Max auto iso settings......

HI guys and gals,

quick question, im shooting with the D500 and the 200-500 lens, can people advise a suitable max auto iso number to set it too?

i shoot wildlife and the lowest light i shoot in is woodlands/forests

now, have been using 8000 max iso, but many people state thats too high and your images will not be as sharp as you could get them (noisey)

any help?

Not a one answer to that question, it depends on what you can stand with noise, what you do with the images, and remember a sharp noisy picture can often be saved, a noise-free blurred image cant.

I work on the principle that for wildlife i need a certain shutter speed , in low light my lens would be wide open, i then have the choice of using whatever ISO gives me correct exposure or i can't take the picture

YOU have to make that determination yourself Dave. What's acceptable to YOU might not be acceptable to ME. And vice versa.

Do some testing. Set up your camera on a tripod, replicate some low light, and take a series of shots increasing the ISO with each shot. Examine the images.

There are several/many methods of reducing noise in post processing. Some more effective than others. Explore those.

interesting replies, ive just had a reply from a nikon wildlife ambassador, saying this.

maximum ISO limits wouldn’t be tied to a lens. So my maximum limit would be the same regardless the lens. I use the full range on all my cameras as I’d rather a noisy image than a soft one. I’ve had images printed both for the home and in magazines at 10,000 - 20,000 so I wouldn’t be concerned with that range personally. But everyone had a different tolerance. Like I say though, a sharp noisy image is better than no image.

When I shoot wildlife, I'm at the slowest shutter speed that I know I can handhold, my lens is wide open or one stop down if light is good. I'm in manual mode with auto iso. Since I'm already at a minimal shutter and aperture, there is no place else to go on shutter and aperture. With that in mind, there is no reason to limit auto iso. There is always a chance to make it look good. If you limit the iso, you don't get that chance. People pictures or landscape is a different story.

What they said. I shoot with the D500 and a lot depends on the size and detail of your subject and a lot more depends on how much cropping you're going to need to do. I do a ton of bird shots and wind up cropping in somewhat significantly on some so I've learned that anything over 4000 will make some of them barely usable (though denoise tools like Topaz Denoise AI are getting very good). If I've got something that fills the frame that 4000 probably could ramp up to 5 digits if I expose correctly (a very important part of it - if you're pulling things out of shadows higher ISOs become problematic).

i asked this same ? to steve perry of backcountry gallery, hes obviously got / use this setup and said max 4000 for this camera... who am i to argue with someone like him and what he shoots.

so at the weekend im going to adjust and see what happens