Low light pictures with 30d

[akcron]

Hello.
I am going to take some pictures of my friends band at the weekend, i have a 30d and have just bought a 50mm 1.8.

I would just like some help from people that have or have had a 30d on what settings they recommend, IE metering mode and AF mode.

Thanks for any help

 

[Photodiva]

Hi I used to do this with my 20D. Its perfectly do-able. I used to push the iso as high as it would go, open the aperture as wide as possible and work with the SS. Depends on the venue, but hold the camera steady!

 

[renu]

Hi push the ISO up to 1600 and keep the aperture wide open and keep an eye on the shutter speed (at least above 1/60sec) if it is 50mm lens.If you use a flash then keep the ISO to a lower value.Metering depends on the lighting in the room.Generally partial metering works fine.

 

[Surrey Sam]

I never liked going above ISO 800 on my 30d as the images really started to become noisy, I'd probably start off with AI focus mode and either centre weighted or partial metering modes and see what it's like from there. If you are not shooting in RAW then don't forget to make sure you get the white balance sorted for the right type of lighting they have there.

 

[tdodd]

In my experience and opinion the 30D is fine at 1600 ISO so long as you expose well and content yourself with looking at the pictures rather than the pixels. Here's a 100% crop, shot raw and unedited....

and resized for the web....

It could probably do with being 1/3 stop brighter at capture, but even with highlight headroom to spare I would say that noise is not a problem. Others may disagree, but I think it's fine.

BTW, a little noise is usually far less offensive and far more easily fixed than too much blur or shake.

 

[akcron]

A big thankyou to everyone.
I have a great idea how to start now. and i can adjust when i find out what the lights will be like .
tdodd i will be very happy if i get results like the photo you posted thanks.

Thanks again.