Maljo
Well-known member
For wildlife we need to use whatever ISO it takes to get a sharp image. But, despite modern software advances, I still really like a low ISO image.
Learning to not be afraid of high ISO shooting
- Thread starter Stephen Berger
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In a mostly ISO invariant camera like the Z9 or a1, underexposing a stop and bringing it back in post vs exposing properly makes little actual difference. I've tested it 
Basically, if you need ISO 4000, you'll end up with ISO 4000 noise if you shoot it that way in-camera or shoot at ISO2000 in-camera and push it a stop in Lightroom. Six of one, half dozen of another.
Of course, as mentioned, a bit of an underexposure can help with highlight protection and I often lean that way myself in the field. For most wildlife work, I'm shoot a touch under the recommended exposure.
Also, as Eric says, a proper exposure may help with focus. Like him, I haven't really seen I make a big difference with strictly focus performance. However, a proper exposure helps significantly with things like subject detection.
Finally, if you want to shoot higher ISOs, the safest way to do it is to fill the frame. I won't hesitate to shoot a frame-filling shot at ISO 6400. Where you get into trouble is with high ISO and cropping.
Basically, if you need ISO 4000, you'll end up with ISO 4000 noise if you shoot it that way in-camera or shoot at ISO2000 in-camera and push it a stop in Lightroom. Six of one, half dozen of another.Of course, as mentioned, a bit of an underexposure can help with highlight protection and I often lean that way myself in the field. For most wildlife work, I'm shoot a touch under the recommended exposure.
Also, as Eric says, a proper exposure may help with focus. Like him, I haven't really seen I make a big difference with strictly focus performance. However, a proper exposure helps significantly with things like subject detection.
Finally, if you want to shoot higher ISOs, the safest way to do it is to fill the frame. I won't hesitate to shoot a frame-filling shot at ISO 6400. Where you get into trouble is with high ISO and cropping.
That's really it isn't it. It all makes for interesting discussion/reading but when shooting wildlife we rarely get to choose. Once you're at max aperture and ss as low(i.e. slow) as you can go for the subject/motion, the ISO is what it is. Or just put down the camera and pick up the binos. The best and perhaps only practical advice on this topic is what @Steve recommends to get your shot then if there's the opportunity start decreasing ss for additional frames to try and optimize IQ. For those of us who shoot BIF the whole discussion is moot. Of course we can argue about what's minimum(i.e. slowest) ss for acceptable results
MikePapple
Well-known member
Yes. I use 135mm F1.8 Sony lens for low light situations (like overcast in a rainforest). Maybe I will settle for environmental shots rather than closeups. For Sony A1 and A7R4 ISO <2000 has low noise. ISO 2000 to 12800 would require noise reduction software like Topaz.
MikePapple
Well-known member
Wish list for next firmware update - manual with auto ISO, but with shutter bracketing.That's really it isn't it. It all makes for interesting discussion/reading but when shooting wildlife we rarely get to choose. Once you're at max aperture and ss as low(i.e. slow) as you can go for the subject/motion, the ISO is what it is. Or just put down the camera and pick up the binos. The best and perhaps only practical advice on this topic is what @Steve recommends to get your shot then if there's the opportunity start decreasing ss for additional frames to try and optimize IQ. For those of us who shoot BIF the whole discussion is moot. Of course we can argue about what's minimum(i.e. slowest) ss for acceptable results
John Navitsky
Well-known member
yah, that’s a good point. faster glass is a significant tool with regard to this issue
MangoYak
Member
Woody Meristem
Well-known member
Mike Lane uses ISO 1600 as his base ISO, I normally use 1000, and those are both with MFT cameras. ISO isn't really much of a concern nowadays until you get really high. As others have said, camera or subject movement is much more of a problem than noise.
Lou C one of the most well known South African wildlife photographers told us a decade ago folk are stuck with film level iso perceptions - now we are on a different planet. BSI CMOS sensors and AI Noise Reduction have transformed the upper ISO levels where useable saleable images can be taken. Base ISO for most CINE cameras is 800. Indoor sports shooters regularly shoot 10,000+ and as ab result we “meet” mortals should not be scared to shoot using EV-2 ISO 6400+ settings that allow us to use shutter speeds high enough to freeze movements and apertures closed down enough to provide adequate DOF to bring our subjects into focus.
