What does ISO stand for and what impact does it have on photograpy?
ISO stands for International Standards Organization, the people who developed this, and many other, standards. The impact it has on photography is this: The higher the ISO, the more sensitive the film, or digital sensor, will become to light. This enables you to use faster shutter speeds in lower light, in order to still allow you to both freeze movement, and keep the shutter speed high enough to still have the camera hand held (as opposed to using a tripod). The ISO standard is based on the ASA scale, which means that ISO 200 is effectively twice as sensitive to light as ISO 100. Therefore, ISO 1600 is 16 times more sensitive than ISO 100. It also has the added benefit of extending the range of your cameras flash. If, at ISO 100, your flash has a range of 15 feet, at ISO 200, your flash would have a range of 22.5 feet, or roughly 50% more range. Due to the fact that the higher the ISO rating, the more sensitive it is to light, it also makes it more prone to noise. ISO 100 film, or CCD
