A hypothetical scenario - you choose the camera settings.

DannL · Mar 11, 2008

In this scenario we hand you a camera and you have control of two settings. One setting being the aperture size adjustment, and the other being the shutter speed adjustment. You can adjust these to any reasonable setting. The camera is preloaded with black and white film rated at ISO 100. For this scenario we will assume the film speed ISO rating is accurate. You have no other tools at your disposal, (ie; no light meter). You are given the opportunity to take one shot and your reputation depends this single negative. It is a bright sunny summer day, early afternoon. The sun is to your back, and your subject is in front of you and is of average color. What aperture setting and shutter speed would you choose for this photograph? Why?

I seem to find myself in this situation regularly, and I am curious how others confront the same situation. Enjoy!

Dann

Nick Zentena · Mar 11, 2008

Assuming 35mm with a fast lens.

F/2? 1/3200.

Why? Shutter speed is just getting the exposure right. F/stop is to minimize DOF. Standard Sunny 16. Unless I miscounted my fingers I think the numbers match up.

DannL · Mar 11, 2008

Nick Zentena said:
Assuming 35mm with a fast lens.

F/2? 1/3200.

Why? Shutter speed is just getting the exposure right. F/stop is to minimize DOF. Standard Sunny 16. Unless I miscounted my fingers I think the numbers match up.

Actually, this being one of the reasons for the question. I have never been able to produce a sufficiently dense negative using the Sunny 16 rule on any type of camera, 35mm, 6x6, 6x9, 9x12, 4x5 , 8x10 etc. I'm wondering if my ability to judge what is actually "sunny" is the problem.

Steve Smith · Mar 11, 2008

Sometimes it's sunny 11

Steve.

Lee Shively · Mar 11, 2008

F/5.6 @ 1/1000. Bracket a couple of shots opening to f/4. That's making a lot of assumptions since it also depends on subject matter, subject movement, depth of field desired, type of lens in use and a few other points I forget at the time.

Vilk · Mar 11, 2008

DannL said:
"...one shot and your reputation depends this single negative. It is a bright sunny summer day, early afternoon. The sun is to your back, and your subject is in front of you and is of average color. [...] I seem to find myself in this situation regularly..."

hmmm... why am i thinking clint eastwood and sergio leone?

i have been quite fine with exposing "just about so" for 25 years now

set your shutter to 125 then forget about it. you've got one variable left. how many settings there? six? how long would it take you to learn to recognize six different shapes? six pitch values? six colours? how about six different exposure values?

forget sunny. shoot the light. it works

cheers!

removed account4 · Mar 11, 2008

125 at about 8.5
i always over expose
sunny16 by 1.5 stops

Christopher Walrath · Mar 11, 2008

Key stop for ISO100 is 1/125 s/s. F16 would give an average exposure at 1/125 or any other combination of EV15. Depending on the lens and the subject matter I would say a wider aperture to ensure good focus and assuming not a telephoto lens should be able to hand hold at 1/60. So I go 1/60 @ f/22. If a lot of shadows in the foreground due to clouds, et. al., then 1/60 @ f/16.

Nick Zentena · Mar 12, 2008

DannL said:
I'm wondering if my ability to judge what is actually "sunny" is the problem.

There is:

Sunny F/16
Hazy F/11
Cloudy F/8
Overcast F/5.6
Not to forget beach F/22 but I ignore this one.

If you ask somebody on the street "Is it sunny?" They'll say yes if it's not raining. Sunny and hazy don't look that different and even F/8 cloudy looks "sunny" to most people. So you need to get a feel for the differences.

You can look at the shadow edges to help judge things.

Or you can try walking around with a meter. Make mental reading. Then compare to the meter. Doesn't take too long to get a feel for things.

BTW I think I forgot a finger when I was counting :rolleyes: But better to over expose by a stop.

Philippe-Georges · Mar 12, 2008

DannL said:
... It is a bright sunny summer day, early afternoon. The sun is to your back, and your subject is in front of you and is of average color...

Dann

Wat/where sun?
California, Iceland, Italy, Congo, open land, city or industrial environment (= pollution haze)?
What mood are you in that day?

walter23 · Mar 12, 2008

f/11 1/100. Extra stop for safety.

Ole · Mar 12, 2008

Sunny 11 works fine here in Norway, but I use sunny 16 further south. In Eritrea (high altitude, no pollution, sun almost directly overhead) sunny 16 gave a half stop overexposure.

Ian Grant · Mar 12, 2008

Like Ole I've always used f11 @ 125th in the UK, except mid summer when f16 is better, but here in the Aegean f22 @ 125th is far more appropriate even in Winter sunlight.

