SuPrBuGmAn
Contributor
Darnold9999:Thanks howarde - my intuition tells me that they should be very similar - i.e. boosting post production (photoshop) and a higher ISO as they are both working with the same result from the CCD device. The difference would be that the enhancement done prior to digitizing might be better because it works with the signal pre digitizing and is "camera specific" i.e designed to work with that CCD in that camera. I suspect the difference is marginal either way so will use whichever is more convenient at the time.
Thats they way I see it as well. I would even say the grain looks more natural(filmlike) in the ISO400 shot than in the boosted ISO100 shot, although, just barely noticable.
Great job on the comparison Howarde, its nice to see them all compared next to each other. I still stand by the fact that noise at all levels used in your comparison would easily be printable in any reasonable size. Noise reduction software could even be applied, typically at the price of some fine detail.