I routinely use DXO PURE RAW 2 and then Topaz DeNoise AI or Photo Ai after editing in LRC, and occasionally PS 2023. I use Phocus 3.7 for Hasselblad and Capture One for Phase One and a few other systems when tethered. I am looking forward to Capture One 23 later this month, but it will not support Hasselblad so I am stuck with/benefiting from using multiple solutions for RAW file conversion and basic lens and tonal adjustments. I always use LRC in my workflow. In other words there are many more tools than we had a decade ago to help us deliver outstanding outputs.
kimball
Brian Kimball
These days high ISO is only a concern because it's a sign you're in a low-light situation.
It's the nature of low light that causes the majority of visible noise in photos these days, not the high ISO.
Visible noise in photographs has two sources: 1) noise coming from the light itself ("shot noise"), and 2) noise introduced by the camera ("read noise").
Maybe I'm wrong in thinking this, but I suspect a lot of folks who are concerned with "high ISO noise" think that noise is primarily from #2, camera read noise. That's really just not the case anymore. Modern cameras have insanely low read noise. So low that, mathematically speaking, there's really not much more read noise improvement that can be squeezed out of cameras, at least not that will make a huge visual difference. In the past 5-10 years they've really come quite close to, asymptotically so, "as good as it's going to get."
Unfortunately nothing can be done about #1, shot noise in low light situations, other than using increasingly sophisticated noise removal software and other tricks, like rapidly taking multiple photographs of the same scene and averaging them into one photograph (see most phones' "night mode" setting as an example).
Again, shot noise is a property of the light from your scene, and is independent of any particular camera or sensor tech. It is caused by the random arrival of photons at the sensor. It's a limitation of physics and the nature of light itself. No sensor tech can reduce shot noise in a photograph. High ISO does not cause shot noise. It merely correlates with it, because shot noise becomes more visible in photographs in low light shooting, where we are all much more likely to use a high ISO.
If you want to avoid capturing visible shot noise in your photos, you have to increase the amount of light hitting your sensor (i.e. increase exposure, in the formal sense of the word). Shoot with a wider aperture, and/or shoot with a slower shutter speed, and/or increase scene luminance. If you are at your widest aperture and slowest shutter speed you can tolerate, and can't increase your scene luminance, you've done all you can. Choosing a lower ISO will not reduce visible noise in your photo, and will actually increase it if your sensor is not ISO-invariant.
Some links for further reading:
https://www.photonstophotos.net/Emil Martinec/noise.html
https://photographylife.com/what-is-noise-in-photography
https://www.dpreview.com/articles/8...e-shedding-some-light-on-the-sources-of-noise
https://www.dpreview.com/articles/0388507676/sources-of-noise-part-two-electronic-noise
It's the nature of low light that causes the majority of visible noise in photos these days, not the high ISO.
Visible noise in photographs has two sources: 1) noise coming from the light itself ("shot noise"), and 2) noise introduced by the camera ("read noise").
Maybe I'm wrong in thinking this, but I suspect a lot of folks who are concerned with "high ISO noise" think that noise is primarily from #2, camera read noise. That's really just not the case anymore. Modern cameras have insanely low read noise. So low that, mathematically speaking, there's really not much more read noise improvement that can be squeezed out of cameras, at least not that will make a huge visual difference. In the past 5-10 years they've really come quite close to, asymptotically so, "as good as it's going to get."
Unfortunately nothing can be done about #1, shot noise in low light situations, other than using increasingly sophisticated noise removal software and other tricks, like rapidly taking multiple photographs of the same scene and averaging them into one photograph (see most phones' "night mode" setting as an example).
Again, shot noise is a property of the light from your scene, and is independent of any particular camera or sensor tech. It is caused by the random arrival of photons at the sensor. It's a limitation of physics and the nature of light itself. No sensor tech can reduce shot noise in a photograph. High ISO does not cause shot noise. It merely correlates with it, because shot noise becomes more visible in photographs in low light shooting, where we are all much more likely to use a high ISO.
If you want to avoid capturing visible shot noise in your photos, you have to increase the amount of light hitting your sensor (i.e. increase exposure, in the formal sense of the word). Shoot with a wider aperture, and/or shoot with a slower shutter speed, and/or increase scene luminance. If you are at your widest aperture and slowest shutter speed you can tolerate, and can't increase your scene luminance, you've done all you can. Choosing a lower ISO will not reduce visible noise in your photo, and will actually increase it if your sensor is not ISO-invariant.
