Whether you’re using full auto, aperture priority, shutter speed priority, or manual mode, there’s a setting that could make your life easier. Here’s why it could be useful to almost every photographer out there.
For an embarrassingly large chunk of my camera-wielding history, I shot fully manual, setting shutter speed, aperture, and ISO myself. Typically, capturing action, I’d find myself tweaking my ISO to govern my exposure while relying on the histogram on the back of my DSLR to keep an eye on my exposure.
If someone had told me about Auto ISO, I could have saved myself a lot of fiddling around and probably captured far more keepers as a result. Discovering this setting was liberating, freeing me up to make more creative decisions rather than finding myself constantly distracted by having to keep such a close eye on my settings. Obviously, you still have to keep it in mind, but Auto ISO requires less concentration, allowing you to focus on other aspects.
If you’ve not tried it, you might fall into one of two camps: someone who’s yet to stray away from the Program mode, or someone who’s a hardened fully manual shooter that doesn’t want to relinquish any degree of control. Whichever camp you fall into, watch this video, give Auto ISO a try, and see how you get on. I made the change and never looked back. Let us know your take on Auto ISO in the comments below.
Is this seriously an actual article worth publishing on F-Stoppers. This place really has become the toilet of the photographic world.
It's literally on the same level as, 'If you haven't tried toilet paper yet, give it a go!" and "for a large chunk of my massively unsuccessful rock-climbing photographic career (not really a career), I didn't realise that ropes were a good idea! But now I think they're great - give them a go!"
Way to go, Andy. Definitely one of you best.
I really can't understand why you spent so much effort on your vitriolic reply if the article was so worthless to you.
Do you see this as just a place for the super technical photographers who know absolutely every setting on their camera and can set it blindfolded?
"This place really has become the toilet of the photographic world."
Yet you seem to be wallowing in it. Positively Freudian.
Get a life, dude.
Sure, but I'm still wondering: Is it okay to use telephoto lenses for landscape photography?
FStoppers hasn't addressed this issue in what seems like hours, and I'm getting nervous.
At the time of my comment there were two existing comments, both critical of an article aimed at the less experience/technical photographers...
Guys, nobody starts off knowing everything. Don't be so negative, does it really make you feel better? Perhaps you should try taking some photos instead.
Auto-ISO is a cool tool, one that some highly experienced photographers may not have played with because they're too busy shooting or simply didn't see it become available a mere decade ago.
When I first played with it, it was crap. You couldn't set shutter limits very easily and it didn't have ISO limits. I had that camera for quite a few years and was slow to play with it again when I got a newer camera - Took a few months before I had the time to experiment.
Fast forward a few years to present day and auto-ISO is something I use a lot, but it's also something that I may amend the limits or even turn off depending on what I'm shooting. At the end of the day, it's just another tool with it's own strengths and weaknesses.
Amen.
Perhaps I misinterpreted "every photographer" to mean "every photographer" rather than "beginner photographers", The problem here is and has been the titles of articles which seem to be intended to be less informative and more click bait.
I've been taking photos since about 1960, and I must admit, I never tried auto-ISO!
I just wish the Kodak Brownie had it, way back when I started…
You write that this article is aimed at the less expirienced photographers, and in that case you would right. Author however, said that 90% of the photographers should give it a go, and in that light the negatieve reactions are correct.
I' ve been taking photo's since my 10', so I' ve learned the hard wat how to use ISO, then ASA or DIN, you used the value written on the box, and adjusted f-stop and schutter accordingly. So no, I won't give it ba go
If only you experienced TAv mode on Pentax bodies.... That was truly useful....
