. Each format and
emulsion
was different and required full understanding prior to really using.
All the films were tested with the idea that I would use only one or two
developers. The most used was D76 diluted 1:1 except for the basketball. I
need speed, sharpness and contrast control. 3.5 minutes is a very short
processing time, but I adapted my methods to allow precise timing. The
biggest improvement was ditching the Honeywell stainless steel tanks and
reels for the Paterson. The Paterson allowed me to pour in and dump the
developer in less that 2 seconds. In the case of dumping, it was followed by
1 rinse in tempered water and the Kodak non-hardening rapid fixer was added
and constantly agitated for the 1st 15 seconds.
The second source, although a little esoteric, is Phil Davis's "Beyond
the Zone system". The book is indispensable when it come to understanding
light measurements.
Regards,
Bob Rapp
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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