Flash vs. higher ISO

[Meetmer]

i shot some pics at my sons bday today. Indoors at a LEGO building party, lots of kids mostly not sitting still. Needed to shoot at least 1/125 and found the camera wanted to go as high as ISO 2500 when shooting at F2.8. - 3.2 with the kit zoom, and up to around ISO 1250 at F2with my 35 mm. I got some shots with my 56 1.2 at 1.2, ISO 400 at 1/60th but restricted by the long focal length. I took some shots with the free kit flash that came with my X-T2 and found the faces look artificially bright. What do people think is the best way to handle this challenging shooting scenario? I’m not sure I like the idea of having high ISO shots of my son on his bday, wondering what people’s thoughts are on the whole issue

doug

 

[Meetmer]

I haven’t tried manually lowering the power of the flash to serve more as a fill in, that sounds like a reasonable suggestion. I will need to look at the menu or see how to do that . What also was annoying was all my lenses were hunting a lot, even the 56 1.2.

what I really need, although won’t help the hunting, is to buy the 23 1.4 lens. It’s fast and a little wider so would be more useful indoors. It hasn’t been on a serious sale in a while and it’s not on sale at all now so going to have to wait. The kit zoom was useless indoors without the flash, the 35 f2 was not bad but still not fast enough, and the 56 1.2 too long for that space

 

[cilucia]

The 23 f1.4 may not solve your problems; my issue with that lens and shooting groups of people, even when they’re lined up next to each other, is that at 1.4, the DOF is still too shallow, so one person’s eyes will be in focus, while another’s is not.

Personally, I will take a high iso picture any day over one that is slightly misfocused, blurry, or only one person is in focus. I don’t print huge (maybe 8x10 in a photobook, max), so I don’t think it’s a huge issue. I really don’t remember the last time I thought “too bad the high ISO ruined this shot” — maybe a product photo for eBay.

 

[Erik Baumgartner]

It’s true, the pic is not bad. I usually cringe when I have to shoot as high as 2500 but I suppose it’s worse if people are dark and blurry due to too slow a shutter speed and improper exposure

ISO 2500-3200 is no problem for an X-T2 (or 20). This is 2500 pushed 3/4 stop in post. You'll get a little noise, but won't loose much in terms of tonality.

 

[tokumeino]

The 23 f1.4 may not solve your problems; my issue with that lens and shooting groups of people, even when they’re lined up next to each other, is that at 1.4, the DOF is still too shallow, so one person’s eyes will be in focus, while another’s is not.

+1 : to shoot groups, you need to avoid shallow DOF. The result is very odd when people in a group are in focus while others are not. It is obvious and displeasant IMO.

I really think that you need to pratcice with flash. I'm only at the begining on the learning curve and I think that learning to use a flash properly is much more difficult than most things in photography. But it is rewarding.

Tip : at the very begining, I used to practice on a statue. I took a full afternoon in my living room, playing with curtains to modulate ambiant light, and performing many experiments to check by myself what I read in books.

Personally, I will take a high iso picture any day over one that is slightly misfocused, blurry, or only one person is in focus. I don’t print huge (maybe 8x10 in a photobook, max), so I don’t think it’s a huge issue. I really don’t remember the last time I thought “too bad the high ISO ruined this shot” — maybe a product photo for eBay.

Agree again. Don't be obsessed by noise. To convince yourself, take a picture at various ISO, postprocess and send to a lab for a good A4 print. You can even crop 2x to see what it would look like on A3 paper. It will cost you a litlle bit for the experiment, but you'll learn much more that way than watching DPR controled test shots. I think that one has to be very picky to reject a 3200ISO shoot solely because of noise. Misfocus, moving blur (objects or camera) are much more immediately noticeable and disturbing than a low amount of noise. What you loose with 3200 ISO is so negligible when compared to photographers mistakes like wrong SS, too narrow DOF or misfocus !

For familly shots, 3200 ISO remains very clean IMO. And 3200 ISO is the same as 800 ISO pushed by 2 stops in post. The following won't suit everybody but with your Fuji camera, you can decorelate exposure and the brightness EVF/screen : you always see a bright scene but the exposure will be different. What you see in the EVF is the indication of number of EV from your exposure and what auto-exposure would provide. It can be usefull to shoot at no more than 800 ISO even if it leads to underexposure (in that case you adjust in post).

