Low Light

I find night and low-light photography particularly interesting. Perhaps it is because it is so difficult, perhaps because the images are so very different to daylight, perhaps because less people take these and perhaps because of the high contrast of colourful subject to black night.

I bought the A610 largely because of its low-light performance. Sure, it was no SLR in this realm, having a nominal maximum sensitivity of ISO 400, but independent tests showed that was closer to a true ISO 640. Certainly, compared to SLR levels this was modest, and compared to the sensitivities of 2008's compacts it seems modest, but the high MP compacts of 2008 produce second rate IQ when pushed beyond ISO 100, and unusable rubbish beyond 200, the A610 in contrast, was still producing useable images at ISO 640. Sure they were a bit grainy but so were the ISO 1600 images from 2008's APS SLRs. Again this little unit proved itself a gem.

Once I had an SLR the drive to get better low-light shots, (especially people under night time indoor lighting), led me to fast lenses such as the 50mm prime and the 17-50 f/2.8 zoom. Although I have managed some decent shots under the better indoor lighting, sadly I am still a couple of stops slow for the poorer class of indoor lighting that I often have to deal with. The final shot here of me drinking beer is an example of the poor light I am talking about. Sure this is a sharp shot but it was at 1/10 sec! It only worked because I held still for it. Realistically, to avoid motion blur from human subjects you need around 1/50 sec. I had my system cranked up to maximum speed: f/2.8, ISO 1600 and still 2 stops slow. Sure, you can push the exposure but that leads to excessive noise.

What I need is a more efficient or larger sensor for an extra stop or two of sensitivity and perhaps an f/1.4 prime. More expense! Sadly there is no cheap way to get really good available-light night shots of people. In the meantime I am using flash a lot!