Some links for further reading:
https://www.photonstophotos.net/Emil Martinec/noise.html
https://photographylife.com/what-is-noise-in-photography
https://www.dpreview.com/articles/8...e-shedding-some-light-on-the-sources-of-noise
https://www.dpreview.com/articles/0388507676/sources-of-noise-part-two-electronic-noise
Excellent explanation.
Calson
Well-known member
Starting with film that was limited to ISO 160 and then to cameras like the D2x that was good only to ISO 640 it was difficult at first to shoot at higher ISO levels. With people and some wildlife the higher ISO would result in a plastic look when the noise was controlled in the cameras. Some animals, as with birds with their feathers are more forgiving of noise and less apparent in the images.
Noise in images is best filtered in the camera as the engineers know the noise profiles with varying amounts of sensor signal amplification. How it is done though does have an impact on the color fidelity of the images produced. Often NR is accomplished that also entails a compression of the tonal range. This is quite evident with a human or a sea lion's throat but not a concern with bird feathers or animal fur. CA is more likely to be evident although the post processing software is excellent in correcting this with the conversion of raw images.
Auto ISO has enable me to be less concerned about the ISO level of animal photography. I have an upper limit set but that is all. This has also helped in my being less hesitant to use a faster shutter speed and ignore the ISO setting needed.
Noise in images is best filtered in the camera as the engineers know the noise profiles with varying amounts of sensor signal amplification. How it is done though does have an impact on the color fidelity of the images produced. Often NR is accomplished that also entails a compression of the tonal range. This is quite evident with a human or a sea lion's throat but not a concern with bird feathers or animal fur. CA is more likely to be evident although the post processing software is excellent in correcting this with the conversion of raw images.
Auto ISO has enable me to be less concerned about the ISO level of animal photography. I have an upper limit set but that is all. This has also helped in my being less hesitant to use a faster shutter speed and ignore the ISO setting needed.
DRwyoming makes an important observation: using negative exposure compensation in an automated mode decreases exposure and does protect the highlights, but with an ISO invariant camera, nothing is gained by using -EV compensation and then brightening in post. You are back to where you started, but you do have the option of not brightening and clipping the highlights. To take advantage of your camera's ISO invariance it is best to use manual exposure in raw as explained by Jim Kasson here. As Steve explains in his metering for Nikon e-book, the sensor has only one ISO (and that is at base) and ISO is not an exposure control but merely a brightening tool. With a given scene, exposure is determined only by the shutter speed and aperture. With the camera set on manual exposure at f/8 and 1/500 sec, exposure on the image sensor (measured in lux seconds) will be the same at ISO 3200 or ISO 400 and it is the exposure that determines the signal to noise ratio. You should note that Exposure compensation has no effect in manual mode.
As Jim explains in manual mode you set the aperture for the desired depth of field and the shutter speed to freeze motion. Say you need f/8 for depth of field and 1/500 to freeze motion. Use these settings and adjust ISO to move the highlights to the right end of the live histogram to determine the optimal exposure to meet these criteria. Keep the shutter speed and aperture at the metered values and reduce the ISO by up to three stops, giving up to 3 EV of highlight protection and then brighten the image in post. More brightening can induce color shifts and changes in saturation with Adobe converters, so do not try more than a 3 EV change in ISO. You get highlight protection with no loss of image quality.
If the subject is stationary and you are using VR/image statbilization, you can get away with much less shutter speed in many cases.
Bill
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kimball
Brian Kimball
Assuming a fixed aperture and shutter speed with auto ISO, there's nothing to be gained noise-wise with -EC, however nothing to be lost either on a camera with an ISO-invariant sensor, all the while improving DR and highlight protection. Of course, that only matters if you need the additional DR & highlight protection. Not all scenes need that.
Assuming a fixed aperture and shutter speed with auto ISO, applying -EC to reduce ISO and then lightening the photo in post will give no noise improvement over just shooting at 0 EC, however it will absolutely increase camera DR. As ISO is raised the noise floor is raised with it, while the maximum lightness value remain fixed. Similarly, as ISO is lowered the noise floor is lowered while the maximum lightness value remain fixed, and therefore camera DR is improved by equal amounts. Of course that doesn't necessarily say anything about shot noise and image quality, or whether that increased DR was actually needed for a given scene.
