D200 at ISO 1600

[Retief]

When I was out on Sunday morning it was pretty dim to begin the day requiring high ISO and slower shutter speeds. I shoot Auto ISO, which I like now on the D200 as well, and as you can see from my other images in the Bird gallery the ISO's varied. These were some from early on, ISO 1600 in the real world.

1.25 stops underexposed, at least. I applies a light touch of Noise Ninja, just the defaults.

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1 stop underexposed, no additional noise processing.

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Exposed much better, no additional noise processing.

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Scientific? No way, but these are "real world" as the world was on Sunday morning.

I don't think they are too awfully bad, what do you all think?

 

[Beezle]

These look great!

 

[phillip 200]

Hi Bill can I ask why you have got positive exposure compensation, I also find that under exposing tend's to increase the noise in the image, I feel that if the camera is set to its lowest noise reduction setting they don't tend to need running through other noise reduction software obviously this is my personal view and that is no way meant to offend you, I took a few ISO 1600 images this morning and they appear to have a lot less noise than your first shot, probably due to the 1.25 stops under exposure, I will post it in this thread if you find it objectionable I will remove it.

All the best

Phillip.

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Nikon D200
Focal Length: 800mm
Color Mode: Mode II (Adobe RGB)
Long Exposure NR: Off
High ISO NR: On (Normal)
2005/12/22 10:08:25.8
Exposure Mode: Aperture Priority
White Balance: Color Temp. (5000 K)
Tone Comp.: Low Contrast
Compressed RAW (12-bit)
Metering Mode: Multi-Pattern
AF Mode: AF-C
Hue Adjustment: 0°
Image Size: Large (3872 x 2592)
1/80 sec - F/6.3
Flash Sync Mode: Not Attached
Saturation: Moderate
Lens: 800mm F/5.6 D
Sensitivity: ISO 1600

 

[Russell Whyman]

Some very nice shots. Something for me to aim for.

 

[Retief]

Philipp, thanks for adding to this thread, much appreciated.

One of the situations that we run into constantly here in Washington is widely varying lighting conditions, especially in the early morning. As you can see, I often shoot birds from right on the water up into the sky. On my D2H I found that one great way to deal with this was to set Auto-ISO and let that vary as required, often shooting in Manual mode to control the other variables.

More often I shoot Shutter Priority, as I was in this case, but I try to keep above 1/500. In this case, as I recall, in order to get even close on exposure, I dropped the shutter speed to 1/500. Then I started using exposure comp to enable me to get the white birds exposed but not blow highlights, note that the last shot is +.3, not +.7. I wanted to test Auto-ISO as well on the D200 and as can be seen from the Swan shots I posted in the Birds forum, I am happy with this on the D200 as well.

I posted this set of three to show exactly what you point out, just look at the difference between the first and the third shot. But I was quite happy that I could bring up 1.25 under and not have utter trash, and if I worked this image a bit I could remove even more.

Once again this points out that getting the exposure and WB as correct as possible is a real key, and it also points out that the D200 does a great job at the higher ISO's as well.

ALso remember that on Sunday this was really not a "planned" test, I just wanted to shoot as I normally would, see what happens and then I can adjust my "style" from there. So far I don't see any major adjustments I need to make.

I also notice that you have a couple of other things set that I have not touched yet, such as saturation and setting WB directly. What have been your findings so far on these?

Again, thanks a bunch for participating in this thread, and always feel MORE than free to add an image or two to any thread I start. All it can do is to enhance the discussion and my learning. And most CERTAINLY no offense taken, I appreciate your comments and findings, as well as being in total agreement with you on the best ways to manage the whole noise issue.

 

[Retief]

Beezle and Russel, thanks for the comments.

As you can tell, I am quite happy with the results so far. As Philipp so correctly points out the real key is good exposure, and I'll add good WB to that also. But it sure is nice to be able to expect these kinds of results.

 

[RonS]

Bill, thanks for the explanation on the exposure compensation you went through on these shots.

Getting proper exposure is one of the processes I am weak on. With information like this I can look back on my previous shots and try to determine what corrections I should have made.