Camera Help...

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by Nano

so whats a good ISO range? I know it depends on lighting, but for actinics? woud 600-800 be ok or still too low
EDIT
Tried 600-800 too slow-1600 to slow
3200 good, but grainy quality. lots of noise in the picture

ughh.. lol

You pretty much summed it up there, lower is better for image quality and the higher you go the more grainy the picture becomes.

Like I mentioned before if you can increase the aperture you'll allow more light into the camera which will also speed things up. I see the P500 has an aperture priority (A) mode so use this setting, set aperture to min f number (3.5) and don't use any zoom otherwise min f number increases. Next you can change your exposure compensation a little to the neg side, maybe -1, the image will be darker but often this is better for lower light shots, this also speeds things up. Now you can try different iso values for best results.

Alternatively you can also shoot in Shutter priority (S) mode and set minimum shutter speed you need to prevent blur. Then simply increase iso until the image is bright enough.

With all that said though for best results use a tripod and turn off tank flow so everything sits perfectly still. This is best way to get good image quality, you can use lower iso and smaller aperture for better DOF in macro shots. The only sacrifice is shutter speed which doesn't matter provided the subject doesn't move. I would only pursue the other options if I can't get the subject to stay still enough.