Sunday, May 17, 2009

What is ISO?

So if you're new to the digital world and you have a nice camera, you might have a setting labeled ISO. You may not know what this is or what it does but you soon will. What ISO is the equivalent to film sensitivity with film cameras. Basically it set how sensitive you're image sensor is to light. The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the image sensor is and thus you can take picture with lower light. Keep in mind though, the higher the ISO setting is, the more noise you will get in your photos. It is a trade off of course.

So ISO setting... range from 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1600.
Unless you have a nice camera, 1600 ISO is out of the question because the (image) noise will become too much of a factor. I tend to shoot with ISO 800 at night and 200-400 during the day time. The number represent how many pixels you are willing to sacrifice to noise. So at ISO 1600, that is a lot of pixels!

My advice to you guys is this, keep the ISO as low as you can while changing the shutter speed and f-stop. Who likes noise in their picture right? So keep ISO in mind and you'll have less noise and less noise makes Better Photos!

If you like further details about this subject I recommend these articles...What is... ISO? | What is ISO setting on your digital SLR (DSLR) camera and how do you use it?

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