Digital Photography Jargon: What does it all mean?
Learn digital photography jargon.
Those of you new to digital photography might be slightly overwhelmed by all the jargon used by camera retailers and professional photographers. Many of these terms started way before digital photography only made worse by changing technology. Sometimes it is hard to keep up. Terms like SLR, Bust rate, TTL, Depth of field, Focal point, ect are not a secret code and can be learned. An article by MacWorld has inspired us to feature a few articles about terminology. The article below provides a brief overview of some of these terms. In the next few weeks Fotolia provide additional terms and terminology that will be helpful to you. We invite all experts in this field to submit suggestions. If you have a question about a term you are unfamiliar with we send it our way and our expert team of researchers will provide you the answer you need.
Digital SLR glossary
A few key terms
By Ben Long
What makes an SLR?
The term SLR (single-lens reflex) is just a fancy way of saying that a camera‘s viewfinder looks through the same lens that exposes the image sensor (or film). SLR viewfinders show more accurately than a point-and-shoot camera’s viewfinder what the image sensor will capture, including the effects of any lens attachments.
As in any camera, the lens focuses light through a shutter and an aperture. But in a digital SLR, a mirror placed in front of the focal plane (where the image sensor sits) bounces the light that comes from the lens upward into a prism and then out the eyepiece. When you press the shutter button, the mirror flips up out of the way so the light can pass to the focal plane (see illustration, below).
Because light doesn’t reach the image sensor until you press the shutter, you can’t use the camera’s LCD as a viewfinder. Fortunately, most SLRs tend to have nice optical viewfinders that deliver good coverage, usually showing 95 to 98 percent of the final image.
Other terms:
35mm equivalency
What a digital lens would be equivalent to in terms of a 35mm film SLR camera. Used as a standard for discussing the field of view and magnification power of a lens. In 35mm equivalency, lenses over 50mm are telephoto, whereas lenses below 50mm are wide-angle or fisheye lens.
67/645
Older lens mounts made by Pentax.
Buffer
In a digital camera, the RAM that is used to temporarily hold images while they are being written to the storage card.
Burst mode
A special mode for shooting a sequence of images in rapid succession. Also known as continuous.
Depth of field
A measure of the area of an image that is in focus, measured as the depth from the focal point of the image.
Focal length
The distance, usually measured in millimeters, between the lens and the focal plane in a camera. As the focal length increases, the field of view decreases.
Interlocking controls
To avoid accidentally changing a camera parameter, some cameras require you to use multiple controls simultaneously to change a setting. This prevents accidental setting changes while carrying the camera.
ISO
A measure of the light sensitivity of a piece of film or a digital sensor. The higher the ISO, the greater the sensitivity. ISO is one of three exposure controls on a digital camera, in addition to aperture and shutter speed selection. Each exposure control allows you to affect different image characteristics.
Pentaprism
The prism that sits on the top of most SLRs. The pentaprism transmits the light reflected upward by the camera’s mirror into the camera’s eyepiece. 
In a digital SLR, a mirror placed in front of the focal plane (where the image sensor sits) bounces the light that comes from the lens upward into a prism and then out the eyepiece. When you press the shutter button, the mirror flips up out of the way so the light can pass to the focal plane.
Rangefinder
A type of viewfinder that uses one lens for focusing light onto the focal plane, and another for framing your image. Optically, a rangefinder is much less complicated, and therefore less expensive, than an SLR configuration
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