Street Photography

Soft-and-Chewy Photography at ISO 12800 and No f/2.8 Fast Lens

The struggle is real, but I managed to make it work in Vietnam

I was photographing the dog | 1/160, f/5.6, ISO 5000 | Photo by author

Non-members can read for free here.

We chose to meet at Bikini Bottom.

No, I don’t wear women’s clothing. The place serves burgers and other comfort food.

My walk from my Da Nang hotel to the restaurant’s tourist-infested neighborhood would have taken me 40 minutes.

But I left early, and it took me about two hours because the opportunity provided natural street photography without forcing it.

The last time I photographed Da Nang, I stood still and relied on focus peaking. This time, I couldn’t, as I traversed the beach town. I dialed in servo autofocus.

Motorcyclists still fascinate me in Vietnam | 1/2000, f/5, ISO 2000 | Photo by author

I didn’t have a fast lens; I sold my f/2.8 a few years back and relied on my Canon R100’s entry-level lenses as the sun set: RF-S18–45mm & 55–210mm. I wonder how I would feel with an f/1.4.

When I first started photography, ISO above 1000 frightened me because of unwanted noise. But nowadays, I don’t mind using ISO 2000 or higher when the signal-to-noise ratio is large enough. Plus, image sensors and noise reduction software have come a long way. If there’s enough light, I can make my lens feel fast.

And that’s what I did on this photo walk.

Fire show provided by the out-of-view beach bar | 0.4, f/22, ISO 5000 | Photo by author

After dinner, my friends and I visited the beach. Eventually, they decided to go to a bar. Since I’m trying to cut down on alcohol, I decided to go the other way, towards Dragon Bridge and my hotel.

As I walked back, I saw what appeared to be an eastern barn owl by the promenade. It caught me by surprise to see an owl by a beach. Not something I’m used to.

I wished I had Canon’s flagship red-circle L lens.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough ambient light, so I had to resort to ISO 128000, which resulted in a low signal-to-noise ratio. I ended up with the soft-and-chewy image below. It looked worse before applying noise reduction in DxO PhotoLab, but that is clearly an owl.

Eastern barn owl | 1/3, f/7.1, ISO 12800 | Photo by author

I still dread ISO 12800 when there isn’t enough ambient. I don’t even push that high when I shoot the stars. I find many of the images don’t come out well and are challenging to post-process. But hey, I think I’d rather work with ISO 12800 than 256000. I’ve never photographed with the latter ISO setting.