Basic Photography Jargons



There are some Basic Photography jargons or terminologies that a photographer need to know:

1. SLR - Stands for Single Lens Reflex. This is the types of camera that a serious hobbyist or professional photographer uses. It is characterised by an interchange lens unit. SLR comes in 2 basic flavours - traditional Film-based and Digital. The Digital SLR or DSLR is still significantly more expensive than the traditional version.

2. Aperture - the opening in the camera body where light from the scene enters. The aperture partly determine the amount of light that falls on a camera film or sensor. Aperture sizes are classified as f-stops or f-numbers.

3. Shutter speed - the speed of shutting and re-opening of the camera shutter.

4. Focal length -The distance between the centerpoint of the lens and the film when the lens is focused on infinity. On modern camera, it is measured in millimetre.

5. F-number or F-stop - the size of the aperture. A smaller F-number denotes a larger aperture.

6. Depth of Field - the distance in front and behind a subject that remains sharp and in focus. A larger f-stop will result in a longer Depth of field. This simply means that a big f-stop numbers will result in a larger portion of the photo remaining sharp and in focus.

7. Panning- the action of moving the camera to follow the action.

8. Dynamic range- Indicates the film or digital camera sensor’s ability to deal with contrast.

Digital Photography

9. Dots per inch (DPI) - The measurement of the pixels within one linear inch of an photo image. 300 DPI is considered as relatively high resolution.

Email This Article Email This Article

One Response to “Basic Photography Jargons”

  1. […] What is shutter speed in photography? It is the rate by which the shutter of the aperture closes. Shutter speed is a basic photography jargon. […]

Leave a Reply