Lesson Info
35. Sunny 16 Rule
Summary (Generated from Transcript)
The lesson is about the Sunny 16 Rule in photography, which states that in bright, sunny conditions, the recommended exposure settings are f/16 and a shutter speed that is approximately equal to the ISO.
Q&A:
What is the Sunny 16 Rule?
The Sunny 16 Rule is a guideline in photography that suggests using an aperture of f/16 and a shutter speed equal to the ISO in bright, sunny conditions.
When was the Sunny 16 Rule more relevant?
The Sunny 16 Rule was more relevant in the past when cameras were manually operated and relied on batteries for light metering. If the batteries died, photographers could use the Sunny 16 Rule as a backup.
How do you apply the Sunny 16 Rule?
Set the ISO to the lowest native setting (e.g., 100), set the aperture to f/16, and select a shutter speed that is approximately equal to the ISO (e.g., 125 for ISO 100).
What if you want to shoot with a shallow depth of field under bright sunlight?
If you want a shallow depth of field, you will need to adjust your settings. For example, if your camera has an ISO of 200, you would need to increase the shutter speed to the closest number (e.g., 250) and decrease the aperture to achieve the desired depth of field.
What if your camera does not have the exact ISO setting mentioned in the Sunny 16 Rule?
If your camera does not have the exact ISO setting (e.g., ISO 100), you can adjust the shutter speed and aperture to compensate. However, there may be limitations depending on the available settings on your camera.
Are there cameras that can go up to a shutter speed of 32,000th of a second?
Yes, there are some mirrorless cameras that can go up to a shutter speed of 32,000th of a second. Although this is rare, it can be useful for exposure control in situations where shooting in bright sunlight with a shallow depth of field is desired.
Lessons
Class Introduction
23:32 2Photographic Characteristics
06:46 3Camera Types
03:03 4Viewing System
22:09 5Lens System
24:38 6Shutter System
12:56 7Shutter Speed Basics
10:16 8Shutter Speed Effects
31:57Camera & Lens Stabilization
11:06 10Quiz: Shutter Speeds
07:55 11Camera Settings Overview
16:12 12Drive Mode & Buffer
04:24 13Camera Settings - Details
10:21 14Sensor Size: Basics
18:26 15Sensor Sizes: Compared
24:52 16The Sensor - Pixels
22:49 17Sensor Size - ISO
26:59 18Focal Length
11:36 19Angle of View
31:29 20Practicing Angle of View
04:59 21Quiz: Focal Length
08:15 22Fisheye Lens
12:32 23Tilt & Shift Lens
20:37 24Subject Zone
13:16 25Lens Speed
09:03 26Aperture
08:25 27Depth of Field (DOF)
21:46 28Quiz: Apertures
08:22 29Lens Quality
07:06 30Light Meter Basics
09:04 31Histogram
11:48 32Quiz: Histogram
09:07 33Dynamic Range
07:25 34Exposure Modes
35:15 35Sunny 16 Rule
04:31 36Exposure Bracketing
08:08 37Exposure Values
20:01 38Quiz: Exposure
20:44 39Focusing Basics
13:08 40Auto Focus (AF)
24:39 41Focus Points
17:18 42Focus Tracking
19:26 43Focusing Q&A
06:40 44Manual Focus
07:14 45Digital Focus Assistance
07:35 46Shutter Speeds & Depth of Field (DOF)
05:18 47Quiz: Depth of Field
15:54 48DOF Preview & Focusing Screens
04:55 49Lens Sharpness
11:08 50Camera Movement
11:29 51Advanced Techniques
15:15 52Quiz: Hyperfocal Distance
07:14 53Auto Focus Calibration
05:15 54Focus Stacking
07:58 55Quiz: Focus Problems
18:54 56Camera Accessories
32:41 57Lens Accessories
29:24 58Lens Adaptors & Cleaning
13:14 59Macro
13:02 60Flash & Lighting
04:47 61Tripods
14:13 62Cases
06:07 63Being a Photographer
11:29 64Natural Light: Direct Sunlight
28:37 65Natural Light: Indirect Sunlight
15:57 66Natural Light: Mixed
04:20 67Twilight: Sunrise & Sunset Light
22:21 68Cloud & Color Pop: Sunrise & Sunset Light
06:40 69Silhouette & Starburst: Sunrise & Sunset Light
07:28 70Golden Hour: Sunrise & Sunset Light
07:52 71Quiz: Lighting
05:42 72Light Management
10:46 73Flash Fundamentals
12:06 74Speedlights
04:12 75Built-In & Add-On Flash
10:47 76Off-Camera Flash
25:48 77Off-Camera Flash For Portraits
15:36 78Advanced Flash Techniques
08:22 79Editing Assessments & Goals
08:57 80Editing Set-Up
06:59 81Importing Images
03:59 82Organizing Your Images
32:41 83Culling Images
13:57 84Categories of Development
30:59 85Adjusting Exposure
08:03 86Remove Distractions
04:02 87Cropping Your Images
09:53 88Composition Basics
26:36 89Point of View
28:56 90Angle of View
14:35 91Subject Placement
23:22 92Framing Your Shot
07:27 93Foreground & Background & Scale
03:51 94Rule of Odds
05:00 95Bad Composition
07:31 96Multi-Shot Techniques
19:08 97Pixel Shift, Time Lapse, Selective Cloning & Noise Reduction
12:24 98Human Vision vs The Camera
23:32 99Visual Perception
10:43 100Quiz: Visual Balance
14:05 101Visual Drama
16:45 102Elements of Design
09:24 103Texture & Negative Space
03:57 104Black & White & Color
10:33 105The Photographic Process
09:08 106Working the Shot
25:29 107What Makes a Great Photograph?
