On 1 September 2010 11:02, Boris Liberman <bori...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Steve, if camera has highest ISO of 3200, it usually means that it is > unusable, but ISO 800 is pretty ok. So, if highest ISO is 12,800 (or even > 102,400) it probably means that ISO 3200 (or 32,000) is usable. It is like > fuel consumption figures of cars of battery longevity of cell phones. It is > all lies, but it is still (co)rel(l)ated to the real world in a manner of > speaking... > > Boris
I'm going to disagree here, and also qualify some comments that are being thrown around haphazardly in this thread (and all over the internet): 1) On some cameras, the maximum ISO is unusable, but that is not a universal truth. For example, on the K100D and K10D the maximum ISO is highly usable and of very good quality. There are probably other cameras out there for which this is true, but I can speak of these two cameras with user knowledge. 2) The K10D IS NOT RUBBISH at ISO 1600! People say all the time that the K10D is bad in low light, but never explain what this means. If by "low light" you mean "not enough light to achieve correct exposure", then yes, the K10D falls short when you underexpose and then try to recover an underexposed image. However, if by "low light" you mean "light so low that you need to use ISO 1600 for correct exposure", then no, the K10D is not bad. When proper exposure is achieved, the K10D works very well at ISO 1600: http://lh6.ggpht.com/_i6tc3TCyOTA/StaFNYxyztI/AAAAAAAACqA/ZjR63tKSk9M/s800/IMGP6109-small.jpg http://lh4.ggpht.com/Miserere/SP1U3Ik6lTI/AAAAAAAABrA/XBLIMplJLv0/s800/IMGP0313-small.jpg http://lh4.ggpht.com/Miserere/SP1U4StRHeI/AAAAAAAABrg/Vthl6szbqvk/s800/IMGP0345-small.jpg http://static.photo.net/attachments/bboard/00V/00VgZv-217447584.jpg The same is true for the K100D Super at ISO 3200: http://picasaweb.google.com/Miserere/TheFranklinKiteTTTheBearS20August2009#5389958172780052770 http://picasaweb.google.com/Miserere/TheFranklinKiteTTTheBearS20August2009#5389958224218569394 http://picasaweb.google.com/Miserere/TheFranklinKiteTTTheBearS20August2009#5389958203791795010 I've seen many shitty ISO 1600 shots from K10D's, and invariably they were shot by someone who didn't know how to shoot the K10D at high ISO, meaning they underexposed their images and then increased the exposure in postprocessing. High ISO shooting is a whole 'nother game, and I suspect it's different for each camera, but there's certainly a learning curve that most photographers don't crawl up before announcing to the World that a particular camera is bad at high ISO. You need a license to own a gun, but they let anyone shoot at ISO 6400. Rant over. And it wasn't directed at you, Boris. Sorry that your message was the one I replied to. Cheers, --M. -- \/\/o/\/\ --> http://WorldOfMiserere.com http://EnticingTheLight.com A Quest for Photographic Enlightenment -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
