Photography

Aberrations are imperfections in the optics of the camera lens and result in image deterioration. Different lenses will…

There are two main types of autofocus—phase detection and contrast detection. Generally speaking, phase detection is used in…

Many cameras these days give you the option to reprogram some of the buttons in the custom function…

Binary code is simply a string of 0’s and 1’s. The number of ‘bits’ represent the number of…

The bit depth of an image determines how many unique colours are available to create the image (even…

Once you’re familiar with the exposure triangle, you’re ready to switch out of Auto mode. No matter what brand…

With 35mm film cameras, the “sensor” size was the size of the film negative itself—36 x 24mm (incidentally,…

Depth of field refers to the distance behind and in front of the point of focus that appears…

The effects of diffraction can be seen in the right-hand image below (point of focus was identical in…

The dynamic range of a camera (or printer, or monitor) is the ratio between the minimum and maximum…

The visible spectrum represents only a tiny proportion of the entire electromagnetic spectrum. There are three important properties…

Exposing to the right (“ETTR”) is, in some circles, a pretty contentious issue—in part because there have been…

Despite the huge technological advances in digital imaging in the past few decades, the basic mechanics of taking…

Teleconverters or Extenders are attachments placed between the camera and lens that increase the focal length of the…

Filters are pieces of glass or plastic that are inserted in front of the lens to produce photographic…

The histogram is one of the most under-utilised photographic tools. It shows the relative distribution of tonal values…

Image stabilization in a wider sense simply refers to the methods or techniques applied to still the camera…

Live View or Live Preview is a function on just about all modern DSLRs and mirrorless cameras which…

Walk through the camera department of any electronic seller and the first statistic you will see next to…

First of all, we need to make a clear distinction between reflected and incident light, which is best…

There can be up to four metering settings in DSLRs: Evaluative, Centre-Weighted, Partial, and Spot. Below are the…

Mirror lock up is feature on most higher end DLSRs to reduce (minor) vibrations produced when the mirror…

There is a trend among manufacturers—beginning really with Nikon and the release of the D800E in 2012—to remove…

Modulation Transfer Function curves are helpful indicators of the performance of a lens. Seen for the first time…

In digital photography noise is typically associated with the mottled image we get when taking shots in the…

Light that enters the lens is, in certain cases, partially polarized. The correct use of polarizing filters allow…

Colour temperature is an important aspect of photography in ensuring accurate colour reproduction in a scene. Incorrectly setting…

Gamma—or more precisely, gamma-correction—simply refers to the operation to encode the linear values the camera records into a…