Photoclubalpha

Well, the new Nikon 5D is out, and according to the specs, has a top (boosted) ISO setting of 3,280,000. That's 3.2 MILLION! So..... I has to see just what this meant in real terms. Not having $6500 to try one - and they're not in stores yet - just did some comparisons on a spreadsheet of ISO vs Shutter Speed vs F-stop using the "Sunny 16" rule we all learned when we started back in the film days.

First, I looked up the fastest shutter speeds in a DSLR, and came up with 1/16000 on a few micro 4/3 cameras. The Nikon only has a top speed of 1/8000. Next, I had to set an F-stop range that's actual. I know there are f0.95 lenses out there, so I set f1 as the low point, and f45 as the high. My kit lens only stops down to f32, some of the others to f22, but I do have a manual focus, cheap tele that goes to f45, so it's my high point.

Please understand that I did the Sunny 16 calculations using the original formulas, and let the spreadsheet do the calculations. Therefore, ISO 100 uses a SS of 1/100, not 1/125. Just like my old Argus C3 that I learned 35mm photography on! So you'll see abnormal shutter speeds like 1/12 instead of 1/15. Use your brain to extrapolate to modern values.

You can see from the attached chart that even in open shade - 4 stops down from the sunny values, that you can't even use f45 and 1/16000, the most you could use is ISO 1.6Million.

Of course, this high of an ISO is designed for very low light conditions, but how to approximate for this? That's where the Looney 16 rule comes in! Under a FULL moon on a CLEAR night, there should be 18 stops of difference from the Sunny 16 rule. That still means 4 seconds at at ISO 100 and your f1.4 prime, but now we're getting usable for the high ISOs. According to my chart, you could do an action stopping 1/4000 sec exposure with your Noctilux at ISO 3.2 million.

Attached is a screen grab of my chart.

Dusty
[img][/img]

WOW!

Thanks for the analysis, Dusty. Much better than spending $6500

Dusty,
Wouldn't it mean you don't need to use a fast lens in low light? That you use your slow f6.3 lens in low light and still not
get tripped over by 1/fl rule? Perhaps, you can have that DoF in low light with cheap(er) lens(es) using the D5? A paradigm
shift in the use model? Just thinking aloud.

Sury

No, you wouldn't need in w/ this camera, but then I'm sure the grain is atrocious at that ISO. However, I could go down to 409,600 ISO and still use my F4 lenses hand held!

Of course, anyone with $6.5K to for this body probably has some faster lenses that that. I want to see real world moonlight ultra-high shots myself!.

Dusty

My point being faster lens solves low light and not DoF. With this camera substituting for fast lens, one can now have
decent DoF AND low light capability. Imagine you now getting all your friends at the back of the table at that low light
event.

If those little grey cells of mine that are not time expired remember correctly, when the D4 came out all the advertising execs who set editorial policy at many magazines were going ape s**t over a range of Nikons specially prepared high ISO images.

To be fair any picture editor ( remember those) at a newspaper cum website would have published a reasonable number of them but they could hardly be called representative of what most photographers buying the camera would have required.

I suspect that many of the Nikon crowd have either purchased a couple of D750 / D810 or have moved on to Fuji APS cameras and are now waiting to see what 2016 brings them. Some corporate photographers will have a company stock to choose from but these days how many of them are we talking about.

Myself, I'll just struggle along at EI 100 - 800 with occasional visits to 1600 - 3200 totally unaware of what I'm missing out on by not being one of the superior beings in the universe .

These new high MP FF cameras are out running current lens performance and there is going to be a trade off for price vs performance.

Just as an example, I have raw photos taken at:

- ISO 25,600, f1.8, 1/125, FF equivalent FL 50mm
- ISO 20,000, f5.6, 1/320, FF equivalent FL 300mm
- ISO 16,000, f5.6, 1/250, FF equivalent FL 300mm
- ISO 12,800, f1.8, 1/30, FF equivalent FL 50mm

Even though these are from a Sony 16mp m4/3 sensor the quality is still, to me, surprisingly good. A current APS-C or FF sensor, of course, would be even better.