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I’ve recently started to incorporate using iso to better take advantage of exposing my scenes to maximize dynamic range in either the highlights, shadows or a mix depending on what I’m filming. For example, if I’m filming daytime exteriors I’ll typically kick up my iso to around 1000 and ND down to reign in my exposure and retain better dynamic range in the highlights or if I’m filming a scene with shadows I’ll lower my iso and light the scene bring my exposure to here I want it and retain better (and lower noise) shadow detail. I think that I mostly understand why I should be doing this but I’ve recently started thinking about my first example—daytime exteriors—and need some help understanding how it works. My issue is that while I bring up my iso (also increasing the noise floor) I’m still having to ND to expose properly and am thus cutting off the amount of light hitting the sensor. Shouldn’t this cause issues with sensor noise, more than say if I kept my iso lower and used less ND, obviously this would not bias my DR towards the highlights like it would if I used a higher iso. Thoughts appreciated, thanks!

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