Is image stabilization worth it? The short answer is yes. Most definitely, yes. Image stabilization is the technology meant to mainly counteract hand motion. It can be built either into your lens, your camera body, or both. When it's built into your camera body, it's called IBIS, which I do believe stands for in-body image stabilization. The fact of the matter is that pretty much everyone who is hand-holding a camera has hand motion in one way or another. And the longer the shutter speed and the longer the lens, the more likely you will have problems. Even if you have rock solid hands, there will be a point at which your hands will fail you. And it's not just when you're shooting static objects. It's also for when you're shooting moving objects, like when you're doing a panning shot of a moving car. I'll talk more about that later.
In the early days of image stabilization, about 20 years ago, it was possible to gain up to one or two stops of shutter speed simply due to the stabilization itself. This is huge. However, modern lenses and cameras are now pushing more than four stops of stabilization. And the current Canon R series cameras are now boasting up to eight stops of IBIS, depending on the model and the lens you're using. This is insane. And at this point, pretty much all cameras from the middle to the high end will have in-camera stabilization. This is standard. What is not standard is how much stabilization you get. Do be aware that if you are shooting much more than 100 millimeters, you will likely need in-lens stabilization because IBIS apparently doesn't work very well with long focal lengths.
So how much is it worth to buy a lens with stabilization? Most of the time, the cost of buying a lens with versus without stabilization is only about 30%, but buying a lens that is one stop faster, can be 50 to 100% more if it exists. So yes, stabilization is worth every penny. And I'm told that although IBIS is great, in-lens stabilization at this point is still better. If you're shopping for a new camera, it is also worth knowing how much stabilization the camera will deliver.
Earlier, I mentioned stabilization for times when you are aggressively moving your camera, like when you're panning left and right. On longer lenses, you may see two or three different options for stabilization. The difference depends on the manufacturer, but generally when it's labeled Stabilization 1, also known as normal, it's for everyday shooting. Think vacation photos, things that have little to no motion. Stabilization 2, also known as active or sport, is for when you are aggressively moving your camera left and right or up and down as with sports or other fast moving objects.
One last thing you'll want to know about image stabilization. If you have your camera on a tripod or something solid like a table, you'll want to turn off stabilization because if it does not find motion, it will create motion, causing a slightly blurry image. Modern cameras are supposed to have a system that detects this and turn off stabilization, but they've been saying this for 15 years. And trust me when I tell you, it doesn't always work as it's advertised. So make sure to test your system to see if this is working or not. Otherwise, just turn off stabilization when you're on a tripod.
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