{"id":21873,"date":"2014-10-24T23:54:33","date_gmt":"2014-10-24T22:54:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.permuted.org.uk\/photography\/?p=21873"},"modified":"2014-10-24T23:54:33","modified_gmt":"2014-10-24T22:54:33","slug":"photography-in-the-gloom-high-iso","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.permuted.org.uk\/photography\/photography-in-the-gloom-high-iso\/","title":{"rendered":"Photography in the Gloom (high ISO)"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s been very quiet this week. We’ve enjoyed (?) plenty of rain and mist, grey skies and a semi-permanent twilight. Not great for taking photos. <\/p>\n

The main challenge of poor (i.e. low) light is the compromise between getting a fast shutter speed (needed to freeze the action) and keeping digital noise down. Getting a decent shutter speed means moving to a high ISO rating, but anything above 1600 (or even ISO 800) causes a lot of digital noise. Some of this can be removed with software, but the quality of the image suffers. If you go for a low ISO, the shutter slows to a crawl and the image blurs. This first shot of a rat was taken at ISO 3200 with a shutter speed of barely 1\/25s. Actually surprisingly ok (and hand-held) but not something I want to try every day.<\/p>\n

\"rat<\/a><\/p>\n

Later in the day the rats were at play and the light had improved. This one is at a tolerable ISO 1600 and 1\/500s shutter.<\/p>\n

\"rat<\/a>
Rat on rock<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Usable images, but a real struggle. That may all change very soon. I’m awaiting delivery of a Canon 7D Mark II, a long awaited and by all accounts much improved version of the 7D. High ISO performance should be a great deal better, focusing faster and more accurate (the auto-focus manual runs to 50+ pages alone, and supposedly auto-focus works in moonlight!). I should be getting mine in a week’s time (pre-ordered, so one of the first in the UK). I can’t wait to try it out, and for once I won’t be cursing the dimly lit mornings, and grey afternoons. Bring it on!<\/p>\n

Camera note: all photos taken with the Canon 7D and EF 100-400mm f\/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s been very quiet this week. We’ve enjoyed (?) plenty of rain and mist, grey skies and a semi-permanent twilight. Not great for taking photos. The main challenge of poor (i.e. low) light is the compromise between getting a fast shutter speed (needed to freeze the action) and keeping digital noise down. Getting a decent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[781],"tags":[127,1183],"class_list":["post-21873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rats","tag-camera","tag-rat","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t