Ian

Michael W · Mar 12, 2008

In that kind of light I generally expose 400 ISO at f/11 @ 1/250 & pull the dev a little. I'm getting shadow detail but not getting the highlights too dense. So for this exercise I'd say f/8 at 1/125.
The basic sunny 16 settings I would mostly use for slide film where I'm more concerned with holding highlight detail. With B&W neg we have the luxury of being able to expose for the shadows & dev for the highlights.

jimgalli · Mar 12, 2008

Move to Nevada. We have the sunny f22 rule about 330 days a year

Snapshot · Mar 12, 2008

I would probably use an f-stop of f/8 and a shutter speed of 1/500th of a second. This setup will give me adequate depth of field and stop virtually all action.

DannL · Mar 12, 2008

I now see why I would determine an exposure several stops different than what the Sunny 16 rule defines to get a good exposure. What I've considered to be very sunny in all actuality is quite dark. So, I used a meter to take reference reading under similar conditions which gave me EV 13.5 off the scene directly and EV 14.5 off my hand. I'll bet that seems like nighttime to some folks.

dpurdy · Mar 13, 2008

Mid summer early afternoon the sun wouldn't be at your back it would be beating down on your head. I would set my camera at 125 f16 and use flash fill.

mabman · Mar 16, 2008

Lee Shively said:
F/5.6 @ 1/1000. Bracket a couple of shots opening to f/4. That's making a lot of assumptions since it also depends on subject matter, subject movement, depth of field desired, type of lens in use and a few other points I forget at the time.

I like this setup if the subject is a person who is sitting/standing reasonably still, as I prefer shallow depth of field for portraits, particularly those taken outside.

A part-time pro photographer told me that for DOF margin of error, f/8 is normally the preferred aperture setting for portraits (he does a bunch of them, and some weddings yearly), but if I can focus properly I like it wider open.

I've shown a few people sample shots with shallow DOF, and they seem to think it's either a Photoshop manipulation or some kind of magic limited to my camera(s) - apparently aperture priority isn't a popular setting on the more automated cameras these days (at least not so the general population is aware of it).

ic-racer · Mar 18, 2008

Any exposure from 1/50 at f16 to 1/8 at f16 should work.

Why?
You said it is ISO rated so we know there is no under-exposure latitude at ISO 100. The overexposure latitude is determined by the film brand so I am assuming a reasonable 4-stop latitude for excellent prints.

Why 'Sunny 11' as the minimum exposure? With a high contrast lens, I have found that using that as the minimum exposure will give better shadow detail. If the lens is normal or low contrast, the extra exposure won't be needed. Also, you did not say the shutter was accurate, so I would not want to push the under-exposure limit.

Want more?
I can't see your scene but we know how bright the sun is. We also know that there is a 5 stop difference between black and white paint. We also know how bright the sky is (based on the 'open shade' exposure rule). This is about 4 stops less than the sun. So we can figure out in your scene there are 5 stops of range in the sunlight and this overlaps by 1 stop with an additional 5 stops of exposure range in the shadows. This gives you 9 stops. We will take one away because the lens flare etc. So, I would guess the camera will 'see' about 8 stops of luminous range on the film plane. T-max has a range about 13 stops (plus or minus a few). So that is how I came up with a latitude of about 4 stops for excellent prints. Your exposure latitude will be even greater if your scene really does not have a 9 stop range, or if you accept less than excellent prints.

Christopher Walrath · Mar 18, 2008

I love posts like this. This is what we have so far.

F/2 @ 1/3,200 assuming 35mm and fast lens
F/5.6 @ 1/1000 bracketing to F/4
1/125 and bracket the range of aperture settings on the lens
f/8.5 @ 1/125 overexposing sunny 16 by 1.5 stops
F/22 @ 1/60, F/16 if shadows in foreground
F/11 @ 1/100 giving one extra stop for safety
Sunny 16 half stop overeposure for northern latitudes
From F/11 in the north to F/22 in the south @ 1/125
F/8 @ 1/125 accounting for highlight density
Sunny 22 rule in Nevada, USA
F/8 @ 1/500 for DOF and stopping of action
F/16 @ 1/125 w/ fill flash
F/8 for portraiture
F/16 @ 1/50-1/8

Seven differing choices for aperture. Seven different choices for shutter speed. Fourteen differing Exposure combinations. Goes to show the different thought processes in the minds of photographers today and that nobody is completely right. 'Course, nobody is completely wrong either. Wow. Deep.

BradS · Mar 18, 2008

Here in N. California, near sea level, full sun at mid day has a light value of about 9. The film speed value for ISO 100 film is 5 so, I get...

Light value + film speed = 9 + 5 = EV14

So, I can choose any combination of shutter speed and aperture that has a sum of 14...

I'd be inclined to go with f/16, 1/60 ( which is: 8 + 6 = EV14 )

seems like I've done this once or twice while shooting the Crown Graphic hand held

A hypothetical scenario - you choose the camera settings.

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