[peos99]

Hello!

The K-5 is said to be great when it comes to taking high ISO pictures. But not for me!
I always get pictures with high noise, almost always completly unusable. And I never go higher than ISO 6400.
And it doesn´t have to be outside when it´s dark, i was at an indoor sport event the other day where the light was pretty good anyway but still i get much noise in my pictures!
I use a K-5 and a Tamron 17-50.

Can someone please give me some advice on what settings to use to get better pictures? Because i have seen great pictures here shot with high ISO.
Or is it that those pictures are edited in photo shop or similar?

[psychdoc]

Post an example photo

[Franky2step]

You must expose correctly, EV+

[Boker]

You must expose correctly, EV+

I agree.A underexposed shot at high iso really brings out the noise.I recently went from a K-X to a K-5 and so far have been disappointed with high iso from the K-5 as compared to the K-X but have got a few shots from the K-5 at iso3200 that are acceptable.Adding sharpening,contrast and saturation can add to the noise.

[Anvh]

I recently went from a K-X to a K-5 and so far have been disappointed with high iso from the K-5 as compared to the K-X but have got a few shots from the K-5 at iso3200 that are acceptable.

How are you comparing, full image or pixel for pixel?

It's unfair to compare pixewl vs pixel because the K5 has 4,000,000 more

[Rondec]

Definitely post some photos. Are you shooting RAW or jpeg? If shooting jpeg, reducing sharpening on the jpegs makes a huge difference, as in high iso situations that really introduces a bunch of noise. The other thing is (as others said) don't under expose. An iso 3200 photos that is under exposed a couple of stops is really an iso 12800 photo, so really is going to look noisy after you bring it up.

[Boker]

How are you comparing, full image or pixel for pixel?

It's unfair to compare pixewl vs pixel because the K5 has 4,000,000 more

Full image as in the end thats all that counts

[Anvh]

Indeed that's what count.
I hear more saying that they like the Kx more at high ISO but from what i've seen the Kx is missing some details though... maybe if you apply a good noise reduction that the image would be very comparable?

[Boker]

Would hope with noise reduction the K-5 will do better.Was out with the K-X a couple after order for K-5 was paced and sold it.At the time was glad to get the sale but wish I had held off until the decision was made to keep the K-x or the K-10.My wind up selling-trading the K-10 and get another K-X.

[Anvh]

K10D has a different sensor, i'm holding on to mine at least.

[derekkite]

I'll share my experience. The same thing happened to me, I saw all these great high iso shots but I had to limit my top end iso to 320 or so to get detail.

First, the sensor needs light. Noise to signal results depend on there being enough signal. In low light you can gain a bit by moving the iso higher, but a larger aperture and longer exposure gives the sensor something to work with.

Second, lenses. I'm not sure why but with my manual 400 f4 at iso 400 I get grainy and noisy shots. I recently acquired a DA*300 f4 and get better results at iso 1600. Maybe it's the coatings or the camera optimized for Pentax lenses, but I'm getting those results that you see on this site, high iso great quality shots.

Third, high iso doesn't allow much cropping, or any at all. A full frame shot will give you enough detail to satisfy the eye, cut it in half by cropping and all you will see is the detail missed.

[GnipGnop]

You can't just crank the ISO and get clean images. When used properly this camera is capable of very clean high ISO images relative to other APS-C cameras, and some full frame sensors. The camera is not going to take a great picture itself. It needs a skilled operator to extract the most from a given scene. Since there is more data held in highlights as opposed to shadows, it is advisable to expose to the right, or expose your picture close to the point of overexposure in order to gather the cleanest data to make your image. Pulling the exposure up in post in an underexposed photo will always result in more noise because there is less data in shadows, so the imaging software has less data to work with to retrieve details.

Read on exposing to the right, work on your technique to maximize the amount of data collected in a given scene and you will be on your way to collecting high ISO images that are clean.

Some examples...


ISO 2000
500px / Photo "Rockwellian Capture" by Robbie Vize



ISO 1250
500px / Photo "Spin" by Robbie Vize


ISO 2500
500px / Photo "Asleep at the art crawl." by Robbie Vize

(notice how much more noise there is visible in the darker areas, and how less noise is visible in the lighter areas? There is also much more detail in the highlights.


ISO 2000
500px / Photo "Gunner" by Robbie Vize


ISO 3200
500px / Photo "Gunner" by Robbie Vize



In all of the photos, notice that the clean details are in the brighter parts of the photos, along with the highlights that occur in the darker areas.

[Boker]

Can get acceptable images with K-X up to iso 3200 depending on subject , lighting and proper exposure.Under exposure seems to get more noise than over exposed.High iso is easier to use in good light to get smaller aperture and higher speed than in low light to get proper exposure.The bee was taken at iso 3200

[Rondec]

Again, a lot depends on how much light is available. With decent light and a good exposure, you will struggle a lot less.

I was in the primate house at the St Louis Zoo and using the DA 55-300 for this shot (at 1/30 second) and I thought it came out pretty well, but I would try not to crop this shot too much either. I think those who shot film before they used digital are more tolerant of a little noise/grain in their photos than those who came to photography with digital.

[RonHendriks1966]

Well the trick is to get the light good in the image you capture. Learn how to handle LightRoom and only make RAW imgaes with all noise reductionsettings in the camera set to off.