This is all shown quite clearly in Bill Claff's DR graphs. All cameras show a roughly 1-stop reduction in DR for every 1-stop increase in ISO through their analog invariant ranges. See how they all have the same slope in their invariant ranges? That's the 1:1 correspondence between changes in stops of ISO vs stops of DR.
kimball
Brian Kimball
Not at all. Most modern raw developers employ highlight protection. -2 EC by way of reduced ISO will have 2 more stops of captured highlights (assuming such highlights exist in the scene), and those highlights will remain available in raw processors. a +2 stop equivalent adjustment in a raw processor does not mean those highlights will be necessarily pushed into clipping.
Not sure if this is a direct quote of Steve or not, but I'd be hesitant in describing sensors in this way. Sensors do not have ISOs, cameras do. ISO is a property of a camera as a whole, including the camera firmware's JPG/imaging pipeline. The ISO standard describes ways to define and measure the sensitivity of a DSC--Digital Still Camera--at each ISO setting, not the sensitivity of a camera's sensor specifically (of which many like to point out there's only 1 sensitivity, where 1 photon begets 1 electron in the sensor, and I've seen good arguments that even that should probably be called responsivity rather than sensitivity). How and whether a camera's sensor changes its characteristics as the camera's ISO is changed is an implementation detail irrelevant to the definition of ISO per the standard. In fact, there are a few camera models where sections of their ISO range are implemented entirely in camera firmware rather than sensor hardware.
There was a time when I strongly doubted the above when it was brought up in forums. Then I lit some money on fire and bought a copy of the standard to see what in the world these pedants were going on about. It took about 50 readings, but it finally got through my thick head that, strictly speaking, ISO itself has nothing to do with sensors. It merely describes a relationship between the density of light hitting the sensor and the camera's final image output.
In the vast majority of cameras, changes to a camera's ISO setting just happen to be implemented mostly via analog sensor hardware, so we all are in the habit of focusing on the sensor when discussing ISO performance.
Agreed
Agreed when using the strict formal definition of exposure, but most photographers regrettably use the casual definition of exposure, which vaguely refers to image lightness, and which makes discussing these technical details quite difficult.
I get it that the amount of actual light hitting the sensor is a result of the aperture and the shutter speed. However, it appears that subject identification uses the image after applying gain (ISO plus EXP COMP) to identify the subject. My experience is that if you are under exposed the camera may not find the bird or the eye and may focus on something in the background but when you add gain to properly expose the image the camera locks on the bird and the eye instantly.
Chris K
Well-known member
Glad to hear you’re experimenting with high ISO. It’s incredibly useful to shoot >1600, especially in winter when the birds are often at their most interesting around sunrise.
I set all my cameras to auto ISO at whatever their maximum is, and manage my shutter speed to the minimum I think I can handle. Wherever the ISO falls, that’s what I get. The way I look at it, I either get a noisy shot, or no shot at all.
Another thought… I recently went back to re-process some RAW files from my original Canon 5D, which had some really ugly chroma noise on ISO 3200 shots. I was able to clean those files up much better with the tools I have today than I was when I originally took the photos. So your noisy photos of today might become less noisy later!
I set all my cameras to auto ISO at whatever their maximum is, and manage my shutter speed to the minimum I think I can handle. Wherever the ISO falls, that’s what I get. The way I look at it, I either get a noisy shot, or no shot at all.
Another thought… I recently went back to re-process some RAW files from my original Canon 5D, which had some really ugly chroma noise on ISO 3200 shots. I was able to clean those files up much better with the tools I have today than I was when I originally took the photos. So your noisy photos of today might become less noisy later!
Secrets To Exposure And For Nikon, page 218
Let’s start by dropping a couple of bombs on your perception of ISO:
#1-Your camera only has one ISO.
#2- ISO is not an exposure control.
The above is a direct quotation from Steve's e-book. My intrepation of #1 is that increasing ISO does not change the sensor's sensitivity to light but merely brightens the image. Steve can jump in at any time to clarify, but I agree with this concept.
You can buy the ISO standard 12232:2019 for 118 Swiss franks (about US $118 also) but the overall gist is summarized in this article on Wikipedia. Nikon uses REI (recommendednexposure index), which is arbitrary and represents whatever they think gives the best results. Note that some of these ISO rating methods apply to sRGB captures and can't be used with raw exposure or evaluative metering methods such as Nikon matrix. The whole topic is very confusing to me and most other practical photographers. However, exposing a uniform white or gray card according to a standard light meter (ISO 2721) will give an sRBG value of neutral gray at about a pixel value of 118 with a standard picture control.
