ISO

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Hand over the Camera

Sunday, April 26th, 2009

Continuing this thread, what about when you hand the camera to another?  My daughter saw me playing with my camera at a stoplight & asked for it.  I know full well that she’ll drop it, push buttons, but will also try to take a photo or three.

So, before handing off the photo, I set ISO to 200 since she’s a shaky shooter.  Whaddaya want at four years?  White balance to daylight, EV stuck at -1/3.  Gets us the shot below.

This one did take some post-processing.  If you notice, there’s a wide, wide range of exposures here.  Had to play a bit before I could resurrect it.

At a stop light on the way to day care, actually.

At a stop light on the way to day care, actually.

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After work, another example

Saturday, April 25th, 2009

You’ve seen the beach, now the other extreme: winter in Alaska.  This photo was taken after work, in early January.  It’s pretty unremarkable – a failure, by my standards. No detail in the moon, the sky overly noisy…  But the colors are rich, and the warmth of the lights reflects (lightly) off the snow.

To pull this one off: ISO set to 400, white balance to daylight, EV still -1/3.  The camera set shutter speed at 1/20.  If I hadn’t been shivering, I might have worked that to my preference.

January Afternoon Moon - 4:45pm.

January Afternoon Moon - 4:45pm on 1/9/2009.

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Caring about ISO

Monday, April 20th, 2009
ISO options on the sd500

ISO options on the sd500

I don’t really want to get into ISO.  At least, I don’t really want to get too far in to the technical details.  Effects, yes.  Science, no.  Want some details?  Check out wikipedia.  Or, as I originally learned it: read The Negative by Ansel Adams (be warned, it’s not for everyone & certainly not appropriate for you if you’re only using a point-and-shoot digital camera – but if you’re ever going to get into film, it’s gold).

OK, so how does ISO effect your end result? Noise. It adds photographic noise.  The dimpled effect in photos when you zoom in & see incomplete data.  As a general rule of thumb, the lower the ISO, the less noise.  However, the lower the noise the slower the photograph.  Remember in yesterday’s post how I mentioned that you can’t control shutter speed on this guy? Well, the lower the ISO, the slower the shutter speed, and the blurrier things get.

So the real-life rule: you want to use as low an ISO as possible for the given amount of light.  Rough examples that I use:

  • Outdoors, sunny (or even cloudy) day: ISO 50.
  • Indoors, daytime, sunny or cloudy with shades open: ISO 100.
  • Indoors, shades closed during the day, but with bleed-through: ISO 200.
  • Outdoors, dusk: ISO 200 (I’ll often start at ISO 100, though).
  • Indoors, night: ISO 200 (sometimes have to go to ISO 400).
  • Indoors or outdoors, From October through March, anytime that’s not between 10am and 3pm: 200 ISO, often dropping to 400.

Notice how I only go to ISO 400 when I’m out of options?  That’s because I don’t usually carry a tripod with me when I’m using this camera.  I almost always have the flash disabled, so I need all the speed I can get.

Buttons & switches on the sd500. Note the "SCM" and "M" buttons.

Buttons & switches on the sd500. Note the "SCM" and "M" buttons.

ISO 400 is the fastest this camera can go.  It’s not too bad, but in low light (think normal indoor light at night) it gets pretty noisy.  This varies from camera to camera, mind you: my SLR does fine up to ISO 800, then spits out pretty nasty garbage.

To get to the ISO menu?  First, set the dial to “M” (for “manual”!).  then click the “FUNC” button – look to the right for a display (click for a larger view).  Now, use the buttons around the FUNC button to move down to ISO, then left & right to set it where you want.

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