Canon 5dmkii Iso 50 - Stock Photography Blog

Canon 5DMKII - ISO 50

posted on 16th of may, 2012

So today I feel incredibly stupid.

Whilst looking at some stunning long exposure black and white shots in a UK photography competition I see something that catches my eye. In the info for one particular shot it shows the photog has a Canon 5D MKII ( which I have had for a year or so now ) and has taken a shot at ISO 50. First thought was this must be a mistake, I have never heard of this capability, after a quick Google search I see it's a function/ability I have over looked.

In the off chance that I'm not the only 5DMKII owner that does not know about this feature I thought I would write this brief article.

Why would you need ISO 50? Well recently I bought a range of ND filters to help reduce light intake thus enabling longer exposures in daylight to generate motion blur like here :

So how do you find this elusive ISO 50? Well first you have to go into your camera's menu and choose the 8th icon from left to right as they appear on your camera's screen, it's an orange box with a camera icon in it. It then lists 5 functions, you need function 1 displayed as C.Fn I :Exposure, hit your set button in the middle of your wheel dial and you see this is for ISO expansion, select on so it goes blue, press set to allow you to make a change and hit set again once selected, press menu twice now to get out of menus and back to your normal screen.

Now when in manual check out your ISO capabilities, you will see a new setting now between ISO AUTO and ISO 100, you know have ISO L which I believe is the ISO 50. I have not used it yet or looked it up on t he net.
Please share any knowledge you have on this function here if you have time :-)

You learn something new every day, well I do at least. Happy snapping :-)

Brett

Tags: 5d iso iso50 mkii

Comments (12)

	Posted by Stevesawusch on May 29, 2012 50 is simulated so depending on what you are photographing/how big it will be printed/displayed it may actually harm the image. I talked with a camera engineer once and he said to stay with the 100, 200, 400, 800, etc intervals because the gain is incremented for each of those. Non standard intervals, the camera over exposes then adjusts down (which you can do in post with full control instead).
	Posted by BCritchley on May 21, 2012 It's a great camera, you will be very happy with one :-)
	Posted by Miketea on May 21, 2012 Very good, this is my next purchase aswell
	Posted by BCritchley on May 21, 2012 Thanks Shamtor, glad others know of this feature :-)
	Posted by Shamtor on May 21, 2012 I use 5D mark II too and 90% of the studio shooting are in 50 ISO, with the other canon too I use the lowest ISO possible.
	Posted by Lostarts on May 17, 2012 Brett, thanks for the tip. I'll explore it too.
	Posted by Iwhitwo on May 17, 2012 Thanks Brett, it is a cool feature to explore.
	Posted by BCritchley on May 17, 2012 Beautiful image Ian, I'm still quite excited at my little find yet embarrassed I did not know it was there. :-) Great tip Brad cheers, hope South Korea is treating you well ?
	Posted by Iwhitwo on May 17, 2012 Brett, here is one I took recently using ISO 50 Evening lighthouse
	Posted by Bradcalkins on May 17, 2012 Interesting. I've read all over the place that you give up dynamic range and so on when you go to ISO 50, but I've never really seen proof. I spent a few minutes looking, and based on reputable sites that measure these things it actually seems to increase dynamic range. So rather than warning you, I'm going to congratulate you on the find :) it is like getting a free new tool - I wish the micro four thirds cameras didn't have such 'high' low ISO minimums (160 and 200)... It is also handy for fill flash in daylight since you can use an aperture one stop wider and stick to your sync speed...
	Posted by Sobek85 on May 17, 2012 Great information
	Posted by Cafebeanzphoto on May 16, 2012 Super cool info !!!!! Thanks for sharing, gonna try it now ....