Bill
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I got use to the high ISO long ago with so much low light wildlife shooting, TOPAZ products to the rescue of many photos. Sure I have some that just work but I get a much better result now than I did 4 years ago.
kimball
Brian Kimball
As noted in my post, I more or less agree with this interpretation as well. It changes the camera's "photographic sensitivity" (as defined in the standard), not the sensor's sensitivity. I think we're mostly on the same page.
I did. It was worth it for me personally since I was so frustrated with everyone's differing definitions and interpretations of ISO. Sometimes you just gotta go to the source.
Yup. I wish more folks knew this. I remember Fuji being heavily criticized for using SOS instead of REI. There was commentary everywhere about how Fuji was cheating with their ISO values, because at the same ISO value a Fuji camera would meter a different exposure than a Canon/Nikon/Sony. Of course SOS is actually measured, while REI is completely arbitrary. The reality was the complete opposite of what everyone was accusing Fuji of.
+1. Very confusing, to me as well. Hence why I needed to read the standard about 50 times before I felt like I was grasping it. Most of my issues in reading it were due to it not matching the vast majority of "educational" material on the internet that I had already ingested. Most people overstate what ISO is, describe it in figurative terms that others take literally, and focus way too much on the sensor without ever mentioning that, strictly speaking, the sensor is just an unspecified implementation detail in ISO. The standard does not care or say anything about it.
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Won't you lose that Dynamic Range if you underexpose and then brighten in post processing? It seems like any increase in gain, whether in the camera or through software, should decrease DR. I'm just asking, by the way, I'm not asserting anything.
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John Navitsky
Well-known member
iirc, there is less color information the higher the iso
100% with you as well on this. It's an entire system, not just the sensor. Although, with newer sensors, just about everything takes place within their circuitry, including analog and I think even digital amplification.
kimball
Brian Kimball
It's a fine question. Keep in mind the term "dynamic range" is merely a ratio between lowest value and highest value. It says nothing on its own about image quality. Also keep in mind there are many different dynamic ranges at play:Won't you lose that Dynamic Range when if you underexpose and then brighten in post processing? It seems like any increase in gain, whether in the camera or through software, should decrease DR. I'm just asking, by the way, I'm not asserting anything.
- the theoretical maximum dynamic range of your camera at base ISO
- the theoretical maximum dynamic range of your camera at your chosen ISO value. With each stop of increased ISO you lose about 1 stop of DR. For example, in most cameras if you are 5 stops up from base ISO, this will be 5 stops less than #1, more or less. Dual gain sensors might be 0.5-1 stop better if you've crossed the dual gain threshold.
- this DR being less than DR #1 is not a fundamental property of ISO, but rather a consequence of how ISO is implemented in most cameras
- the actual dynamic range of the scene. Hopefully it fits within DR #2. If not, you will likely need to drop your ISO. If you can't drop your ISO, you're going to have blocked shadows or clipped highlights, or you'll need exposure bracketing followed by blending in post.
- the actual dynamic range of data in your raw file. This will either be the same as DR #3, if DR #3 did indeed fit within DR #2, or it will be DR #2, and will have those blocked shadows and/or clipped highlights.
- the actual dynamic range of your final edited image. This entirely depends on how you edit, but is usually the smallest of all DRs, because we all need to tonemap our captured data into the number of stops a print can actually contain, or a monitor can actually display, and both are commonly much, much less than what our cameras capture.
DR is also not a synonym for noise. How much noise is present in deep shadows directly impacts one of the two numbers used to calculate a camera's theoretical maximum DR, but that's it.
So back to your question: Won't you lose that Dynamic Range when you underexpose and then brighten in post processing? Only if by lightening your image you're pushing the highlights into clipping and having to recover them. Then you will have reduced your image's DR (#5 above).
But generally speaking, per #5 above, decreasing a photograph's DR while editing is not a concern at all. Editing photos to lift blacks/shadows and pull back highlights is by definition decreasing the DR of your photo, and we all do that all the time to make our photographs look better.
We also occasionally stretch a photo's DR, by dropping blacks and increasing whites. We do this to add global contrast to an otherwise dull scene, for example.
What we do with a photo's captured DR is an aesthetic, subjective decision. There's no rule that says decreasing a photograph's DR is automatically bad.
With that said, we all benefit from cameras that can capture greater and greater maximum theoretical DR, just so we have more data to process in post when shooting really contrasty scenes.
Hope that helps.