My Auto ISO testing

[toomanycanons]

These are just random static landscape shots from today to see how well Auto ISO on my Z6 performs, me having never used Auto ISO before. Lots of shade, some sunlight

I was checking mainly for correct exposure, however the Z6s computing figured it. Minimum shutter speed (on A) was 1/100

As always, these aren't SOOC, I did some tweaking in Lightroom but you can check the ISO the camera chose

Peering down to Geneva Creek from the road







The road to Guanella Pass was unpaved till maybe 15 years ago. I hate dirt roads and had forgotten about this route till I found out it had been paved, now it's one of my favorite day trips



Lots of hiker bridges over the creek







As seen from Guanella Pass proper, Mt. Bierstadt at 14,066' on a cool rainy day. I was checking for recent snowfall (yes, in August) but doesn't look like it got cold enough up there. This was shot through my drivers side window

 

[toomanycanons]

I didn't know what to expect, except maybe it would work as advertised. As it is, in my use case, I didn't come across any downsides. On every shot, it raised the ISO more than I would have manually but not catastrophically

I'm also used to choosing to manually shoot at lower shutter speeds than the 1/100 I set (within reason) but that option isn't available when I've set minimum shutter at 1/100, right? I don't know if I'll ever get used to seeing ISO numbers other than 100/200/400/800 etc. ISO 360 or 140 or 1000 just seems wrong, what can I say?

And to think there is a high percentage here who always use Auto ISO and are probably wondering what the heck I'm going on about

I wonder if Auto ISO works the same on my Z50? Hmmmm...

 

[JA_Johnson]

I And to think there is a high percentage here who always use Auto ISO and are probably wondering what the heck I'm going on about

Yes.

 

[AWG_Pics]

And to think there is a high percentage here who always use Auto ISO and are probably wondering what the heck I'm going on about

That would be me. However I am impressed how you continuously try to learn new things and don't give up. You live in a great place. I am a former geologist and some of us like to say: "The most interesting people live near tectonically active areas, such as mountains!"

 

[toomanycanons]

at a client's insistence. My go-to lens at the time didn't have VR (on my D850) and I had to keep my shutter at minimum 1/60 hand held

I remember setting Auto ISO back then at ISO 400 tops and the camera always shot at 400 even when I could have gotten away with 200 or less. Maybe I didn't have Auto ISO set up properly but I really didn't want to shoot every shot (downtown scenes) at 400

Anyway, I'm probably going to go back to manually setting the ISO to as low as I can get away with because that's what I'm used to and that will avoid the brain damage of seeing ISO 140 and 560 and 1000

 

[Howard V]

They all look beautiful to me. I also enjoyed your comments and captions. You’ve inspired me to get out today.



It’s surprising, to see the Asters already in bloom. But then, it is almost September.

 

[Howard V]

I’m just two days into testing my “new” Z 50, with default to Auto ISO and Auto minimum shutter speed. In low light it’s setting the shutter speed to match the focal length set on my kit zoom, and my 23 prime (which it reads as effectively 1/40 for the crop factor). ISOs seem a bit higher than I’d set manually in the same light levels, but I don’t see image noise being a problem. And it’s nice not to have to be steadily conscious of manually changing ISO.

 

[sirhawkeye64]

I didn't know what to expect, except maybe it would work as advertised. As it is, in my use case, I didn't come across any downsides. On every shot, it raised the ISO more than I would have manually but not catastrophically

I'm also used to choosing to manually shoot at lower shutter speeds than the 1/100 I set (within reason) but that option isn't available when I've set minimum shutter at 1/100, right? I don't know if I'll ever get used to seeing ISO numbers other than 100/200/400/800 etc. ISO 360 or 140 or 1000 just seems wrong, what can I say?

And to think there is a high percentage here who always use Auto ISO and are probably wondering what the heck I'm going on about

I wonder if Auto ISO works the same on my Z50? Hmmmm...

I think to do a proper test you need to photograph the same scene with and without auto ISO and shoot JPEG only (and not tweak in post) to get the most accurate comparison.

In my experiences, auto ISO on the Z cameras is quite good and I trust it probably 95% of the time I use it (sometimes in difficult lighting situations, it may choose an ISO that is not ideal, but part of that can also come down to metering mode and the scene itself, but overall, it's way better than auto ISO used to be). I would suspect that the results you found here are probably pretty close to what you'd find on your Z50 as well as I would think Nikon uses the same logic for all cameras, although there could be tiny differences related to (low-light) capabilities/differences of the FF sensors vs APSC sensors.

For me, the specific ISO number doesn't matter that much and I don't put too much emphasis on it as long as it falls within my "acceptable" region of ISOs (which on my current cameras is about ISO 64-6400). The only times I might take note and adjust the ISO is if I'm nearing the point where the dual gain sensor kicks in (so on my Zf, that's 800... so if i find myself around ISO 640 or ISO 500 I might just run it up to ISO 800 to take advantage of the reduced noise and increase in DR).

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