Noise Question

[Wally]

Hi All,
Does shutter speed and/or the choice of lens contribute to the amount of noise?
I shoot a lot of hockey.  My settings with my 5Dm111 and 70-200 (mi) are 1/1000 sec and iso 2000
Last night I threw my 300f4 with an old 1.4 extender on and shot at 1/640 iso 3200.  The pictures were outstanding for noise....better then the 70-200 with the above settings.

Any comments?

Thanks

[neuroanatomist]

Many things going on. 

Depending on scene, noise is more or less apparent.  Large areas of OOF 'negative space' show noise more prominently (subjectively, because there's nothing else there to pay attention to, you eye starts looking for patterns).

Shutter speed does affect noise, but meaningfully only with longer exposures (you'll notice more noise at the same ISO in a 0.5 s exposure vs a 1/200 s exposure, but not between 1/1000 and 1/640. 

ISO matters - 'tweener' ISOs have more or less ISO noise than the full stop settings, depending on camera model.  So, ISO 500 is noisier than ISO 800, while ISO 640 is slightly less noisy.  That's beacuse with a full stop base ISO, the up tweeners are pushed (1/3 stop up, e.g. 125, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, etc.) while the down tweeners are pulled (1/3 stop down, e.g. 160, 320, 640, 1250, 2500). 

[Wally]

Ahhh....I forgot about the "tweener" iso's.  So really with my other settings I should either go back to iso 1600 or up to 3200. 
Thanks for the reply...cool stuff.

[Waterdonkey]

"ISO matters - 'tweener' ISOs have more or less ISO noise than the full stop settings, depending on camera model.  So, ISO 500 is noisier than ISO 800, while ISO 640 is slightly less noisy.  That's beacuse with a full stop base ISO, the up tweeners are pushed (1/3 stop up, e.g. 125, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, etc.) while the down tweeners are pulled (1/3 stop down, e.g. 160, 320, 640, 1250, 2500)."

I thought this was only for crop frame? I'm not saying I know... Just that I thought I read... 

[dstppy]

Many things going on. 

Depending on scene, noise is more or less apparent.  Large areas of OOF 'negative space' show noise more prominently (subjectively, because there's nothing else there to pay attention to, you eye starts looking for patterns).

Shutter speed does affect noise, but meaningfully only with longer exposures (you'll notice more noise at the same ISO in a 0.5 s exposure vs a 1/200 s exposure, but not between 1/1000 and 1/640. 

ISO matters - 'tweener' ISOs have more or less ISO noise than the full stop settings, depending on camera model.  So, ISO 500 is noisier than ISO 800, while ISO 640 is slightly less noisy.  That's beacuse with a full stop base ISO, the up tweeners are pushed (1/3 stop up, e.g. 125, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, etc.) while the down tweeners are pulled (1/3 stop down, e.g. 160, 320, 640, 1250, 2500).

Okay, so, on the 5Dmk2 and 7D (cameras you used to use a lot), which are the 'good' ISOs?

[neuroanatomist]

Less noticeable on the 5DII, more on the 7D with the higher noise to begin with, but 125, 250, etc., are noisier that the next full stop up. I didn't really notice any difference between the 160, 320, etc., and the full stops.

[Wally]

Different camera bodies have different base or native iso's.  According to many, the base iso on the 7D is 160.  The base iso on the 5DmIII is 100.

I certainly seen a difference on my 7D using 160 320 640 etc but honestly I try not to use the thing anymore now that I have a 5D. 

W

[kfreels]

Many things going on. 

Depending on scene, noise is more or less apparent.  Large areas of OOF 'negative space' show noise more prominently (subjectively, because there's nothing else there to pay attention to, you eye starts looking for patterns).

Shutter speed does affect noise, but meaningfully only with longer exposures (you'll notice more noise at the same ISO in a 0.5 s exposure vs a 1/200 s exposure, but not between 1/1000 and 1/640. 

ISO matters - 'tweener' ISOs have more or less ISO noise than the full stop settings, depending on camera model.  So, ISO 500 is noisier than ISO 800, while ISO 640 is slightly less noisy.  That's beacuse with a full stop base ISO, the up tweeners are pushed (1/3 stop up, e.g. 125, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, etc.) while the down tweeners are pulled (1/3 stop down, e.g. 160, 320, 640, 1250, 2500).

Okay, so, on the 5Dmk2 and 7D (cameras you used to use a lot), which are the 'good' ISOs?

160, 320, 640, 1250, 2500, 5000

[Wally]

5Dm2 and 5Dm3 have base iso's of 50.  Different then the 7D

[neuroanatomist]

5Dm2 and 5Dm3 have base iso's of 50.  Different then the 7D

Lowest available ISO is not the same as base ISO.  Note that there's no ISO 50 setting, it's "L" and it's actually exposing at ISO 100 and digitally pulling the exposure down a full stop.

Base ISO is the unamplified signal from the sensor.  Native ISO settings other than base have analog gain (usually positive, but sometimes negative, e.g. ISO 100 if the sensor's base is 160) applied before the analog-to-digital conversion.  Expanded ISO settings (L, H1, etc.) have digital gain applied after the ADC.

[PackLight]

Tweeners aside;

Wouldn't it be possible in the scenario that OP describes that the appearance of noise could be exaggerated (more noticable) somewhat with one lens over the other. After all he was shooting with two different lenses, at ISO 3200 at twice the focal length. With the compression and different framing of the lens it could have made the noise less noticeable.

[Studio1930]

Yes, it does depend on the camera model for the in-between ISO noise issue.  The 1DX does not appear to have this issue but the 5D3 does.  For my 1DX, I have stopped worrying about in-between ISO settings but it appears you still need to remember them for the 5D3.

http://home.comcast.net/~NikonD70/Charts/RN_ADU.htm#EOS%201D%20X_14,EOS%205D%20Mark%20III_14