Each month, I will be bringing you 1 basic photography tip. It is designed to help the casual picture taker improve her images. And today’s tip is for the point-and-shooters and DSLR carriers alike. Lower Your ISO Back in the days when men were men, cameras required film. And not all film was alike. One difference between different types of film was the “film speed.” (or ISO) If you wanted to take pictures in a darker setting, you needed to use a higher film speed. My mom was a huge fan of her 800 film, though I never really knw what that meant. Well I know what it means now…and no one cares. Digital cameras mean that you can change your “film speed” without having to change film. Instead, all cameras have ISO settings. I won’t go into the detail of ISO. I will just tell you that, if you want to get the best images possible, you need to turn off auto ISO. If you’re taking pictures outside, pick the lowest ISO possible on your camera (typically 50, 100, or 200, depending on who made your camera). If you’re going to be taking pictures inside, you will want to have your ISO to the second or third lowest setting. Going higher than this (higher than 800 or 1600 especially) will generate very poor images that have lots of noise. And Auto ISO too quickly uses high ISO values. So turn off your auto ISO, and pick the lowest ISO that won’t get you blurry images.

Each month, I will be bringing you 1 basic photography tip. It is designed to help the casual picture taker improve her images. And today’s tip is for the point-and-shooters and DSLR carriers alike.

Lower Your ISO

Back in the days when men were men, cameras required film. And not all film was alike. One difference between different types of film was the “film speed.” (or ISO) If you wanted to take pictures in a darker setting, you needed to use a higher film speed. My mom was a huge fan of her 800 film, though I never really knw what that meant. Well I know what it means now…and no one cares.

Digital cameras mean that you can change your “film speed” without having to change film. Instead, all cameras have ISO settings. I won’t go into the detail of ISO. I will just tell you that, if you want to get the best images possible, you need to turn off auto ISO. If you’re taking pictures outside, pick the lowest ISO possible on your camera (typically 50, 100, or 200, depending on who made your camera). If you’re going to be taking pictures inside, you will want to have your ISO to the second or third lowest setting. Going higher than this (higher than 800 or 1600 especially) will generate very poor images that have lots of noise. And Auto ISO too quickly uses high ISO values.

So turn off your auto ISO, and pick the lowest ISO that won’t get you blurry images.