This is not an amorous hug. It is combat between two 5000 pound northern elephant seals for the right to mate with a harem of females. I captured this in the Channels Islands National Park, California in the mid-80s after I got special permission to camp for four days in the park to photograph these once critically endangered animals. I used a Mamiya RZ 67 medium format film camera at the time, and all my exposures were done with a handheld meter. On the first day, the meter fell into salt water and died a very quick death. I was left with no meter at all, but the previous week I had practiced judging daylight exposures without a meter using the age-old 'Sunny f/16 Rule'. This is based on the fact that the correct exposure for bright sunlight is f/16 with a shutter speed that is the reciprocal of the ISO. So, if the ISO is 64, then the shutter speed must be 1/60th for a correct exposure. For diffused sunlight, you'd open up one f/stop to f/8, and for open shade, f/5.6 is correct. When I got home and developed the film, I was very surprised that about 92% of my images were correctly exposed.
1 Comments
Feb 22, 2018, 12:48:57 AM
Bob - Must have been quite an experience to watch and photograph these massive animals. Jim, as you show us, it is a good idea to learn how to get along without a light meter. I have been told that what you describe based on the "Sunny f/16 Rule" also can be called the "Four Stops of Light".