Ansel Adams’ greatness wasn’t shooting. It was printmaking. He invented a system for getting the maximum tonal range in a print. In fact he spent so much time printmaking that he would sometimes reshoot a print (take a picture of a picture) to save that negative as the canonical one to make additional prints from, because it would be impossible to replicate all the dodging and burning that he did to make that perfect print. Having done a little darkroom work myself, I can’t even begin to guess how much time he spent in the darkroom.

Aside from that, I don’t know why so many people on this site seem to hold Adams up as the world’s greatest photographer. His work was great for its time, but if someone was shooting the same things today it would most likely be lost in the deluge of boring postcard landscapes. Contemporary photographers that are great shoot a ton. Watch an in-the-field video with Martin Parr. Someone like that comes home with hundreds or maybe over a thousand frames from an afternoon at the fair.

Say what you want about Ansel Adams but he certainly was more accomplished than a two time state champ in track