After evening chapel at the Church of God mission hospital, Nigeria.
In 1989 I was on a three-week tour of several African countries on assignment for the World Missions Department of the Church of God -- a tour that took me to Ghana, Nigeria, Zambia, and Kenya. I spent several days at the Church of God mission compound at Abak, in Ibom Province, Nigeria. One evening, as I was walking across the grounds toward the mission hospital, I noticed that the beams of the setting sun were running horizontally across the ground and splashing sunbursts against the hospital wall.
The evening chapel service had just concluded. A few people were standing around, but what I mostly saw was the light. I was carrying my faithful Olympus OM2n camera loaded with Fujichrome 100-speed slide film and fitted with a Tokina 100-300mm f4 zoom lens. There was no time to plan a careful composition, change lenses, or take a meter reading. I seldom used auto-exposure in those days, but the OM2n had that capability and I quickly flipped the switch to auto and made three quick shots before the light faded.
My lens was at the 300mm setting, wide open at f4, and the auto-exposure was giving me 1/15th second. I had little hope of getting anything usable -- but nothing attempted, nothing gained! Since there was no chimping in those days, I had to wait until I was back in the U.S. to find that I had one very sharp exposure and another that was usable out of the three.
And although I had been only minimally conscious of the people in the photo as I shot, their positions turned out to be just right. Serendipity.
This, by the way, is an exception to the rule that light should come at an angle from one side or other of the subject. Great light is where you find it, and when you see it, go for it. Take a chance. You may not get the shot you're hoping for, but then again, you might. Either way, you'll learn something valuable.
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Photography and text copyright 2023 David B.Jenkins.
I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.
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