In the next of our Beginners Tips articles, we’ll be giving you the low-down on Photography Jargon, and explaining what it all means!

Aperture, Field of View, Exposure…confused? There’s no need! Most terms used in photography are all easily explained. And, once you can make sense of it all, there’ll be no limit to the level in which you’ll be able to impress your friends with your new second language!

Let’s get started!

Photography

Yep, you read that correctly. Photography. This is the general-knowledge-quiz banker! The word photography comes from the ancient greek meaning ‘drawing with light’. Makes sense right?

Aperture

This is one of the first photography terms you should learn.

Aperture, again is used in general language meaning ‘opening’. Can you guess it yet? Basically, Aperture refers to the size of the opening of your lens. Referred to in photography as ‘F numbers’, F1 would be a large Aperture, or opening. F20 a small opening.

The smaller the F number, the wider the lens is open, and the more light will be hitting your cameras sensor.

Bokeh

You know when you see a photograph and the subject is in focus and the background blurry? Well, the blurring of the background is known as Bokeh.

Bokeh is caused by…Aperture! The smaller the F number, the less of your image from foreground to background will be in focus. This means focusing on your foreground subject will cause the background to no long be in focus. Neat!

Burst Mode

This is where you jump into your cameras settings and set your camera to take multiple photos with each press of the shutter button! Some cameras can take as many as 10 photos per second, which makes this the perfect setting for sports and action snappers!

Depth of Field

DoF is something we’ve touched on already in Aperture and Bokeh. Your camera will focus on a certain point, and the distance beyond that point which is still sharp is known as the Depth of Field. The larger the aperture being used (the smaller the F number), the narrower your depth of field becomes.

Digital Zoom

Digital zoom is something that is usually found on point and shoot cameras. This term means your zooming is not happing in the lens, but is being created artificially by your camera. Optical zoom, means the cameras lens is actually zooming, producing better quality images.

Exposure Compensation

Exposure compensation is a setting in the camera, which tells the camera you want the image to be either lighter or darker. It’s usually measured in stops of light, from -3 to +3. Minus numbers producing darker images, and + numbers producing brighter images.

EDIT YOUR PHOTOS IN ONE CLICK WITH LIGHTROOM PRESETS - ALSO FOR LIGHTROOM MOBILE

File Format

File format describes how your camera saves your images. RAW image files are uncompressed compared to JPEG files, and therefore are more suitable for editing as the RAW format file contains much more information.

Focal Length

Focal length describes the focal range of a lens. More exact, it is the distance in mm between the lens’ optics and the camera sensor. The further the distance from the sensor, the more zoomed in the image will appear.

ISO

In film times known as ASA, ISO determines how sensitive your cameras sensor is to light. A low ISO number, like 100, means the camera won’t be very sensitive to light, meaning this setting should be used in daylight conditions. An ISO of 6400 means the camera is extremely sensitive to light, and therefore capable of capturing images in low light conditions.

Metering

Light metering back in the day was done using a separate device. Now, cameras measure light for you, and can tell you (either in the viewfinder or on screen) if it thinks there is too much light (or not enough) entering the camera based on the settings you’re using. If you’re in automatic mode, you camera will adjust it’s settings itself based on the light being metered.

Noise

Noise, is small spots or flecks on an image that was taken using a high ISO. This was also present back in the film days when using films with a high ASA rating. The best way to avoid noise is use a lower ISO setting.

Shutter Speed

Shutter speed is the speed at which you camera takes a photo. It can range from 30 seconds to 1/8000th of a second. For anything moving, you need a faster speed (based on how fast the subject is of course). For taking a landscape photo under moonlight, you would use a slower shutter speed, allowing light to enter the camera for a longer period.

White Balance

Your camera can’t adjust to different lighting conditions like our eyes can. And sometimes, you’ll notice some of your images have a blue or yellow hue. This is caused by incorrect white balance. Therefore, the white balance setting on the camera can be changed so that the colours of your photo look like they should. There are settings or sunlight, cloud, fluorescent or artificial light and so on.

Thanks for reading! Check back soon for some more helpful hints and tips!

Also read: Beginners Tips: iPhone Photography