As Nikon’s entry-level DSLR, the D3400 doesn’t have as expansive an ISO range as some of the high-end models. Some of those have ISO ranges that go all the way up into the millions.
But the D3400 still has a relatively broad range, from 100 through 25,600. Compared to back in film days, that’s pretty incredible.
An ISO of 100 means that the sensor’s light sensitivity is low. That’s a good setting for shooting in bright conditions where there’s plenty of light.
An ISO of 25,600 means that the sensor is very sensitive to even small amounts of light, making it a useful option for night or low-light shooting, such as indoor or night photography.
The catch with ISO, of course, is that the higher numbers also bring the risk of degraded image quality. That’s why photographers’ first instinct is usually to use the lowest ISO they can get away with. With high ISOs, the first issue is noise and grain in the photo.
The second issue is that at very high ISOs the sensor doesn’t respond as well to color, so you can get washed out and harsher colors. How much of a problem those things are is entirely subjective and depends on what you’re shooting and the look you’re going for. A third issue is that dynamic range gets reduced, meaning that the sensor doesn’t deal as well with detail in highlights and shadows.
The latest cameras are getting very good at combining high ISOs with low noise and good color reproduction. But there still might be limits beyond which the results might not be a good fit for what you want.
If you’re shooting purely for your own enjoyment, then you have a lot more wiggle room and can probably put up with a lot more image noise than if you’re shooting for someone else. For instance, if you’re shooting for a stock agency, they can be notoriously picky about any visible image noise when viewing the image at 100 percent.
So the shots below are designed to give some practical examples of the D3400’s performance at different ISO settings.
And related to this, I’ve also put together a quick guide on how to change the ISO on a Nikon D3400.
How these high-ISO examples were shot
There are no fancy settings here-deliberately so. To get a consistent exposure across the frames, I mounted in on a tripod and put it on Aperture priority setting. So the aperture remained constant, with the shutter speed adjusting to compensate for the ISO I was setting.
So you’ll see that the overall visual exposure remains pretty constant across all the images, but you’ll also notice that the low-ISO ones used a longer shutter speed (hence the light streaks). And they’re taken with consistent natural light.
By default, the Nikon D3400 applies noise reduction to high-ISO photos in camera, and I wanted to remove that complication. You can turn that setting off or change its aggressiveness, but by default it’s turned on. That in-camera noise reduction doesn’t, technically, affect RAW images as such, just JPGs.
But it is applied to the JPG preview images that are embedded into the RAW files and that are the versions you see when you view the image on the back of the camera. Those are also the initial versions you see when you import the images into apps like Lightroom or PhotoMechanic. If you open a RAW file and see apparent effects of in-camera noise reduction, that’s why. To bypass that, I’ve made sure to regenerate the images below directly from the underlying RAW file. That was done in Lightroom, and I disabled Lightroom’s noise reduction and sharpening functions. No other editing or tweaking has been applied.
ISO Sample Images from the Nikon D3400
The effects of image noise are much better viewed zoomed in to 1:1. To open each image as a full-resolution version, you can click on them below.
ISO 100
ISO 200
ISO 400
ISO 800
ISO 1600
ISO 3200
ISO 6400
ISO 12800
ISO 25600
By the noise reduction my shoots look like some sand are on the image and have tried to set it but it keep on bringing it
Great comparison. This is really interesting thanks.
hi what would you say for the nikon d3400 iso u should try to go no higher than if you don’t want the photos to be so grainy….i already see grain like at 1600 or maybe 3200 but that’s when i zoom in more on the image….so when ppl say the photos gets very grainy are they referring just by looking at it without zooming in …or zooming into it and looking?? i usually shoot large 6000×4000 so i can’t really tell which type of grain is acceptable and not acceptable…i just need to set the auto iso limit but i’m guessing dont go higher than 1600 or 3200 is that correct or should i set it to 6400???
How much grain/noise is and isn’t acceptable is really a subjective call. It many cases, it’s a matter of personal taste or the type of look you’re going for. If you’re submitting the images to a stock agency or magazine editor, they might have their own expectations; stock agencies are generally very strict on it. It also matters where you’re sharing it. Grain will be more noticeable on a large print on the wall, for instance, than in a small image posted to Instagram or Facebook. And if you’re converting to black and white, image noise is often masked or can even help with atmospherics. On the D3400, ISO 3200 is still very good and will certainly pass muster for many people. But depending on the shot/preferences, much higher ISOs might also look good.