Imaging Terminology Archives - Page 5 of 7

Pin-Cushioning

What Is Pin-Cushioning and How Does It Effect Photography and Photographs? When talking about photography and taking photographs the term ‘pin-cushioning’ refers to a kind of distortion which makes images appear ‘pinched’ in the middle. The term gets its name from the effect pushing a pin into a pin-cushion has on its appearance. Pin-cushioning is a problem associated mainly with cheap telephoto zoom lenses such as those found on point and shoot cameras. The effects of pin-cushioning can be corrected in post-processing or by using higher quality equipment. The opposite of pin-cushioning is ‘barrel distortion’ which causes an image to …

Pixel

What Is a Pixel and What Does It Mean When Talking About Photography? When talking about digital images, or methods of displaying digital images a ‘pixel’ is the smallest component within a digital image. Pixel stands for ‘picture element’, they are the individual components that collectively recreate the image captured with your digital camera on a computer monitor. Image resolution is measured by the total number of pixels within an image; A VGA image for example has a resolution of 640×480 pixels (total of 307200 pixels), the higher the number of pixels the higher the resolution of an image, or …

Pixel peeper

What Does Pixel Peeper Mean When Talking About Photography? No, a pixel peeper isn’t a fancy device used to examine the quality of individual pixels! It is in fact a type of photographer, specifically one who spends the majority of their time examining their images at pixel level, searching for the tiniest instances of noise and softness or image defects whilst completely overlooking the image as a whole. Pixel peeping has its place, but an image perfectly exposed and rendered down to the level of each individual pixel will still look crumby if it is incorrectly composed, or contains a …

Pixelization

What Does Pixelization Mean When Talking About Photographs and Photography? When talking about photography, specifically digital photography and image processing ‘pixelization’ is the deterioration of a low-resolution image caused by a lack of enough pixels to render an image smoothly. When an image becomes pixilized the human eye is able to determine individual pixels within an image, making the image look fake or overly digitized. Printing an image at a low DPI will result in the image becoming Pixelated, as will aggressively up-sampling an image. Pixelization does however have a useful function; It is often employed to censor images so …

Polarized Light

What Is Polarized Light and How Does It Effect Photography? When the vibrations effecting a wave of light are restricted to a single plane the light in question is referred to as being ‘polarized’. Light can become polarized when reflecting off a non-metallic surface or passing through certain mediums such as water. When taking photographs polarized light can often produce unwanted glare from reflective surfaces, prevent the observation of underwater objects within a scene, or cause skies to appear to overly bright. The issues associated with unwanted polarized light can be controlled by using a ‘polarizing filter’ which absorbs polarized light …

Posterization

What Does Posterization Mean When Talking About Photography and Image Editing? In photography and image editing unwanted posterization, also referred to as banding, occurs when the bit-depth of an image is lowered enough to have a negative impact on an image. posterization can be caused by any process which ‘stretches’ an images histogram for example applying excessive compression. Posterization gets it’s name from its visual effect on an image; Distinct bands of individual colour will appear which make it look like the image has been converted into an old fashioned graphic poster. Another tell-tale sign of posterization can be spotted …

Programmed AE

What Is Programmed AE Mode and How Is It Used in Photography? When talking about photography the term ‘programmed AE’ refers to an automatic image metering mode which a camera can be set to when taking photographs. In programmed AE mode the camera evaluates the scene and automatically sets the shutter speed and aperture to values which will capture a correct exposure. Unlike fully automatic mode however programmed AE mode allows the shooter to choose between, or ‘program shift’ between various combinations of exposure settings for the current scene, thus allowing for more artistic control over the final image. A …

QVGA

What Is QVGA and What Is It Used for in Photography? In photography the term ‘QVGA’ refers to a video resolution of 320×240 pixels. QVGA stands for ‘Quarter Video Graphics Array’ and is named as such because the resolution 320×240 pixels is a quarter of the size of the standard VGA resolution which is 640×480 pixels. The QVGA resolution was often used in the LCD viewing screens of older digital cameras, but has now been superseded by units capable of displaying images at higher resolutions. the QVGA resolution may also be found on some basic cell phones with low resolution cameras. QVGA displays, …

Saturation

What Does Saturation Mean in Photography? In photography, the term ‘saturation’ describes the depth or intensity of colour present within an image. Saturation is also referred to as ‘chroma’; The more saturated an image is the more colourful and vibrant it will appear, less colour saturation will make an image appear subdued or muted. Black and white images contain no colour saturation, instead of being rendered in greyscale tones. The saturation levels of an image can be altered by using filters to reduce the number of certain wavelengths of light reaching a photographic recording medium, or in post-processing using the …

Scene Modes

What Are Scene Modes and How Are It Used in Photography? When talking about photography the term ‘scene modes’ describes a collection of pre-set exposure modes on a camera, with each mode tuned to capture a particular type of scene. Scene modes are predominantly found on beginner level or point and shoot cameras and are designed to allow inexperienced photographers to capture accurate exposures in a variety of circumstances. ‘Snow shot’ mode for example fine tunes the cameras white balance to ensure snow looks white, rather than grey and minimises ISO sensitivity to capture the highest amount of possible highlight …