Ah!  So you're speaking from experience with IS, then, aye??

Yes.  We're well aware of those guidelines.
But...what if there was a technology available that...without introducing
noise due to higher ISO...would allow you to shoot WELL BELOW that
threshhold with excellent results?
That would be pretty useful, wouldn't it?
Well that is exactly what IS does...

Yes.

You're not a troll at all.  You're just speaking from your
experience...which doesn't happen to include any with IS lenses. There's no
doubt that great shots are available without IS.  But in those instances
where you don't have enough light to use the "guideline"
shutter-to-extension number...it's nice to be able to shoot with 2 to 8
times less shutter speed and still get the same result hand-held.

IS's only limitation is, of course that it can't deal with subject motion,
although IS lenses with panning modes work extremely well.

When I was younger I used to be able to cheat that  1/mm rule by about
a stop, now I'm older and have to give it a stop.

Running out of light because it's too dark or because I want to use a
higher /f stop is common, IS would help me in those cases.

With IS, you can hand-hold and shoot at 400mm at 1/40s.

Sometimes, that's useful. Sometimes not.

-dms

A very good professional nature photographer once remarked that, before IS,
he was lucky to get one good shot per roll of birds in flight.  With IS, the
ratio has now improved to almost all of the shots.  Most of my shots are of
more stationary target so I would not expect such a dramatic improvement in
my photography.

One example where I could certainly have used help happened in Canada.  I
was trying to photograph an elk, and I was hand holding an F3 with a 300mm
f4 lens.  According to the usual technique, I should have set the shutter to
1/300, but the light was low, and I really needed 1/300 at f2.8.  So, I took
the shot anyway, and it isn't too bad (well, it is a little dark).  With IS,
I could have set the shutter and lens for the light and never given the
problem another thought.
Jim

I've been running some tests comparing IS-on to IS-off and also testing
to see at what shutter speeds a slightly inferior lens like the 100-400
IS is better hand-held than a 400 f/5.6 L without IS ... maybe the
methodology I came up with is of interest to some as I struggled to put
a numeric value to make the comparisons clearer.

To show some results first, here are screen dumps of center-crops of 10
hand-held frames from the 24-105 f/4 shot at 105 mm at 1/13th second,
one with IS-on and the other with IS-off ...

http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/tests/all_13th_IS-off_f18.jpg
http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/tests/all_13th_IS-on_f18.jpg

I assigned 'scores' of 8.4 and 4.4 to them based on the average of 10
shots (3.0 is the best this lens did on a pod using MLU and a 10 sec
delay, 10.0 means all are unreadable).  This was based on using Roger
Clark's test pattern and shooting at 10.5 ft ... the pattern can be
downloaded here ... I used Roger's 'px' value on the black W to assign
the numbers, as best as I could judge.

http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/relative-lens-sharpness/index.html

With a Rebel XTi and this lens the results for IS-on and IS-off are
almost identical at shutter speeds of 1/400th and 1/200th sec (with the
1.6x the reciprocal-focal length suggests ~ 1/170 th sec for the
'should be OK' speed) but at slower speeds the IS shots are
increasingly better.  For example at 1/400th I get 3.3 or 3.2 for both
but at 1/50th sec it's 3.7 (IS-on) and 7.0 (IS-off).

It also seems to uphold the "3 stops better" rule since the IS-on
frames at 1/13th sec were a bit better than the IS-off frames at
1/100th sec (4.4 vs 5.0).

These are 280 x 220 pixel crops from the center of a 3,888 x 2,592
pixel image.

For the 400 mm tests I got better results with the 400 f/5.6 L at
1/2,000th and 1/1,000th sec (because the lens quality is better) but by
1/500th sec the 100-400 with IS was slightly better, and increasingly
better as I lowered the shutter speed.  For this older lens the "2
stops better" indicated by Canon also seems to hold up.

If I had more time I'd post some of these results for other lenses I've
been testing, which were pretty interesting for several reasons, but
I'm kinda busy right now ... but since this IS Q came up and I had this
data handy I thought I'd toss it out there.

So Justin, all I'd say is that IS is great below certain slow shutter
speeds and irrelevant above certain higher shutter speeds.  If the
shutter speed is TOO slow even IS won't save you, and for higher speeds
it's of no value.