 

[Christof21]

i shot some pics at my sons bday today. Indoors at a LEGO building party, lots of kids mostly not sitting still. Needed to shoot at least 1/125 and found the camera wanted to go as high as ISO 2500 when shooting at F2.8. - 3.2 with the kit zoom, and up to around ISO 1250 at F2with my 35 mm. I got some shots with my 56 1.2 at 1.2, ISO 400 at 1/60th but restricted by the long focal length. I took some shots with the free kit flash that came with my X-T2 and found the faces look artificially bright. What do people think is the best way to handle this challenging shooting scenario? I’m not sure I like the idea of having high ISO shots of my son on his bday, wondering what people’s thoughts are on the whole issue

doug

I think you should set the ISO, it is not surprising that your camera "wants" to select an high Iso in low light !!

I guess you are in auto-iso ?

 

[Meetmer]

I do usually set either the f-stop or the shutter speed and leave ISO on auto. In the menu system I have three presets where I can put the minimum shutter speed‘s and maximum ISO that I will tolerate on auto settings. Still I do my best to try and keep the ISO as low as possible but I agree with other posters that it would be better to except more grain but have no blur. I guess I’m always a little bit surprised when I think things are in focus until I get home and look it up on my 27 inch monitor.

 

[Christof21]

I do usually set either the f-stop or the shutter speed and leave ISO on auto. In the menu system I have three presets where I can put the minimum shutter speed‘s and maximum ISO that I will tolerate on auto settings. Still I do my best to try and keep the ISO as low as possible but I agree with other posters that it would be better to except more grain but have no blur. I guess I’m always a little bit surprised when I think things are in focus until I get home and look it up on my 27 inch monitor.

So you have to understand how flash works with Fuji (it can depend on camera, I describe the Fuji way).

There is no difference between flash and no flash, it will use the same parameters !! So it will select high ISO, this is normal.

You expose for the ambient light and the flash will compensate for the missing light.

What you have to do is switch to manual and select a lower ISO. Simple !

You should also select preview exposure off, otherwise your LCD/EVF may be too dark.

I can go deeper in the explanations if you are interested

 

[cilucia]

and it’s more flash than I’ll ever need, because I am just an enthusist (and a LAZY one at that).

I’m going to get raked over the coals for admitting this, but I honestly just put the flash on, set the ISO to 400 or 800, set the shutter speed to say 125 or 250, set the aperture to something that gives me the right DOF (say around 4, 5.6 maybe), and let the flash work out how much power to give. I’ll point it up to the ceiling or to the nearest wall, play around with the angle. Then, even lazier, I’ll set the exposure dial on my body if things still look a bit dark. I’m going to have my Fujifilm card revoked after this admission, but it is really not difficult if you don’t want it to be

 

[Flash Photo]

I think many of us can improve our pictures by using flash more often.

If you want to take pictures at a baptising in a dark church. Either you need to crank up ISO very high or you use one or a couple of flashes. Remember that you often also need depth of field if you have more than one person in the frame. The same of course goes for a wedding. I have now shot many of both and so far no priest have sad no when I have asked them if I can use flashes.




Baptising, catholic chapel in Split, Croatia. Low ceiling made it more difficult to spread the light.



Another baptising in Sweden. The church is not so dark but have very strong lighting from one side because of huge windows. To even out the light I had to bounce 2 strong flashes up to the ceiling that goes up to 10 meters up.




Church in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Flash is also almost necessary for catching kids when they are playing. Even with high ISO you often don't get enough light in a room to freeze the action.











There is also many situations outdoors where a flash can even out the light or give you a different photo.

Here my dog is playing where the sunshine comes down through the trees and give very deep shadows and bright highlights at the same time.





It takes some time to learn to handle flashlight. You should preferably directly buy a flash that you can use off the camera and a trigger.

Keep it simple and try to use walls, and ceilings to bounce the flashes. Mostly that works very well. Don't go and buy light modifiers like soft boxes and umbrellas before you really need them. I have them but avoid them. With light stand and modifiers you get som much more to drag around. You need assistants very often that can support the light stands or they might blow over and ruin your flash.

 

[Christof21]

Deeper explanations:

If you use auto-iso with EC=0, then there is good chance that your photo is exposed correctly from start !

The camera uses the same settings with or without flash, so in low light it will use a high ISO, no surprise.

Besides, because it is already exposed correctly, your camera does not need to use flash (in fact usually it uses flash but very litlle..)

