I’ve seen great white sharks in the wild, from much much safer vantage points. I love sharks and all, but I would not do that.
Elind: That was my first thought as well.
Carcharodon carchariasgo to five meters or so (the biggest ones)
Assume a person is two meters. In my copy of this photo, people are about 100 pixels long, and the shark (with its tail curved) is about 300. If the shark and the people are the same distance away from the camera, that makes this shark 6 meters long which is beyond reasonable unless it happens to be the biggest one ever.
However, the shark is in focus and the divers are not, so I assume it is close to the camera. Old fisherman’s trick to make the sunfish look bigger?
If this was a Megalodon, it would be a little one. They were closer to 30 meters.
maratkhramovsays
Greg, I got about 285 for the shark if we say the person on the bottom left is 100 pixels. The average person is not 2 meters tall. Not to mention most of these people aren’t standing perfectly straight. And yes, you can clearly see in the picture the shark is slightly facing towards the edge of the cage, I would say its head is a minimum of a meter in front of the cage.
It’s obviously not photoshopped though, but if you’re assuming the shark and a person are at 1:1 representation then you’ll be thrown off from the size.
This IS a big fella though. I would estimate it at 5 to 5.5 meters.
David Marjanovićsays
Not only is shark fin soup a Chinese delicacy but a noticeable portion of what’s sold as scallops is actually shark meat.
Consequently, plenty of species of big shark are scarily endangered.
BTW, it completely misses the point to call shark fin soup a delicacy. The point is to show one’s guests “look at me, I’m so filthy rich I can afford to have pure fucking cartilage boiled for ages and spiced out the wazoo so it almost becomes sorta kinda edible”. <Borg>Taste is irrelevant.</Borg>
The average person is not 2 meters tall.
Yeah. More like 1.70.
DLCsays
We seriously need to stop hunting sharks.
Seriously. we’ve wiped out like 90% of them.
andyosays
greg is right, the shark is better focused and looks clearer (less water between it and the camera) than the divers in the cage. Also, the light seems to be hitting it at its left side, not below like it would be if it was at the same distance as the cage.
andyosays
Also, this was taken with a fairly wide angle lens, which means 2 things (unless it was heavily cropped): the camera was fairly close, so any distance difference between the cage and camera, and shark and camera would be more pronounced, and the rectilinear distortion at the edges would elongate the shark, as it does the cage near the corner.
andyosays
Sorry, meant the ratio of those distances would be more pronounced, so the shark would look bigger than if the pic was taken from farther away.
AmandaSsays
Also, I’d strongly suspect they aren’t teeth marks along its side. They look more like the results of a shark/propellor interaction.
atrichornissays
The largest reliably measured GWS was 6.4 metres. Also, only captured sharks have been reliably measured, so it is completely possible that larger sharks roam the oceans as yet uncaught, especially as they’ve been protected in most waters for a long time.
Holy Freaking Shit. That’s the inside of my nightmare.
It’s now officially time to start shitting bricks.
Some of that stuff floating in the water aint fish!
Bill realised all too late that while this was an awesome photo he was taking, he would not live to see it published.
Is it possible to eat sharks?
I wish I could afford to do that.
The great metazoan digester.
And hey, a shark!
Glen Davidson
Dang, what really freaks me out are the teeth marks along the side.
Steve tasted great.
Given the kit I would be betting on the shark as the snack. Megapredator has nothing on tech.
neleabels
Not only is shark fin soup a Chinese delicacy but a noticeable portion of what’s sold as scallops is actually shark meat.
Just wait ’til the big one shows up.
I almost dropped out of my chair when I saw the picture. I was thirteen when Jaws hit the theaters. I haven’t been in the ocean since.
I think this a photoshop. The shark looks too big for a great white. more like a megalodon, long extinct.
Why are they up there instead of down there?
I’ve seen great white sharks in the wild, from much much safer vantage points. I love sharks and all, but I would not do that.
Elind: That was my first thought as well.
Carcharodon carchariasgo to five meters or so (the biggest ones)
Assume a person is two meters. In my copy of this photo, people are about 100 pixels long, and the shark (with its tail curved) is about 300. If the shark and the people are the same distance away from the camera, that makes this shark 6 meters long which is beyond reasonable unless it happens to be the biggest one ever.
However, the shark is in focus and the divers are not, so I assume it is close to the camera. Old fisherman’s trick to make the sunfish look bigger?
If this was a Megalodon, it would be a little one. They were closer to 30 meters.
Greg, I got about 285 for the shark if we say the person on the bottom left is 100 pixels. The average person is not 2 meters tall. Not to mention most of these people aren’t standing perfectly straight. And yes, you can clearly see in the picture the shark is slightly facing towards the edge of the cage, I would say its head is a minimum of a meter in front of the cage.
It’s obviously not photoshopped though, but if you’re assuming the shark and a person are at 1:1 representation then you’ll be thrown off from the size.
This IS a big fella though. I would estimate it at 5 to 5.5 meters.
Consequently, plenty of species of big shark are scarily endangered.
BTW, it completely misses the point to call shark fin soup a delicacy. The point is to show one’s guests “look at me, I’m so filthy rich I can afford to have pure fucking cartilage boiled for ages and spiced out the wazoo so it almost becomes sorta kinda edible”. <Borg>Taste is irrelevant.</Borg>
Yeah. More like 1.70.
We seriously need to stop hunting sharks.
Seriously. we’ve wiped out like 90% of them.
greg is right, the shark is better focused and looks clearer (less water between it and the camera) than the divers in the cage. Also, the light seems to be hitting it at its left side, not below like it would be if it was at the same distance as the cage.
Also, this was taken with a fairly wide angle lens, which means 2 things (unless it was heavily cropped): the camera was fairly close, so any distance difference between the cage and camera, and shark and camera would be more pronounced, and the rectilinear distortion at the edges would elongate the shark, as it does the cage near the corner.
Sorry, meant the ratio of those distances would be more pronounced, so the shark would look bigger than if the pic was taken from farther away.
Also, I’d strongly suspect they aren’t teeth marks along its side. They look more like the results of a shark/propellor interaction.
The largest reliably measured GWS was 6.4 metres. Also, only captured sharks have been reliably measured, so it is completely possible that larger sharks roam the oceans as yet uncaught, especially as they’ve been protected in most waters for a long time.