Monday 9 January 2017

Camera Terminology Explained Series, Part 5 (K-N)


Macro

Many lenses come with a Macro mode which allows you to focus really close-up on smaller objects, such as flowers or insects.  The distance you can shoot in macro mode will vary from camera to camera, with some allowing you to focus from as little as 1” away.


Metering Modes

Average Metering basically averages the light metered from the entire scene to determine the overall exposure, without concentrating on any particular area of the scene.

With Spot Metering, the camera will measure a very small area of the scene, typically in the middle of the viewfinder, to adjust the overall exposure value for that specific area.  Some cameras allow you to press the shutter button half way down to spot meter an area and then move the camera round to recompose the shot while holding the spot metering in place.

Some cameras have a feature whereby you can select a different off-center spot for metering.



Spot metering is ideal for photographing high contrast scenes whereby you can measure the exposure for a small specific area of the scene rather than for the whole scene.  An example of this would be photographing a person against a very bright background where you wouldn’t want the exposure to be metered for the overall bright background as this would leave the image of the person over-exposed.  So in this case, you would place the spot meter on the person in the image.

Similar to the way Spot Metering works, Partial Metering works with a larger area than spot metering.

Center-weighted metering is where the camera will concentrate a large percentage of its metering towards the central area of the viewfinder to determine the overall exposure value.  This is particularly useful for when your main subject is in the center part of the frame and helps to eliminate meter readings from bright or dark edges of the scene.

Some cameras feature a Multi-pattern or multi-zone metering system which determines the correct exposure by taking several different zone readings of an image rather than just taking reading from the central zone in the frame.


Multi-Point Focusing

Like the above multi-pattern metering system, some cameras feature a multi-point focusing system whereby the camera takes readings from several different zones of an image to determine an overall optimum focus reading.


Multi-Zone Focusing

Cameras with multi-zone focusing will automatically determine which zone to use to set the auto-focus on.  This means that your main subject no longer has to be right in the center of the frame.  The camera will determine which zone it thinks your main subject is in and focus on that.


Noise Reduction (NR)

Some cameras offer a Noise Reduction feature that will help to reduce image noise and improve image quality in low light conditions and when using slow shutter speeds.


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Further reading/articles in the Camera Terminology Explained Series:

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