weird way of storing data in a database field

I’m working on a project that reads the Adobe Lightroom catalog (which is just a SQLite database) and does some analysis. I reading the shutterSpeed column I realised that a shutter speed of 1/320 was stored as 8.9321928 and 1/60 was stored as 5.906891. After asking some questions around the web I learn that they were stored as

[quote]2 to the power 8.9321928 = 320
2 to the power 5.906891 = 60
It’s the number of stops faster than a shutter speed of 1 second.[/quote]

Thanks to a knowledgeable gentleman named Hal P. Anderson for that great info.

I always hated logarithms but it looks like I’m back there again…

Any thoughts on why Adobe would do this?

@William Plunkett — Just off the top of my mind:
• Their algorithm uses 2^x so it makes sense to store its value
• By contrast with a division (1/320 or whatever), 2^x will not become 0 or infinity just because of a bad value floating around