Suppose now you keep auto-iso but with EC=-1:

The exposure compensation only changes ambient light, not total lightness (which will be achieved thanks to the flash). What this means is that it will underbrighten by 1ev, again exactly as if you had no flash. And the flash will add the EV missing.

Globally you have an image at lower ISO which is cleaner thanks to the help of flash.

You can continue by decreasing EC which will add more flash at lower ISO (cleaner image).

It is perfectly feasible to use auto-iso, I have explained why at the end you had high ISO shots.

The best thing is certainly to use manual mode..

In manual you set all parameters (shutter speed, aperture, iso),and when all set, you see how it is exposed if you look at your metering scale (you can display it in the LCD or EVF). The EC dial has no effect in manual, but you see how you exposed thanks to this scale.

Imagine that you reach 0 in this scale, this generally means that it is correctly exposed and no (or little) flash will be used.

Anyway, just set the aperture, shutter speed (slower than the sync speed) and ISO you want, it will set the ambient light.

The flash will add the missing light (if it is powerfull enough) to expose correctly your subject.

Note that the total light remains unchanged so far... I explained the ambient light.

When you want to change the total light (on your subject), you use the flash compensation.

So if you see that your subject is too bright, use the flash compensation.

For the exposure compensation, you can ignore it like most people you are in manual, but I just wanted to explain what happened in your case.

I hope this is more clear.

You will find good information on this site, especially to explain flash/light:

https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/camera-flash-2.htm

 

[Meetmer]

Thank you that is very informative, i will take a look at that tutorial.. Flash is tricky, usually i find the pictures to look artificially bright if i am standing too close. The birthday cake had blown highlights. Other photos where i was standing further away looked better. I do think i am going to just try allowing the ISO to go as high as 3200 but also maybe buy a better flash like the godox which will be much more powerful than the kit flash and then bounce off of the ceiling. It is not practical for me to have a separate flash unit, or use assistants, or anything like that for casual shooting.

To the person who told me the 23 mm 1.4 wouldn't solve my problem, i agree the shallow DOF is an issue, but it also depends how far away the photographer is standing and I agree if all people aren't lined up it's not going to work. At 1.4 from 6 feet away the DOF is 0.53 feet in front and 0.64 feet behind the focal plane. At 8 feet it increases to 0.91 feet in front and 1.19 feet behind. At 3 feet its only 0.14 feet in front and 0.15 feet behind

doug

 

[Rob-in-Alberta]

i’ll tell you what i do cause i got two kids and that’s all i shoot. i find this works in most situations to good results. I have an Godox 350, but i rarely use it excep for staged shots. Even a little onboard fill flash does wonders even at higher iso. The noise isn’t that bad at 3200 if faces are filled in.

1. set the flash compensation to -1.

2. put the flash compensation in your q menu so you can adjust it quickly. or to a quick button.

3 somewhere between -1 and -2 you can for the flash and not blow too much out. it diffuses naturally depending on how far you are

4. if you can, put a small piece of paper in front of it to diffuse it even more so it’s not as harsh. i’ve use a napkin or tissue before cause they are always around at kids parties.

5. just practice and see the results.

 

[Pritzl]

ISO is not important. Noise is the result of not enough light, not high ISO. They just happen to occur in tandem.

So, when shooting indoors, take a first test pic using the widest aperture and slowest shutter speed the situation can tolerate. You have just captured the most light you can under the conditions. Let the ISO settle wherever to provide the right image brightness. Examine the result. If you are satisfied, continue. If not, you'll need to improve the lighting somehow and a good bounce-capable flash is a good start; for Fuji, the Godox system would be my choice.

 

[Ed B]

Thank you that is very informative, i will take a look at that tutorial.. Flash is tricky, usually i find the pictures to look artificially bright if i am standing too close. The birthday cake had blown highlights. Other photos where i was standing further away looked better. I do think i am going to just try allowing the ISO to go as high as 3200 but also maybe buy a better flash like the godox which will be much more powerful than the kit flash and then bounce off of the ceiling. It is not practical for me to have a separate flash unit, or use assistants, or anything like that for casual shooting.

To the person who told me the 23 mm 1.4 wouldn't solve my problem, i agree the shallow DOF is an issue, but it also depends how far away the photographer is standing and I agree if all people aren't lined up it's not going to work. At 1.4 from 6 feet away the DOF is 0.53 feet in front and 0.64 feet behind the focal plane. At 8 feet it increases to 0.91 feet in front and 1.19 feet behind. At 3 feet its only 0.14 feet in front and 0.15 feet behind

doug

Here are a few pictures taken over the years all using a flash attachment. A couple taken with a DSLR and a couple taken with old compact cameras but all were taken using either a Canon or a Metz flash.

