6d settings

[joel222]

I will be assisting at two weddings this weekend, and at somepoint will be taking some shots. I have been using my 550d for this previously, mostly in av with iso 400-800 indoors and 100 outside, but a lot of the time the shutter speed drops too low. I have recently took delivery of a 6d with 24-105 and would like to use it this weekend. How far will I be able to push the iso indoors without noticeable noise?

 

[Phil V]

I will be assisting at two weddings this weekend, and at somepoint will be taking some shots. I have been using my 550d for this previously, mostly in av with iso 400-800 indoors and 100 outside, but a lot of the time the shutter speed drops too low. I have recently took delivery of a 6d with 24-105 and would like to use it this weekend. How far will I be able to push the iso indoors without noticeable noise?

It doesn't matter. If the choice becomes noisy or blurred?

Noisy shots can be delivered, blurred ones can't . It's dead simple.

And that's without the chorus from all the pro photographers which goes something like:

No customer has ever complained about a 'noisy' image

Image noise is what guys with cameras obsess about instead of learning how to take good pictures.

 

[HoppyUK]

I will be assisting at two weddings this weekend, and at somepoint will be taking some shots. I have been using my 550d for this previously, mostly in av with iso 400-800 indoors and 100 outside, but a lot of the time the shutter speed drops too low. I have recently took delivery of a 6d with 24-105 and would like to use it this weekend. How far will I be able to push the iso indoors without noticeable noise?

Define 'noticeable' noise.

The most common problems are not so much inherent noise, but a) under-exposure, and b) excessive cropping. Avoid both those things and you should be fine.

On the other hand, you could always just try it

 

[joel222]

Cheers for the replies. you're both right. Just wanted to make sure I could push it right up without being dissaointed when got home and put the pics on computer. Trial and error i suppose.

 

[Nod]

Yup, trial and error BUT the time for the trials and most especially the errors is before the event rather than after! Take some test shots in conditions as close to those you expect to find at the venue and see how far you can push the ISO before noise gets to be a problem at the final expected print size. Don't pixel peep them to look for the noise, look at full sized prints - they tend to be more forgiving. Depending on the couple's taste, B&W conversions also tend to be more forgiving than colour - nasty noise in a colour shot can convert to "arty" graininess in a mono conversion... Don't forget that there are plenty of ways to reduce noise in PP as well, including some free bits of software.

 

[Russ77]

I've produced acceptable images at ISO6400 using my 7D which has got quite a bad (and unjustified IMO) reputation when it comes to "noise"

As above, shoot using the settings that give you the shots you want, if that means bumping up the ISO then don't be afraid to do so

 

[Andy_S]

No customer has ever complained about a 'noisy' image

Image noise is what guys with cameras obsess about instead of learning how to take good pictures.

Indeed Noticeable noise on images can be (mostly) cleaned up, and a sharp noisy image is far better than a clean blurry mess because of a low shutter speed.

I got my 6D last weekend and one of the first things I did was check the high ISO ability, it was one of my reasons for upgrading from a 500D.
Pointing it at my housemate, inside at night; f16, 1/200, ISO26500 and wow!
On the back of the camera it looked good zooming in. Imported it to Lightroom and there was obvious noise, roughly similar to 3200 on my 500D. A quick play with some of the sliders and the image was 'clean'.
Here's a 100% crop, yes it still looks a bit noisy, but bear in mind it's only a fraction (~1/50) of the whole image. Viewing as a whole it will looks much better. I could have pushed the noise reduction slider much further, but I was at the point the skin was beginning to look artificially smooth (melted,) which was worse than the noise that remained.

IMG_0065 by Andy_S_C, on Flickr