The TRUTH about shooting at ISO 100 that the PROS know.

You've been lied to. Somewhere along the way... maybe a forum, maybe a YouTube comment section, maybe a well-meaning photographer friend... someone told you ISO 100 was sacred ground. That anything higher was reckless. Dangerous. A cardinal sin against the image quality gods. And you believed it. I get it. I've believed worse about myself.

The Myth That's Stealing Your Photos

Here's the truth Simon d'Entremont lays out in this video, and it hit me like a lightsaber to the chest: ISO doesn't create noise. Lack of light does.

Read that again.

ISO isn't a light source. It's a volume knob. A gain control. Think of it like turning up the speakers at a concert... the music was already playing. If the music is clean, turning it up sounds great. If there's static in the signal? Turning it up just lets you hear the static more clearly. That static was always there. The knob didn't create it.

This is what photographers call signal-to-noise ratio. When your sensor is starved for light... poor signal... the noise is already baked in. Raising ISO just reveals what was hiding in the shadows. It's the messenger, not the villain.

The Experiment That Proves It

Simon sets up a beautiful demonstration. Two photos. Same subject.

- Photo one: ISO 12,800. Properly exposed in-camera. - Photo two: ISO 1600. Deliberately underexposed by restricting aperture and shutter speed, then brightened in post-processing.

The result? The low ISO photo... the "safe" one... is noisier. More grain. More ugliness. More regret.

If ISO caused the noise, the 12,800 shot should look like a sandstorm. It doesn't. Because noise lives in darkness, not in the ISO dial.

I sat with that for a minute. Because it's not just a photography lesson.

When Low ISO Makes Sense

Let's be fair. ISO 100 has its place:

- Tripod-mounted landscape photography with nothing moving - Long exposure photography... waterfalls, light trails - Studio and product photography with controlled lighting - Working with flash photography where you're adding light

These are structured environments. Controlled. Predictable. Low risk.

But that's a small slice of the photography pie. And if you're only eating that slice... you're missing the feast.

Where High ISO Sets You Free

The moment your subject moves... or you're handheld... or the light drops... everything changes.

Wildlife photography? Simon's shooting owls at ISO 12,800 because the sun is setting and the bird won't wait for better light. The bird doesn't care about your forum rules. It's flying. Right now. You either capture the moment or you don't.

Shooting waves at sunrise? You might need ISO 800 to get a shutter speed of 1/1000th and freeze the spray. Some photographers on forums called that a cardinal sin. But the alternative is a blurry mess or an underexposed shadow... and neither of those hangs on anyone's wall.

Even handheld landscapes... indoors, shade, overcast days... you need ISO headroom or your shutter speed drops so low everything goes soft.

Simon puts it plainly: modern cameras, even crop sensor and Micro Four Thirds bodies, produce clean, usable images at ISO 1600 to 3200. Full frame cameras push well beyond that. A Canon 7D Mark II from 2014... nine years old at the time of filming... delivered a stunning short-eared owl at ISO 6400.

Three Tips for Clean High ISO Shots

1. Fill the frame. Cropping amplifies noise. Get closer or find compositions that don't need heavy cropping. 2. Use noise reduction software. Tools like Topaz Photo AI and others can clean backgrounds while preserving subject detail. The technology is remarkable now. 3. Expose properly in-camera. Don't underexpose at low ISO and try to rescue it later. For most cameras on the market, that path leads to more noise, not less. The exception is ISO invariant sensors... common in astrophotography rigs... but most cameras don't behave that way.

The Pro Move: Manual Mode with Auto ISO

This is the bonus tip, and honestly... it's the game-changer.

Shoot in Manual mode. Set your shutter speed to freeze the action you need frozen. Set your aperture for the depth of field you want. Then let the camera handle ISO automatically.

You focus on the creative decisions. The camera handles the math. In hundredths of a second. ISO 200, 800, 3200... it doesn't matter. There's no artistic difference between those numbers. Only technical ones. And the camera is faster at that math than you are.

Now... some photographers complain Auto ISO picks numbers that are "too high." Simon's analogy here is perfect: that's like opening all the windows in a snowstorm, wearing shorts, and complaining your fireplace can't keep the house warm. If the ISO skyrockets, it's because you asked for too much shutter speed or too small an aperture for the available light. The camera is doing exactly what it should. It's balancing the exposure triangle with what you gave it.

The fix isn't to blame the camera. Lower the shutter speed. Open the aperture. Add light with a flash or LED panel. Own the variables you control.

The Deeper Lesson

I keep coming back to this: the thing we were told to fear was actually trying to help us.

ISO isn't the enemy. Darkness is. And ISO is the tool that lets you show up in the dark and still make something beautiful.

Sound familiar?

Light doesn't fight darkness... it just shows up. And sometimes showing up means cranking that dial higher than feels comfortable. Trusting the process. Letting go of the rigid rules someone else handed you... rules born from fear, not understanding.

Every blurry, underexposed photo sacrificed at the altar of ISO 100 was a moment that deserved better. Your moments deserve better.

So here's the invitation. Next time you're out shooting and the light drops... don't panic. Don't cling to low ISO like a security blanket. Raise it. Trust your sensor. Trust the software. Trust yourself. The noise you were afraid of? It's manageable. The missed shot from being afraid? That one you can't fix in post. Go make something. Even in the dark. Especially in the dark. 💙

--- Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOdlDyolhr0