Sunny 16?

Cason

There is a well known children's photographer I'm sure everybody has heard of. I was looking at her photos and reading the EXIF on some of the photos. I'm puzzled on how she got the shot.

If you have opanda installed with FireFox then you will be able to read the EXIF if you right click a picture.

I won't post her pictures since they are not mine; however, go to http://www.alwblog.typepad.com/page/2/

The 5th picture from the bottom is of a boy and girl. The EXIF reads:

Shutter:1\1250
F-stop 1.8
ISO: 400

The time she took the picture was around noon. I'm guessing it was over cast. I broke out my Sunny 16 guide and do not see how it is possible to get the shot. With her ISO and Fstop set, the shutter should between 1\32000 and 1\64000. Her Nikon D200 must be tricked out to get that fast shutter time.

I tried to take a photo and it was blown out. I tried to recover in Photoshop and I could not figure it out.

Any ideas?

Blackwood

ND filter?

mr peas

Most likely its because she processed the image from RAW, pushing and pulling the image to her liking.

Very beautiful images, bookmarked!

jfriend

RTP wrote:

There is a well known children's photographer I'm sure everybody has heard of. I was looking at her photos and reading the EXIF on some of the photos. I'm puzzled on how she got the shot.

If you have opanda installed with FireFox then you will be able to read the EXIF if you right click a picture.

I won't post her pictures since they are not mine; however, go to http://www.alwblog.typepad.com/page/2/

The 5th picture from the bottom is of a boy and girl. The EXIF reads:

Shutter:1\1250
F-stop 1.8
ISO: 400

The time she took the picture was around noon. I'm guessing it was over cast. I broke out my Sunny 16 guide and do not see how it is possible to get the shot. With her ISO and Fstop set, the shutter should between 1\32000 and 1\64000. Her Nikon D200 must be tricked out to get that fast shutter time.

I tried to take a photo and it was blown out. I tried to recover in Photoshop and I could not figure it out.

Any ideas?

The kids are not in the sun, they are in the shade. The sunny 16 rule only applies in direct sun which is many stops brighter than full shade.

SloYerRoll

jfriend wrote:

The kids are not in the sun, they are in the shade. The sunny 16 rule only applies in direct sun which is many stops brighter than full shade.

You can tell this from lack of hard shadows.

pathfinder

Sunny 16 says that a sunlit exposure for ISO 400, is f 2.0 at 1/32,000TH of sec from my post here

Shade would require three more stops or 1/4,000th of a sec, which is getting within two stops of the stated f1.8 at 1,1250th.

Polarizing filter might account for 1.5 stops or so? ND filter? But why shot at ISO 400 with an ND, just drop the ISO to 100.

I agree that the background does look sunlit, but there are certainly no shadows on the kids that I notice.

Perhaps there is a scrim overhead to account for the even, flat light that would cost a stop or so also. I suspect this is probably more likely than an ND or polarizing filter.

But that does not explain the sunlit background not being completely blown out.

I am interested in other explanations also. Are we certain that the exif is accurate?

If the kids are in an alley, rather than in a shaded area facing an open sky, then the light level might be a full stop less than open shade also.

dadwtwins

She could of used lights as well to dim down the sun and brighten the subjects. I was trying to look at the catch lights in the eyes and it looks like she used bounce light to brighten the subject which will dim the sun down a little

Elaine

I'm quite sure she's a natural light only photog, so I'm guessing these kids are in the shade of a building. Wouldn't the concrete aid in bouncing light all around, kinda like shooting in a garage?

Art Scott

Elaine wrote:

I'm quite sure she's a natural light only photog, so I'm guessing these kids are in the shade of a building. Wouldn't the concrete aid in bouncing light all around, kinda like shooting in a garage?

I visited her new blog and it states she shoots natural light 100% of the time even in her 2100sq ft studio....no artificial light.....[URL="httphttp://alwblog.typepad.com/blogging_with_audrey/://"]New Blog[/URL] she does have some very nice children's pics....

Cason

Elaine wrote:

Wouldn't the concrete aid in bouncing light all around, kinda like shooting in a garage?

That would definitely be a large source of ambient light. Which is what you want.

So if she is in the shade (alley ways surrounded by large buildings) would Sunny 16 still work? Hard shadows would be f16. No shadows would be f5.6. At f1.4, the shutter wold still be off the charts.

Check it: http://www.calculator.org/exposure.aspx

ChatKat

Technique
I recently took a class where we learned how to expose like that.

Shoot wide open on a 50 or 85 - using the 1.4 1.8 or for me the 1.2 - Expose for the subject and ignore the sun in the background. That's exactly what you get. We used a meter but you can use the in camera meter

Cason

ChatKat wrote:

I recently took a class where we learned how to expose like that.

Shoot wide open on a 50 or 85 - using the 1.4 1.8 or for me the 1.2 - Expose for the subject and ignore the sun in the background. That's exactly what you get. We used a meter but you can use the in camera meter

1.2...NICE!!

What is your ISO?