Ansel Adams

One of America’s famous photographers, Ansel Adams was best know for his black and white photos of the American West and Yosemite National Park. His photography is straight forward of nature in a crisp and realistic way. They portray the beauty and elegance of nature with an underlying motivation of persuading the people of America to value the land and to preserve the American wilderness. His first artistic career was as a pianist, but he than began experimenting in amateur photography. He became serious about photography in the 1920s with the dispute of photograph being more persuasive than a hand-drawn illustration. He had several technical accomplishments, one being the use of his own zone system. The zone system allows photographers to calculate and control the range of gray-scale tones in their negative by using a light meter.