Auto iso is only good in low light. Auto shutter is better for when you have lots of light. Still, auto iso isn't that good. Better to go full manual in low light. I can't believe this is real. Auto iso is mostly bad
I find that auto Iso is very useful in photographing wildlife, particularly birds in flight, even in bright conditions. I set the aperture depending upon the separation of the subject and the foreground/background and generally shoot at a high shutter speed to stop action. Since the lighting and background can change drastically in very short order, auto Iso is quite helpful to get proper exposure in high and dynamic lighting conditions. A perfect use case is photographing hummingbirds. In most cases, to freeze the motion of the wings, one must shoot at least 1/4000 sec. Even when allowing a little wing blur for dramatic effect, one can rarely go below 1/2000 sec. As hummingbirds are so agile, the lighting conditions and background can change in an instant. So, even in bright conditions, auto shutter would have very little latitude in nailing exposure, Much more effective to use auto Iso. I find this mode useful for photographing running horses as well, for the same reason. Even though I can use a much slower shutter speed, the range of shutter speed is still quite limited depending upon the desired rendering of the leg motion and the flowing of the mane. I wouldn't want to lose control of aperture, so auto Iso works very well.
I am just a hobbyist and not a professional photographer. I would certainly be interested in hearing whether or not hardcore wildlife photographers find auto Iso to be valuable.
I use auto ISO because I need full control over shutter speed. Sometimes I select a slower speed to help keep the ISO low and sometimes to deliberately capture motion but other times I need to use a fast shutter speed to freeze motion. Auto ISO is extremely useful for me, even on bright sunny days. Saying it is mostly bad is just a sweeping generalisation which many will disagree with.
1000%
The only time I don't use it is when using flash/strobes.
man. just imagine, being born, and you already know how to walk as a baby. the comments here are really toxic. its like these people know everything already and they are done learning anything new in life. isnt life a learning process? if the article is making this place a "toilet of the photographic world" then my guy, WHY ARE YOU HERE? delete your account and go somewhere else with that toxic sh3t. there will always be beginners and there will always be pros.
Obviously there should be a choice for Fstoppers when they enter.. Savants, and The great unwashed. Good God.
take a fancy camera
add a great lens
then ruin the whole package by allowing the camera to use the most destructive component to adjust itself
sure you can get a picture at iso 800 instead of 200
but it will likely look a lot less "quality"
if you ever reach the point where you want to create a consistency in your work, you should find the iso setting at which you get the most pleasing results, and set it there
then, if you can't shoot under conditions that allow the optimal, you should adjust - but only when necessary
Auto-ISO using 800 instead of 200? Sounds like you had Exp Compensation set incorrectly; or weren't paying attention to the 2 other settings; or you just made that up in an attempt make it sound so devastating.
Most (all?) relatively modern cameras allow you to set the min and max ISO for auto-ISO as well as the min shutter.
Simply set the max ISO to one that isn't too noisy for your liking, then set the min shutter to one that's appropriate for your subject - The camera will always use the lowest ISO it can.
My personal experience with auto-ISO has been really positive (except for when I shot with an elderly Canon).
Are you using an aps-c DSLR from ten years ago because modern mirrorless cameras are really good with high ISO noise control. I can shoot at 1600 ISO and get excellent results. Where I live, natural light sources are constantly changing and having auto ISO is a godsend. As a street photographer, I need full control over aperture and shutter speed and can afford to have the ISO on auto to keep consistent exposure. It works really well for me. Consistency for me doesn’t mean a constant ISO value because you’d then need to adjust aperture or shutter speed if the light changes and consistency with those setting for me is more important.
Don't you run into the same proble as using shutter priority when shooting BIF? The meter being fooled by the bright background and under exposing the bird?
All the auto-ISO is doing is trying to keep the shutter speed above the minimum you've set.
If your camera's metering is fooled in a given mode without auto-ISO it'll be fooled with. If your metering is thrown though, perhaps you need to use a different metering mode/method or even use exposure compensation.
If you really want to try something "different", go read the actual International Organization for Standardization, ISO 12232:2019 paper. One of the things you will learn is that the ISO standard applies only to jpegs. At best, the so-called "exposure triangle" is isosceles, not equilateral. As you say, give it a go.
Whenever I read comments like yours, I laugh. Living in past where you just settled for the shots under the guise of "keepers". And, you probably don't shoot anything fast paced.
Reading bios like yours also makes me laugh. Just can't stay away can you. :D