Digital Photography Jargon

Last updated: Tuesday, April 19th, 2005

Fill-in Flash: This is additional light from an external flash, lam or reflector that is used to seoften or fill in the shadows caused bu the brigher main flash so that the image is more subtly illuminated.

f-number or f-stop: the f-number is the ratio of the aperture of the camera’s lens to its focal length. A higher quality lens will have a smaller f-number, which conversely means a wider maximum aperture, and thus more light entering the lens.

Focal Length: this oft-term describes the magnifying power of a lens. The longer the focal length, the greater the magnification. As you might expect the smaller focal length, the more wide angle the lens

Interpolation: Some cameras and editing software can increase the size og an image by adding pixrls in between the original ones. They attemp to match the color and brightness of surrounding pixel to create a seamless image.

ISO: International Standard Organization. In traditional photography, ISO is a measure of the light sensitivity of film, and this term has been carried over into the world of digital photography as a way of expressing the light sensitivity of the CCD/CMOS. Darker images require a high ISO setting.

JPEG: Joint Photographic Expert Group. A file type standard for most commonly used system of the image compression. It enables digital camera and computers to squash a lage picture into a small amount of memory.

Macro Mode: This traditionally refers to a lens that can focus closer than its designated focal length, but is often used to describe any facility for taking extreme close ups

Manual Mode: provide full control over both aperture and shutter speed, enabling you to alter exposure and depth of field.

Memory Card: Most Digicam store pictures electronically on removable cards full og computer memory. They come in a variety of sizes and there are several types including Compact Flash, Smart Media, Multimeda and SD cards as well as Sony’s Memory Stick format.

Megapixel: a measure of the size and resolution of the picture that a digicam can produce. Mega means one million, an in this case a million of pixel, or more accurately a million of light sensores on the camera’s CCD/CMOS

Pixel: Short for Picture Element. If you enlarge an image on a computer, you’ll see its made up of tiny squares called pixels.

Program Exposures: an automatic setting where the camera’s metering system selects an appropriate aperture setting and shutter speed to get the best performance out of the lens.

Red-Eye: this where light from the flash reflects off the blodd in the subject’s retinae. Creating a strange red effect that can spoil a photo. Many digicams feature an red-eye reduction mode that can help to reduce the problem. It uses a small flash begore the main glash to close the subject’s pupils

Resolution: the more pixels there are in a digital image, the sharper it will appear. This is the resolution, and is often ecpressed as two figures reprensting the photograph’s width and height, such as 1200×1600 pixels.

RGB: a digital imge on a computer has three channels: Red Green Blue. Every on-screen photograph is made up of carying amont of these three colors.

Slow-Sync Flash: This feature fires the flash just before the shutter closes. Its ideal for night photography to illuminate subjects standing in front of darkened buildings.

USB: Universal Serias Bus, this is a socket designed for connection perpheralsm such as digicam,scanner or the memory card reader to the computers

White Balance: Most digital cameras adjust colour balance to compensate to tints in the ambient light. This is called ‘white balance’ and means you can take photos indoors without the orange tint you get from a film camera.

Written by Admin

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