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ISO and what it does for you. Camera NEWB
I'm looking to get a new camera and I've tried looking up what some of the different terms mean. The only one I can't really get a handle on is the ISO. What exactly is ISO and is it better to have a higher or lower number?

I'm fairly new to photography and I'm not looking to go pro or anything but if somebody could dumb it down for me I'd be massively appreciative...

Pic unrelated.
>> ac
ISO is a measure of the sensitivity of the imaging surface, I.e., the film or digital sensor. A higher number means that it needs less light to get the same exposure.

So if you can take a shot at f/2.8 1/30th at ISO 100, you can take it at f/2.8 1/60th at ISO 200.

Going to higher ISOs has a cost, though--with film, higher ISO film is grainier; with digital, higher ISO settings on the sensor are noisier. Better sensors have less noise at higher ISO, so I shoot constantly at ISO400 on my digital SLR, but ISO400 on my little point & shoot camera was unusably noisy.
>> Macheath
Assuming you're going digital, ISO is the sensitivity of the sensor. The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the sensor will be to light. The advantage of this is you can use a faster shutter speed or smaller aperture in a darker place. The disadvantage is you get noise which manifests itself as discolored pixels.

Generally you want ISO to be as low as possible in order to not affect picture quality, but there will be some situations where you will need a high ISO.
>> Anonymous
Why is it my P&S can go as low as ISO 80, yet the lowest my DSLR can go is 200?
>> Anonymous
>>48816
Now it's the time the stop anything you are doing right now and give me your DSLR since you can't understand it.
>> Anymonous
>>48816
That means your DSLR can take a more or less dark picture faster than your P&S. Means you'll see blurry shit on your P&S and a picture on your DSLR.
And what>>48876said.