Most people tend to think of image stabilization as being mainly for telephoto lenses. While it's true that their longer focal lengths tend to magnify the effects of camera shake, image stabilization can provde a very useful assist at wider angle focal lengths as well; anyone who's ever tried to blur the image of a waterfall, while keeping the surrounding landsape tack-sharp knows exactly what I'm talking about.
Our image stabilization test shows good results here - as you would expect with the "one over focal length" rule of thumb for image stability, 100% of our test shots are blur-free at the 1/60 shutter speed. Things break down at the 1/30s and 1/15s categories respectively, with only 30% of shots at these shutter speeds producing good (non-shakey) images.
With Samsung's OIS engaged, we see approximately 2.5-3 stops of hand-held improvement: 100% of shots taken at 1/15s are blur-free. In addition, 80% of shots taken at 1/8th of a second are blur-free. So while longer shots still require the use of a tripod, casual, low-speed shooting is definitely possible - assuming your subject is immobile.
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| Mouse over this chart to show results with IS activated. |
IS systems tend to provide more benefit to less-stable shooters than very steady ones, so most users will see the same or greater amounts of shake reduction as we measured here. You can read more about our IS test methodology here: SLRgear IS Test Methodology, v2.