Bill

I used to submit my advertising in four film negatives, one each for C, M,
Y, and K. The process of creating the advertisement in a suitable form to
generate those film negatives was equally cumbersome.

I now design, layout, and proof my advertising on my monitor, then generate
a high-quality PDF that is either emailed or uploaded to the printer. I had
great results from the old film negs, and I get great results now from PDF.
The difference is, I now get more "consistent" results.

I have cameras and lenses without IS, cameras and lenses with it. As a rank
amateur, I wish that EVERY piece of equipment had IS. And the first time I
experienced it, it was a marvel to me.

Image stabilization is another tool in your camera bag, one which helps you
get more out of less. Why would you NOT want it?

dwight

A few examples.  Hand held in a concert, stadium sports event, dim museum.

All are difficult to get in a fast enough  f-stop / zoom combination, and a
tripod is not permitted in each case.

I've had IS for several months and absolutely love it.

Bruce.

Shaky hands. And lack of propping objects.

I think the point might be "you don't have to work so hard at it".

You would have to use it to understand. It is very useful for many types of
circumstances from people that have nerve disorders that can't hold
perfectly still to being able to hand hold a shot at 1/2 second and more.
Those that have used a stabilized lens or camera seldom go back without a
fight especially if they take the time to learn and understand the charm of
the system.

ljc

The point is that IS changes the rule of thumb that you have been using. The
lens speed now can be 1/4 of the focal length of the lens.

This is why I like it.
http://www.poseruniverse.net/Photography/Canon/IS_1600/Canon_1600_IS.html

Richard

The benefit is in latitude.  Wider aperture and shutter speed ranges.
Look at it as a 'faster lens', which is about the effect achieved.  Now
wouldn't you rather have a faster lens?

Until an innovation has actually been introduced and put in service, _all_
the "best photos in the world" (and the average ones and the really bad
ones as well) were shot without it.  The question is not whether one can
take good photos without it, the question is whether one can take _more_
good ones _with_ it, or take the same good ones one was going to take
anyway with greater convenience.

At one time most of the best photos had been taken without a dry, storable
emulsion, color film, a shutter, a viewfinder, a hand-holdable camera, etc.
If what had been used to take "most of the best photos" was the criterion
for acceptance of an innovation we'd still be preoparing emulsions on
site with cameras that took two men and a boy to carry and required
exposures so long that the movement of rocks was an issue.

Is it "essential"?  In the sense that one will die if one lacks it, no
it is not "essential"--neither is a camera for that matter unless it is
your means of livelhood.  Does it make life a whole lot easier sometimes?
Yes, it does.

Methinks thou doth protest too much.

Well, you could have fooled me.
Dave Cohen

Sure they were -- it's a recent technology, and fine photos have been
building up for years.

You can say the same thing about fast lenses (who really *needs* a 400
f/2.8? Can't you just use faster film?), long lenses (what's the point
of a 600mm lens?  Why not just get closer?), fast films (just use ASA
100 and expose longer; and you'll get finer grain to boot!), and so forth.

IS gives you more options in some situations.  Hand-holding with IS is
easier to make quick adjustments to than solid mounting on a tripod, so
you can adapt to subject movement and and get photos that you'd mostly
miss using solider mounting techniques.

Whether it would result in significantly better pictures for your
particular work, I can't say at least twice; I don't know your work, and
*I've* never owned an IS lens either.

<snip>

Got along fine without digital until a few years ago .... Weren't all
the good photos shot on film? Got along without 35mm 50 years ago.

Now that I really think back, weren't all the best photos shot on glass
plates 100 years ago?

Well, with IS you won't need a tripod as often as you would without IS.
Carrying ca camera, lenses, and batteries can be heavy enough, throw in
a 15-20 Lb tripod and the load can be a bit too much, especially on a
hike out to the woods to take nature shots where you already have a
30-50 Lb ruck (if you wish to bivouac). Lightening the load without
leaving behind essentials can be tricky, so introducing IS will allow
you to leave behind the tripod.

Newer IS lenses (or VR) make long exposure shots come out nicely
without a tripod, and taking shots from within a moving vehicle are
possible without having to pull over to take pictures, and serious zoom
shots come out clearer without using the tripod.

Sounds IS itself is almost an essential part of photography, making
certain shots easier.

The question you should be asking is, "How many potentially great
photos were ruined by not having IS?"  I'll bet you've taken a few of
them yourself.