I use a flash for a lot of my indoor images and use fill flash for many of my outdoor images.

A decent flash doesn't cost much money and I really think everyone who loves photography should at least experiment and make up their own minds about whether they like using one or not.

 

[The Ghost of Caravaggio]

In the situation you describe there aren't many options.

• Use the minimum amount of flash light possible. I abandoned automatic flash operation to simplify having more control over the ambient-flash balance.
• If you are lucky, you can mount a flash on the camera hot shoe and rotate the head 180 deg. opposite the lens. Aim the flash head angle to bounce off a large surface. This is not always possible.
  • There could be no bounce surface near by.
  • The surface could be a dark color and, or absorb light.
  • The relatively high flash level means there will be a recycle delay for the flash to charge. The delay will get longer as the flash batteries deplete.
• The ideal solution is on or more off-camera flash units triggered by wireless remotes. When the flash light is indirect (bounced off large surfaces) the results can have a natural look. With kids running around this is not a practical solution.I have placed flashes high up in furniture or shelves using clamps or a small base. Again, the idea is to use the lowest practical level of bounced flash light
• Sometimes you just have to live with using the ambient light. IN this case I use raw files, set ISO to 1600 and set the shutter time and aperture as needed. Then you must brighten the images as needed during post-production. In very low light I resort to monochrome rendering. Of course this method has two disadvantages.
  • You can't check focus in-camera. This means you have to be very good at using the AF system.
  • You can't conveniently share the images on-location as in the in-camera JPEG rendering will appear too dark.

 

[Meetmer]

sharper at higher shutter speed with higher ISO 6400




ISO 1000, 1/125 note the motion artifact / blur

This comparison goes to the discussion about how images at higher ISO appear. Top image actually looks preferable

 

[Michigan Sandman]

One of the reasons the top image looks better is because of the higher shutter speed. Your are shooting the 55-200mm lens at 200mm, the longer the lens the more it will show the smallest of shake or movement. Shooting with my Nikon gear, if I shoot with my 300mm f/4 lens, my shutter speed would be at least 1/500. No shutter shake, and this is a heavy lens, and it is usually handheld. If it is windy or uneven terrain I would up the shutter speed. I find the Fuji 55-200mm a really good lens for a reasonable price. Happy shooting.

 

[Meetmer]

I agree that the faster shutter speed helps, remember the cars on the freeway are moving. The lens has OIS that is usually 4 stops so i think 1/125 potentially could be okay, yet i agree the 1/250 was better. My point was, if my fear is about image degradation due to high ISO the blurriness from the slower shutter speed had much more of an impact on image quality than the ISO, which actually looked fine at 6400

 

[phototeacher]

I agree that the faster shutter speed helps, remember the cars on the freeway are moving. The lens has OIS that is usually 4 stops so i think 1/125 potentially could be okay, yet i agree the 1/250 was better. My point was, if my fear is about image degradation due to high ISO the blurriness from the slower shutter speed had much more of an impact on image quality than the ISO, which actually looked fine at 6400

Of course the fast shutter speeds stops action more effectively, but I don't understand your comment about OIS. Image Stabilization (whether In Body or In Lens) will help lessen camera shake at slower shutter speeds, which will lessen some blur caused by camera movement, but if you want to really 'stop' action (cars, runners, bikers, jumpers, etc.) then you do that with a faster shutter speed; OIS will NOT help with action-stopping, only with camera shake/movement. If the light levels are low, or the camera lens will not open up enough, then the only way to get the faster shutter speed needed to stop action would be by increasing the ISO. High ISO results are subjective, depending on the viewer's tastes, and also are dependent on whether you are printing large sizes, or pixel-peeping at 100% or more on a large computer screen. For this reason only the viewer (you) can decide what ISO makes the photo too noisy, but I have no problems with ISO 6400 printed to 8x10, or viewed on a screen full frame, not zoomed in 100% ! Also, is it better to have an in-focus,action stopped noisy shot, or no shot at all?

 

[Meetmer]

Oh sorry, you are right I misspoke. I was thinking that the OIS would help the slight blurriness of the Best Buy sign which could have been due to camera shake. I’m not sure why 1/125 wasn’t enough in that case