07:01Lesson Info
Sunny 16 Rule
Alright, so this whole section we've been talking about exposure, and there's a couple of kind of special exposure concepts I wanna talk about. First is one of the basic rules that I've learned, which was the Sunny 16 Rule. This is just, it's not really even necessary these days. It was kind of necessary back in the days when I had a manually battery-operated camera. And if the batteries ever died, what would my exposure be when my light meter doesn't work. And now, well, you're not gonna be able to take pictures if your camera doesn't have battery. But just the concept of it, I think, is still relevant and good to know. And so the Sunny 16 Rule states that if you are in full sun, the exposure is f/ and a shutter speed that is about equal to your ISO. So let's walk this through and see what this looks like in the real world. Alright! It is a sunny day, and we wanna get a photograph at f/16. We want lots of depth of field, so this is a perfect example of a Sunny 16 situation. So, the fi...
rst thing that we probably wanna do in a situation like this is set our ISO to the lowest native setting on our ISO, which would be 100. Now, it is the Sunny 16 Rule, so we set an aperture of f/16, and we set a shutter speed that is as close to the ISO number as we can get. So since we have 100 selected, we would select 125. And I know on some cameras you can actually select 100, and that would be fine, but we're just going with those whole numbers for examples in this class. And so do that and you're gonna get a perfect exposure in bright, sunny weather, assuming there's no clouds, and it's not smokey, or some other situation. Like "It's a sunny day, but I was inside. "Why did I get bad exposures?" Alright, so it's under bright, sunny light. Now, that all works well and good, but what if you don't want to shoot at f/16? Okay, what if you wanna shoot with shallow depth of field under bright, sunny light? Well, you're just gonna need to do some horse trading, trading some shutter speeds for some apertures. Alright, so let's just get our numbers set up here. We'll go ahead and set our ISO of 100. We'll do f/16 just to get our numbers set right, and of course a shutter speed of for proper exposure in bright sunlight. But we wanna shoot with shallow depth of field so the background is out of focus. And so in this case, there are some cameras out there, including cameras that I own, that do not have an ISO of 100. Alright, does anybody have a camera like that? There's some cameras out there that have a native ISO of 200, alright. And so in this case, we're wanting to get shallow depth of field with a camera that has an ISO of 200. So what we're gonna have to do is go up to a shutter speed of 250, cause that's the closest number we have to 200. We're keeping our aperture at f/16, but now we're gonna want to make some changes so that we can get to shallow depth of field. And so let's go all the way down to 1.4. And what you wanna do is here, you can count up how many stops of light did we move. And when we count from 16 down to 11, one, two, three, four, five, six, we moved the aperture seven stops of light. We're letting in seven more stops of light, which means we need to close somethin' else down, let in seven stops less light. And how are we gonna do that? Well, we have alotta room to move in the shutter speed. And so we can go faster on the shutter speed up to 8,000th of a second, but that is, unfortunately, only five stops. And so we can't really do it, because we're gonna be two stops overexposed. We need to close down to something that doesn't exist. But it does exist on some cameras that'll actually go up to 32,000th of a second. It's very rare that this happens, but there's a few cameras out there that'll go up to 32,000th of a second. And there's really nothing that I can point to that you need a 32,000th of a second for in motion-stopping capabilities. But for exposure control, which is what we're talking about here, it can be valuable for people who wanna shoot in bright sunlight with a shallow depth of field, sometimes slightly handicapped by that ISO 200. So that's why there's a few of these mirrorless cameras that can go up to 32,000th of a second.
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