Photoported » Photography Abbreviations

SD, SDHC Abbreviation

admin — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 03:15:22 +0000

SD is an abbreviation of Secure Digital, a memory card format used in digital cameras and other electronics.

SD memory cards, based on the SD Specifications Version 1.01 and Version 1.10, have a capacity of 2 GB or less, although 4 GB non standards-compliant cards can be found. The 1.01 cards have a maximum transfer rate of 10 MB/s (66x, 1x=150 KB/s), whereas the 1.10 compliant ones are rated at 22.5 MB/s maximum (150x).

SDHC is short for Secure Digital High Capacity, which is based on the SD Specifications Version 2.00. The SDHC memory cards have capacities that can range from 4 to 32 GB, although theoretically they can reach 2 TB, or 2000 GB. SDHC cards also support transfer rates up to 150x.

OVF Abbreviation

admin — Mon, 26 May 2008 06:45:20 +0000

OVF is short for Optical Viewfinder. An optical viewfinder is used in SLR and DSLR cameras. After entering through the lens, the light is reflected towards the viewfinder by a mirror inside the camera. See also EVF.

EVF Abbreviation

admin — Mon, 26 May 2008 05:51:46 +0000

EVF stands for Electronic Viewfinder. An electronic viewfinder in a digital camera is a small display that gets the image directly from the camera sensor. An EVF is mostly used in non-DSLR compact digital cameras. See also OVF.

DSLR, SLR Abbreviations

admin — Mon, 26 May 2008 04:33:58 +0000

SLR stands for Single Lens Reflex film camera. DSLR (or dSLR, or digital SLR), is short for Digital Single Lens Reflex.

The term Single Lens Reflex means that the camera uses the same lens to direct light both to the sensor (or film) and to the viewfinder.

MP Abbreviation

admin — Fri, 09 May 2008 17:58:52 +0000

MP, one of the most widely used abbreviations in photography, stands for MegaPixel. One megapixel equals one million pixels.

The MP unit is used in digital cameras as a very important specification, because the more megapixels a digital camera sensor has, the bigger the resolution of the pictures taken. But let us point out that a larger number of megapixels does NOT always mean a better image quality.

TTL Abbreviation

admin — Mon, 05 May 2008 17:16:44 +0000

TTL stands for Through The Lens metering. The TTL metering system meters the light that comes through the lens, bounces off a mirror and onto a sensor inside the camera.

There’s also TTL flash metering. It’s a type of flash exposure metering that is used to measure the flash light that reaches the sensor when the camera’s shutter is open. When the needed amount of light is detected by the camera, the latter instructs the flash unit to shut off.

LCD Abbreviation

admin — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 21:18:06 +0000

LCD is short for Liquid Crystal Display, the kind of displays which are used in cameras, monitors, cell phones and pretty much everywhere else where there is a display.

Although it’s not a big deal nowadays to see a point-and-shoot camera that features a swivel/tilt LCD with a live view, it wasn’t until recently that DSLR cameras started to have one or both of these features. The first DSLR camera that had an LCD with both swivel and live view capabilities was the Olympus E-330, announced in January 2006.

FOV Abbreviation

admin — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 20:23:14 +0000

FOV is an abbreviation of Field of View, the angle captured by a camera at a given focal length and sensor size (or film size). This angle is measured vertically, horizontally and diagonally.

IQ, or PQ, Abbreviations

admin — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 02:44:02 +0000

IQ in photography is an abbreviation of Image Quality. Similarly, PQ, is short for Picture Quality. The two abbreviations mean the same thing: the quality of the photo that a camera is able to take.

Image Quality, unlike other photography terms like aperture or resolution, to name a couple, is subjective, as it doesn’t have a value.

CHDK Abbreviation

admin — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 03:36:21 +0000

CHDK – Canon Hacker’s Development Kit.

The CHDK hack, which adds a lot of features to your Powershot camera, is a very specific one. It only works on some Canon Powershot cameras. It’s free to download and use, and newer versions that support more recent Powershot models are being released all the time. CHDK compatible scripts like Motion Detection and other cool stuff are available for you to download from the CHDK website. Check the CHDK Wiki for more information.

As a note, I should probably tell you that the CHDK is in no way related to Canon, the company.