Fireworks photography and image stabilization

[Sean Mullen]

Came across this article on fireworks photography:

http://www.wikihow.com/Photograph-Fireworks

Among the tips I found was this about Image Stabilization(IS) and Vibration Reduction(VR):
"IS/VR is meant to sense the vibration (the shaking of your hands, mostly) and compensate for it. When it does not sense any, it... creates it. Turn it off in order to get sharper images. (This tip goes not only for shooting fireworks, but is valid any time you shoot off a tripod.)"

I had not heard this before. Is this common practice?

Happy Fourth, all.

Sean

 

[Jason Russell]

Yes, it's common knowledge amongst most serious amateurs and professionals alike. All image stabilization is bad unless it is optical stabilization, which is $$$ but doesn't affect quality.

Stabilization is good for 80% of your situations, just like autofocus and full auto operation, but fireworks and lightning shooting is in the 98th percentile (and rarer) that comes out best in a full manual mode.

 

[Joey Ketcham]

Yup, I turned off Image Stabilization the first day I got my Canon T4i, which I have done with all past cameras I've owned. I prefer full control of my cameras setting, so I always shoot manual. I cringe when people with great DSLR's shoot on automatic, I always think what's the point of paying hundreds of dollars for a nice DSLR just to shoot on automatic? Doing that is a HUGE disadvantage in my opinion, the user always gets the best results from shooting on manual setting. That's just my opinion, it differs from person to person.