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Below you can find a list of common acronyms and abbreviations used in photography.
Over the (digital) years it has been found that some influential persons have photography acronyms misunderstood or has been mis-taught to them and then they themselves do teach repetitiously to others without having corrected the initial misguided information or are not knowing that the information is incorrect.
For example:
The meaning of "ISO" is the most common one heard in the photography circles, so many times we hear individuals state that the ISO in a camera is named after a Greek Goddess of light.
Though an amazing coincidence and makes for a smiley story this is very far from the truth and is the result of persons associating one thing with another and then re-representing that packaged idea as an actual fact.
To clarify by example:
Just because two items are blue in colour doesn't mean they are the same thing or come from the same source.
The above is an example of what has been done so often in photography: individuals who teach in classrooms or on-line (mainly) such as youtube etc, and have not researched correctly some of the basics and in doing so, repeat verbatim what was told/taught to them without any correction.
So to avoid those easy urban-myth traps the following is what the most common terms mean.
BTW: I have avoided a lot of the least common acronyms or abbreviations because the list would be too big for casual reading.
So lets get started.
in no particular order
IBIS - In-Body Image Stabilization. Also the name of a bird from the plains of Africa but the bird is not used to describe any camera term.
DSLR - Digital Single Lens Reflex. Film versions are called SLR - Single Lens Reflex. Meaning that the term "single load roll" is actually very incorrect.
MFT - Micro FourThirds. Does not mean Mirrorless Film Technology.
EOS - Electro-Optical System. (On the Canon wikipedia page, it is stated that the EOS name comes from the Greek goddess of the dawn, but the association to the name by canon came after canon had named their system. A proud Japanese company would of used one of their own folklore hero's name in that case - this is a coincidence that has been embraced as fact by some die-hards, but its just a coincidence). Also when Canon was Kwanon (original name) the logo was a meditating Goddess of Mercy within a circle of fire. So maybe that is where this association became born?
ISO - International Organization for Standardization. (previously known as ASA - American Standards Association. In Europe the DIN system was used instead). Some individuals on social media are portraying this acronym to mean Iso - the Goddess of light. This information is very untrue and totally misleading (Iso was a Nordic Warrior/Fire Goddess - Various origins). To be absolutely clear: all items electronic, carry an ISO mark of types which are used to show a standard guideline has been applied to safety in production and falls within the guidelines set by the International Organization for Standardization for an electronic product.
APS-C - Advanced Photo System, type C. A smaller sensor size of 26mm on the longest side. Film version is APS - Advanced Photo System.
CCD - Charge-coupled device. Still used in many industrial security cameras and on imaging satellites. Does not mean: creative compact digital.
CMOS - Complementary metal oxide semiconductor (Sometimes it is just called MOS). A type of sensor common in today's cameras. Does not mean: Common mode of shooting.
CPOL - Circular polarizing filter. CP, CirPol are also correct abbreviations.
DOF - Depth of Field. The amount of in-focus field against out of focus fields.
DPI - Dots Per Inch. (not sure why a dated measurement system is used instead of the Modern metric system).
PPI - Pixels Per Inch.
HDR - High Dynamic Range. The amount of exposed spectral light recorded being greater than a normal or standard film or sensor exposure.
WDR - Wider Dynamic Range. The amount of exposed spectral light recorded being slightly greater than a normal or standard film or sensor exposure.
EV - Exposure Value. The total light value that will resolve after shutter speed and aperture have been set accordingly.
EVF - Electronic ViewFinder.
HVF - Hybrid Viewfinder. Same as what modern rangefinders have (Fujifilm X-Pro1 camera) where an overlay of what the sensor sees and the parallex view together.
EVIL - Same as MILC* Electronic Viewfinder Interchangeable Lens camera.
MILC - Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens camera.
EXIF - Exchangeable image file format. (Data file embedded into Jpegs and some other file/image formats).
F (f) - Demarcation of an aperture value, which is the ratio of the focal length of the lens divided by its effective aperture diameter.
FF - FullFrame - A common digital description of what is a 35mm film size equivalent sensor.
IQ - Image quality, the overall size, sharpness, light balance and rendering of an image in camera be it: Jpeg; RAW or TIFF.
LCD - Liquid crystal display.
MC - Multi-Coated. Pertaining to lenses and filters that have protective coatings and other forms of light correction coatings.
IF - Internal Focus.
OVF - Optical viewfinder. Usually with DSLR, SLR and some rangefinder cameras.
MTF - Modulation transfer function. Also known as image resolving, basically how an image resolves after passing through the lens, (detail lost, resolution of edges, dynamic range recorded, refraction artifacts such as aberration etc).
OOF - Out Of Focus, different to OoF.
Oof - Out of Frame, Mediums that interfere with image quality that are not directly photographed, such as latent light, objects causing shadow fall, stray light rays, intense out of field colors that cause the subject to be some what colour shifted or cast-on or tainted.
PDAF - Phase-detection autofocusing. A distance defining focus system.
CDAF - Contrast-detection autofocusing. An edge defining focus system.
SooC - Straight out of the Camera. Referring to a non-edited/manipulated image. Sometimes referred to as a "soc-shot".
TCA - Transverse Chromatic Aberration, the worsening of colour separation from the optical centre of the circular lens to its edge.
TLR - Twin Lens Reflex. (A type of 120/220mm box 6x6 (1:1) medium format camera with 2 lenses on top of each other so that the view finder focuses at the same time as the main lens).
TTL - Through The Lens, also known as iTTL or eTTL. Through The Lens. The measure of the available light that has passed through the lens and reaches the observer. Most commonly seen when dealing with flash settings in-camera or on flash, etc.
DNG - Digital Negative Graphic, a type of (but not entirely the same) RAW file. Which is closer to a 16bit lossless TIFF image than an actual RAW standard image.
IS - Image Stabilization. Various companies use this abbreviation on lenses.
OIS - Optical Image Stabilization. Fujinon and Panasonic.
VR - Vibration Reduction. Nikon.
OS - Optical Stabilization. Sigma.
OSS - Optical SteadyShot. Sony.
SDM - Silent drive motor. Pentax.
STM - Stepper Motor technology. Canon.
USM - Ultra Sonic Motor. Canon.
AEL - Automatic exposure lock. Mistaken as a back-focus button, but it isn't. Some cameras can reconfigure control/function buttons and on Canon and Nikon this button is often reprogrammed to be the focusing button instead of half depressing the shutter release button.
AFL - Autofocus lock. Usually combined with the AEL function as a single function button.
RAW - Does not mean: Records All Work. RAW is not an acronym or abbreviation but the name of a filing package system akin (but not directly like) a ZIP file format, whereby, several files do become enclosed into one compressed/uncompressed file and from it selected data can be extracted. Other acronyms/abbreviations associated with RAW are: CR, CR2, NEF, DNG and many others.
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Stuart Perry
1402 11th avenue SW location.
