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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Do I use the flash? (1 Viewer)

S

sward17

Member
Hi,

Apologies if this has been covered before as I'm new to the forum, but I need to ask:

'Do you use the flash when digiscoping?'

It's just that I use a Canon A650IS and the manual states that when the flash is used in Aperture Priority mode, the fastest shutter speed is limited to 1/500, whereas I was hoping for faster if the conditions were suitable.

Thanks in advance
 
If you try using the flash you are likely to find that all your photos are very underexposed. If you want to use fast shutter speeds you will have to crank up the ISO (if the camera can cope with it) and hope for sunny days!

Good luck anyway!

Roy.
 
Also, what does ISO stand for. As I understand it, it basically allows for faster shutter speeds, but increases the 'noise' in pictures. Some schools of thought suggest a high ISO is best avoided. What does anyone think?
 
"noise" is relative to the camera and the user. Since you are new to digiscoping, try different ISO settings to see if you like the results. If you are a casual photographer, then you might not even notice "noise" unless you start cropping the pic.

Generally, you will want to keep shutter speed above 1/30sec to minimize blur from mechanical issues. But if your subject is moving, 1/125sec and higher is needed. Depends on the kind of movement, randomness and its speed. To get these high shutter speeds digiscoping under good light, you will need to shoot at ISO200. Under cloudy conditions, or if your target is in shade or shadows, ISO800 and higher will be needed. On small digicams, ISO800 shots can look real grainy (noise). DSLRs generally work better than digicams above ISO400.

hope this helps,
Rick
 
sward17 said:
Also, what does ISO stand for. As I understand it, it basically allows for faster shutter speeds, but increases the 'noise' in pictures. Some schools of thought suggest a high ISO is best avoided. What does anyone think?
Click to expand...

ISO relates to the sensitivty of the camera sensor. Increasing ISO means sensitivity is increased enabing higher shutter speeds but at the expense of more noise on the images. Compact cameras used for digiscoping tend to have very small sensors which worsens the situation. DSLRs have alrger sensors and and deal with noise much better.

ISO200 is about the highest I go for digiscoping.

Flash is all but useless for digiscoping.

Digiscoping generally means low shutter speeds so use of a shutter release cable/shutter timer/remote electronic activation is preferable to releasing the shutter by hand.
 
The first thing I do when digiscoping is turn off the flash and set to aperture priority. Apart from being useless at digiscoping distances, the flash would be extremely irritating and would run down yr batteries.

I find anything above ISO200 is v noticeable on my simple compact.
 
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