Skip to main content

What is Auto-ISO and how to use it?

Shutter speed, aperture and ISO are the three main variables for getting a properly exposed photograph. Digital camera manufacturers provide the freedom to adjust the value of ISO, shutter speed and aperture easily on the fly. In situations where aperture and shutter speed aren't enough to give a good exposure photograph, ISO helps a lot. Though with tremendous advancements in digital sensor technology and noise reduction algorithms, shutter speed and aperture have become more crucial factors than the value of ISO in digital photography. If you are a total beginner and want to learn the basics about ISO first, here is my post about how ISO works. 

Is Auto-ISO good or bad?


What is Auto-ISO?
Both aperture and shutter speed can affect a digital photograph in a way that it can be impossible to salvage a photograph. Example: Depth of field cannot be fixed later, neither motion blur. Keeping these two problems in mind for a fast-paced environment, it is preferable to fiddle around with ISO. Extending the ISO control further, a new feature called Auto-ISO came into existence from various camera manufacturers. Auto-ISO refers to automating the increase and decrease in the value of ISO depending on the amount of light available. Auto-ISO offers more convenience to the photographer, as you can set a maximum allowed range of ISO and forget about changing ISO after that. If it gets dark, ISO will increase automatically. If there is plenty of light available, the ISO value will be decreased.



Manual + Auto-ISO
Ability to use Auto-ISO feature in manual mode offers great flexibility and can be a blessing for situations where light changes every few seconds. You can set the maximum range of Auto-ISO to a value like 6400 or even higher. When the available light changes, the camera will auto adjust the value of ISO to compensate. In low light conditions, the maximum value of ISO selected by the camera would be the one defined by the user in settings.

Aperture priority + Auto-ISO
In aperture priority mode with Auto-ISO, minimum shutter speed value is set to trigger an increase in ISO. This value is usually 1/(Focal length). First, the camera will keep increasing the shutter open time if the available light keeps decreasing.  Once the minimum allowed shutter time limit is reached, the value of ISO will go up to compensate. This helps to reduce blur introduced due to possible camera shake or not so steady hands. 

Is Auto-ISO good or bad and when to use it?
Auto-ISO feature can be extremely beneficial for sports, wedding, and other fast-paced environments. One less variable to worry about greatly improves the overall efficiency to get good shots. But where does Auto-ISO fail or is not recommended? For landscape and long exposure tripod work, auto ISO is not necessarily required as there is a fair amount of time to adjust the settings. In a situation where the user has full control of conditions such as a portrait studio, use of Auto-ISO is not recommended. This is because Auto-ISO can cause inconsistent jumping around of ISO value in between multiple shots. Another situation where Auto-ISO is not recommended is when using an external flash. In the next section, a list of cameras with Auto-ISO is mentioned to help you decide on a camera body. 

List of Canon cameras with Auto-ISO:
Canon 6D
Canon 6D Mark II
Canon 5D Mark II
Canon 5D Mark III
Canon 5D Mark IV
Canon EOS-1D X
Canon EOS-1DX Mark II
Canon EOS 5DS / EOS 5DS R
Canon EOS 7D Mark II
Canon EOS 80D
Canon T5i
Canon 60D
Canon 77D

List of Nikon cameras with Auto-ISO:
Nikon D610
Nikon D800/D800E
Nikon D5500
Nikon D7200
Nikon D7100
NIkon D7000
Nikon D5600
Nikon D750
Nikon D610
Nikon D850
Nikon D80
Nikon D3400

List of Sony cameras with Auto-ISO:
Sony A7 II
Sony A7 III
Sony A7R II
Sony A7R III
Sony A6500
Sony A6300
Sony A6000

Hope this post helped you to understand the Auto-ISO feature, give it a try and see if you like it.  Questions are welcomed in comments, happy photography. :) 

Comments

  1. Cyn22 June 2020 at 19:12

    Handy tips! Thank you! I usually set my ISO on manual mode.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dragon Sunsets23 June 2020 at 03:09

    I am saving up for a DSLR and you have given me so much information. I like the list of brands to choose from if I would be needing a camera with auto ISO. Thanks so much for giving me an idea of what auto ISO is and how I can take better photos.

    ReplyDelete
  3. everydayoddysey24 June 2020 at 14:21

    Hey awsome Tips for evry photography enthusiast!
    - Kristina

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown1 July 2020 at 00:29

    Thank you for the helpful tips!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Best ultra wide angle DSLR lens for astrophotography

Selecting a DSLR or lens for a particular type of photography is never easy, speaking from personal experience. Photography is an expensive hobby, which is the reason we want to get the best out of every dollar spent. I am writing this post to help my readers know the various options available in the market for ultra wide-angle camera lenses. Tokina 11-16 mm F/2.8 ultra wide angle lens is still a part of my night photography or astrophotography gear. It is one of the best purchases I ever made when it comes to photography. An ultra-wide angle camera lens is a lens having a range less than 15 mm for a cropped (APS-C) sensor. For a 35 mm film or full frame camera, the value is 24 mm. In simple terms, an ultra wide angle lens covers an extremely wide area or offers a wider field of view. This makes even bigger mountains look smaller when an ultra wide angle lens is used.  Milky way shot using Tokina 11-16 mm There are so many third-party manufacturers of lenses in additio...
13 comments
Read more

Canon CR3 raw format guide

A raw image file is like a digital negative without any lossy compression and minimal processing applied to it. A digital camera shooting images in raw format provides output in the best possible quality, which means files are larger in size and take more space. The benefits offered by shooting raw format overpowers the slight storage hassle though. Few of the well known raw formats include CR2, NEF, RW2, RAF, PEF, ARW, etc.  In this post, we will talk about the new compressed raw format introduced by Canon starting with its mirrorless series of cameras. History of Canon raw formats Back in the early 2000s, Canon cameras produced raw photos in CRW format. Cameras shooting in CRW include Canon D60, Canon D30, Canon 10D, and Canon EOS 300D. Most of the cameras released after the year 2004 shoot raw photos in CR2 format. Examples of CR2 format Canon cameras include 350D, 6D, 7D, 5D, 5D Mark II and many more. In 2018, Canon introduced its new mirrorless camera known as th...
20 comments
Read more

Depth of field photography guide for beginners

Depth of field in photography is essentially what's in focus. It could be +/- "y" feet from point of focus. There are a lot of discussions on the internet about bokeh vs background blur which makes depth of field a confusing topic for beginners. Terminologies such as bokeh, background blur, shallow depth of field and deep depth of field are all interlinked with the concept of depth of field. Commonly abbreviated as DOF, depth of field forms a very important part of modern-day digital photography. It can tremendously help to achieve creative shots in literally any field of photography. In the next section, I will describe the above terms in simple words skipping any involvement of physics. Shallow depth of field means everything except the focused subject is blurred out. This can include an object either from foreground or background. A deeper depth of field means everything is sharp and in focus. A good example of deep depth of field photographs would be landscape phot...
2 comments
Read more