how important is locking the mirror

Why not just do some tests, some with lockup and some without. As you are shooting digital and not film, make the most of being able to test at no expense, plus getting yourself immediate results.

Sam-D
 
Vibration from mirror slap is usually most noticeable around 1/4-1/15sec, and it can be quite bad. Shorter speeds show it less, and with longer speeds the camera settles quickly so it doesn't effect most of the exposure.

Personally, I always try use mirror-lock up on a tripod, and ceratinly at anything between 1/60sec and one second. Ironically, sometimes it is worse on a tripod, particularly if you have the centre-column extended* as that provides a very unstable platform and in normal use your hands act as very effective vibration damping.

If you shoot in live view, which is brilliant on a tripod, the mirror is already locked up.

*if you want vibration-free stability, avoid using anything more than a couple of inches of centre-column extension.
 
HoppyUK said:
Vibration from mirror slap is usually most noticeable around 1/4-1/15sec, and it can be quite bad. Shorter speeds show it less, and with longer speeds the camera settles quickly so it doesn't effect most of the exposure.

Personally, I always try use mirror-lock up on a tripod, and ceratinly at anything between 1/60sec and one second. Ironically, sometimes it is worse on a tripod, particularly if you have the centre-column extended* as that provides a very unstable platform and in normal use your hands act as very effective vibration damping.

If you shoot in live view, which is brilliant on a tripod, the mirror is already locked up.

*if you want vibration-free stability, avoid using anything more than a couple of inches of centre-column extension.
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Thanks for the info Mr Hoppy. I went to my custom setting and changed a few things like enabling the mirror lock. I was worried that this may effect other setting and I wouldn't find out until I uploaded the pics. I'm going on vacation the day after tomorrow so I do not have time to check things out. It's interesting that the camera goes to mirror lock wail in live mode. Sense it does that automatically I'm not sure if there is a point in messing with the setting if all I have to do is push one button and I'm done.
 
I must admit i often forget to do that for long exposures, But i do have my camera set so as to dampen mirror slap. Well i guess thats what quite mode 1 and 2 are? Also am i correct in thinking you should also disable noise reduction for long exposures?
 
Hotshots said:
I must admit i often forget to do that for long exposures, But i do have my camera set so as to dampen mirror slap. Well i guess thats what quite mode 1 and 2 are? Also am i correct in thinking you should also disable noise reduction for long exposures?
Click to expand...

Silent shooting mode only works in live view, so yes, by definition the mirror has to be already up for this. The silent mode works by separating the noise of the shutter and the mirror, so it appears to sound a bit quieter, when strictly speaking it isn't. Canon 5D3 works differently by slowing down the mirror, so it is actually quieter.

The only reason to disable long exposure noise reduction is because it doubles the length of time the camera is out of operation - say 20 secs exposure, then another 20 secs while it produces the 'dark frame' that is part of the reduction process. When exposures get very long, sometimes you don't want to wait while it does that. And chances are you'll be post processing anyway, so can apply noise reduction then.
 
Ok i suppose all that makes sense, Thanks Richard.
 
Hotshots said:
I must admit i often forget to do that for long exposures, But i do have my camera set so as to dampen mirror slap. Well i guess thats what quite mode 1 and 2 are? Also am i correct in thinking you should also disable noise reduction for long exposures?
Click to expand...

I not sure if I have a quiet mode or its possibly called something else. One of the settings I changes was enabling the noise reduction for extra protection from noise. Now I remember the setting I was concerned with leaving on, its this one. I will go disable it and only turn it back on when I have a lot of time to kill between shots. Is this the same thing as quiet mode or mirror dampening?
 
shaylou said:
I not sure if I have a quiet mode or its possibly called something else. One of the settings I changes was enabling the noise reduction for extra protection from noise. Now I remember the setting I was concerned with leaving on, its this one. I will go disable it and only turn it back on when I have a lot of time to kill between shots. Is this the same thing as quiet mode or mirror dampening?
Click to expand...

The silent mode (that makes the camera shutter/mirror action quieter) is not the same as noise reduction (which reduces speckly looking grain in the image, known 'noise').

'Noise' comes from the sensor's signal amplifier. It's called noise becuase it's the same thing as the humming/buzzing sound that you get from a hi-fi system during quite bits when you turn the volume up high.

High ISO is produced by simply turning up the sensor's amplifier, to make a brighter image out of a low light signal, but the downside is more noise in the image. For the same reason, you get more noise with smaller sensor cameras. They collect less light, so the signal has to be amplified more, so you get noiser images than a larger sensor camera, at the same ISO.
 
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