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Getting exposure right in the field vs brightening in post
Apologies if this has already been discussed in another thread – while it’s always good to get as close to your final photo while shooting the image (in terms of exposure and composition) and not have to rely too much on post editing, there are situations during hand held photography in low light with moving subjects where (with the minimum aperture) you can’t lower your shutter speed too much for risk of a blurry image – in such situations, is it better to ramp up ISO to get the desired exposure while shooting (which may tend to cause some graininess) or is it better to keep the ISO reasonably low and underexpose and brighten in post? Which approach tends to get sharper cleaner images?
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5 Replies
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I am a novice in this feild. But I would like to know in which case do you get the best focus? Low light conditions is a challenge to get the focus right. What one expert on YT told is that if you get the focus right then rest of the things can be corrected in post editing.
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Going forward pls post your queries as a separate thread instead of asking in someone else thread of a different topic.
AF depends on light / contrast in the scene. And most importantly your camera + lens combination. If you have a f2.8 lens you have more light coming into the camera and hence faster AF compared to a f5.6 lens. It also depends on the camera model and the AF algorithm of that camera.
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It’s almost always better to capture a noisy image than a blurry one. Motion blur is usually unrecoverable, whereas noise can often be cleaned up effectively with today’s powerful denoising tools. If boosting ISO helps you get a sharp frame, it’s worth it. Some modern sensors are also ISO invariant… meaning that shooting at a low ISO and underexposing, then lifting the shadows in post, results in similar noise levels to shooting at a higher ISO with correct exposure. For example, an image taken at ISO 800 and brightened later can look very close to one shot at ISO 6400. That said, not all cameras are fully ISO invariant, so it’s helpful to know how your specific camera behaves. But in general, a sharp image with noise will almost always be more usable than a blurry one.
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Yep…agree. Both options results in similar noise in image. Instead of underexposing a lot, I would increase the ISO and get the correct exposure. Noise can be easily handled with Denoise of lightroom.
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Autofocus relies on contrast and light. In low light, using a higher ISO helps the sensor and AF system “see” better thus results in faster and more accurate autofocus. Using a lower ISO in low light condition (underexposing), the camera will start to hunt for focus.
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