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Optimum ISO setting for 5D

N

Noel Greene

pro member
I read in an article by 2 leading experts on digital imaging that each DSLR has an Optimum ISO setting and they encourage photographers to use the Optimum ISO setting for the particular camera in use. They also point out that when shooting in RAW only F Stop , ISO and Shutter Speed matter .. Can anyone tell me what the Optimum ISO setting for the 5D and the 1Ds III is please.

thank you

Noel Greene
 
Last edited by a moderator:
B

Bart_van_der_Wolf

pro member
Noel Greene said:
I read in an article by 2 leading experts on digital imaging that each DSLR has an Optimum ISO setting and they encourage photographers to use the Optimum ISO setting for the particular camera in use.
Click to expand...

Optimum can mean several things, depending on the shooting scenario, but I assume they were looking at noise and dynamic range. In that case it would be the ISO setting that produces the least noise and uses the least amplification, thus maintaining the highest dynamic range possible.

They also point out that when shooting in RAW only F Stop , ISO and Shutter Speed matter ..
Click to expand...

In most cases that's true, although e.g. white balance settings will affect the JPEG that's embedded in the Raw file, and the default settings that Raw converters use. Things become tricky when manufacturers allow noise reducion before writing the Raw data. Canon sofar doesn't apply noise reduction to the Raw data at exposures shorter than 1 second.

Can anyone tell me what the Optimum ISO setting for the D5 and the 1Ds III is please.
Click to expand...

I've measured it for the 1Ds Mark III, and it's ISO 100. From a quality point of view, the optional 'L' setting is essentially identical to ISO 100, although the camera's exposure metering is going to produce 1 stop more exposure which would reduce the dynamic range (in the highlights) if not corrected. That ISO 'L' behavior was confirmed in a later analysis, I've never used anything lower than ISO 100 since.

I'm not sure about the 5D (there is no Canon D5), because ISO 'L' is not implemented the same in all models (e.g. ISO 'L' is optimum in the 1Ds Mark II when actually exposed as ISO 70-80).

Bart
 
N

Noel Greene

pro member
Bart

Thanks for all this information and yes they were discussing noise and dynamic range.

I have the canon 5D .. I mispelt it as D5 .. maybe a Freudian slip .. in camera terms

I am relatively new to Digital imaging but I am learning as I go along

regards

Noel Greene
 
Cem_Usakligil

Cem_Usakligil

Well-known member
As a 5D user, I find ISO 100 to deliver the best quality on my 5D.

I see little difference when using ISO 200. 400 is a bit less but still very good.
All higher ISO values such as 800, 1600 and 3200 exhibit visible noise but they are very usable and the image resolution does not suffer much. Even ISO 3200 is usually quite good. I don't use ISO 50 except when I don't have an ND filter and I want to slow down the shutter speed as much as possible.

Please pay attention to the fact that you should not use the in-between values at all. Do not use ISO: 125, 160, 250, 320, 500, 640, 1000 and 1250. This results in an IQ degradation. Read the many articles on the net about this issue.

HTH.
 
J

John Sheehy

New member
Noel Greene said:
I read in an article by 2 leading experts on digital imaging that each DSLR has an Optimum ISO setting and they encourage photographers to use the Optimum ISO setting for the particular camera in use. They also point out that when shooting in RAW only F Stop , ISO and Shutter Speed matter .. Can anyone tell me what the Optimum ISO setting for the D5 and the 1Ds III is please.

thank you
Click to expand...

This is a tricky question, because it does not explicitly include the possibility that you have an aperture and shutter speed that you want to use. If you care about neither of these, then a good exposure at ISO 100 is going to be the best you can get.

If you have reason to use a specific aperture and shutter speed in ambient light, however, then the highest ISO that doesn't clip any highlights is going to give you the least noise.
 
M

Mike Bailey

pro member
As a landscape photographer, I typicially start with aperture priority on the 5D. I've tried the 'L' setting a few times, particularly when the light was getting too bright for a waterfall scene, and found the overall quality at that setting less than ISO 100 or 200. For landscape photography, then, ISO 100 or 200 seems to produce the best quality, with 100 holding a slight edge over 200. This is just from emperical results based on many thousands of frames with the 5D over the past 2 1/2 years (I didn't get it when it first came out).

Mike
 
N

Nill Toulme

New member
Cem_Usakligil said:
...Please pay attention to the fact that you should not use the in-between values at all. Do not use ISO: 125, 160, 250, 320, 500, 640, 1000 and 1250. This results in an IQ degradation. Read the many articles on the net about this issue.
Click to expand...

As I recall — almost certainly from an earlier thread on this forum — for the cameras I was and remain particularly interested in, i.e., the 1DMkII, MkIIN, and sMkII, this is true up to ISO 800 but not to higher ISOs. That is to say, while for example ISO 800 produces less noise than ISO 640, ISO 1600 produces more noise than ISOs 1000 and 1250. Accordingly it has been my practice to avoid the intermediate ISOs below 800, but to use the ones above as necessary.

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net
 
Cem_Usakligil

Cem_Usakligil

Well-known member
Nill Toulme said:
As I recall — almost certainly from an earlier thread on this forum — for the cameras I was and remain particularly interested in, i.e., the 1DMkII, MkIIN, and sMkII, this is true up to ISO 800 but not to higher ISOs. That is to say, while for example ISO 800 produces less noise than ISO 640, ISO 1600 produces more noise than ISOs 1000 and 1250. Accordingly it has been my practice to avoid the intermediate ISOs below 800, but to use the ones above as necessary.

Nill
~~
www.toulme.net
Click to expand...
On hindsight, I now remember that you are right Nill. But I have made such a sport of avoiding the in-between ISO values, that I have forgotten this useful fact. Thanks for reminding me :)

Cheers,
 
J

John Sheehy

New member
Nill Toulme said:
As I recall — almost certainly from an earlier thread on this forum — for the cameras I was and remain particularly interested in, i.e., the 1DMkII, MkIIN, and sMkII, this is true up to ISO 800 but not to higher ISOs. That is to say, while for example ISO 800 produces less noise than ISO 640, ISO 1600 produces more noise than ISOs 1000 and 1250. Accordingly it has been my practice to avoid the intermediate ISOs below 800, but to use the ones above as necessary.
Click to expand...

Yes, there is less disadvantage to the intermediate ISOs at the top end of the range, because the realtionship between read noise and ISO is already approaching a direct proportion there. ISO 1600 has almost double the read noise of ISO 800; ISO 200 in Canons usually have only about 1.1x as much read noise as ISO 100, so amplifying the ISO 100 noise by 1.25x and 1.6x for ISOs 125 and 160 results in too much read noise, compared to ISO 200.
 
J

John Sheehy

New member
Bart_van_der_Wolf said:
Maybe it is, since my 1Ds Mark II does benefit from an ISO 'L' setting with lower noise and a slightly larger dynamic range. So from my perspective, it depends on the specific model.
Click to expand...

I thought that the read noise at ISO 50 was the same in ADUs, and double in units of electrons, compared to ISO 100. If so, I can see less shot noise, but not less read noise.

Regardless, the camera should have started at an ISO that uses the full well capacity across the entire digitization range, as should all cameras. Obsessions with powers of 2 times 50 is ridiculous, IMO.
 
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