It's been a while, so the Bee and I are going to give a little lesson on ISO. It's SO important!

When I made the choice to go Manual and never look back, I started learning exactly how important ISO is. Don't ask me what it stands for, that I couldn't tell you!
What I can tell you is that it takes a picture like this:

and turns it into this:

These were taken within the same 10 seconds with just one minor change, my ISO.

The first was taken at 1/200s shutter speed, f/2.2, and ISO 200.

The second, 1.200s shutter speed, f/2.2 and ISO 1000.

Big difference.

For those of you who are afraid to leave the Auto function (yes, there are lots of you!), I hope you at least took my challenge and moved onward towards the A function. A is for aperture and the camera will usually choose the lowest f/stop possible for you, meaning, depending on the light, it will give you the blurriest background it can. Now... this is where ISO comes in. The camera can only do so much without completely losing the moment. Learn where your ISO demand dial/ button is. Once you find it, it's really simple to control (vs. learning Manual and controlling all three). Play around in different lighting... as shown above, these picts were taken in the SAME lighting in the SAME minute. If I had not set my ISO so high, I would have had to chuck (read: Delete) the picts.

So, another challenge: Play with ISO... you will find that by doing this you can take many more pictures without flash, more photos inside, and you will capture more moments with better lighting due to your new-found knowledge.

Three other points:

-Risk: By upping your ISO, you do increase "noise", which is those pixely looking dots. If you click on the first picture, look at Bee's face, it's a bit pixely. The noise doesn't really come in until about 800, though. So don't be afraid! To me, noise is better than the look of flash!

-I kept the photos above unedited (although I did crop the third pict to be more comparable) so that you can see the true difference.

-If you have a point and shoot, you can, amazingly, control your ISO to a degree. Sure enough, my old Powershot has ISO settings at 100, 200, 400, and 600! How I wish I would have known that before!

Did that make any sense to you at all? Please do share your before and afters with me, post a link on the comments!