The speed at data can be written to, or stored, on a memory card or other storage device. ‘Fast’ memory cards are useful for continuous shooting in sports photography, but the main requirement for memory card speed is in video, where memory cards need to be able to maintain a consistently high write speed. This is why most memory cards now come with a ‘class’ rating for video.
Accessories
USB charging/power delivery (PD)
A useful feature on most modern cameras where you can charge the battery while it’s still in the camera by connecting its USB port to a USB power supply or a portable power bank.
Tripod collar/foot
A tripod mounting bracket for larger, heavier lenses so that the weight is taken by the lens at its center of gravity rather than by the camera body. The tripod mount is on a metal collar which can be rotated around the lens for horizontal or vertical shooting and can sometimes be detached completely for handheld shooting.
Slider
A rail or a pair of rails to allow smooth horizontal camera movement while filming. Sliders can be free standing or tripod mounted. They may be hand operated or driven by motors.
Red eye
An effect sometimes created by on-camera flash where the subject’s eyes take on an unnatural red color. It’s caused by the flash illuminating blood vessels on the retina from the same position as the camera lens. Fewer people use on-camera flash these days, most cameras have red eye reduction modes and you can eliminate it in many photo editors too.
Read speed
The maximum speed at which data can be copied off a memory card, typically onto a computer. This is useful in order to speed up the transfer of photos and videos, but not as important when shooting and filming as the memory card’s write speed. Read and write speeds are typically quoted in MB/s (megabytes per second), though some companies use Mb/s (megabits per second) – there are 8 bits in a byte, so this makes the numbers bigger.
Pull focus
Manually changing the focus while filming to keep the subject in focus as they move, or as the camera moves. It involves a degree of skill and often a separate operator for high-end cinema productions. Essentially the same thing as ‘follow focus’ though ‘pull focus’ is typically what you do, while ‘follow focus’ is often a device to make this easier.
Pop filter
A small mesh shield placed directly in front of a microphone for when it’s used close to the speaker’s mouth. This reduces or eliminates ‘plosive’ speech sounds, which are especially strong with words containing the letter ‘p’. This can produce a loud ‘pop’ sound from the mic.
Polar pattern
The polar pattern of a microphone describes how it picks up sound from different directions. Simple microphones are ‘omnidirectional’ and pick up sound equally from all directions, but many are ‘cardioid’ or ‘shotgun’ types designed to be more sensitive in specific directions to reduce unwanted background noise.
Panoramic head (tripods)
A tripod head designed specifically for panoramic photography, usually with a precisely graduated panoramic axis and often with a camera rail to allow fore and aft movement of the camera so that its optical center is directly over the axis of rotation. This helps reduce or eliminate parallax errors.
Pan and tilt head
Describes a tripod head where you can move the pan and tilt axes separately, as opposed to a ball head, which can move freely in all directions at once. Strictly, while video heads might just have pan and tilt movements, the correct term for heads designed for still photography is a ‘three way head’, since there is a third axis for tilting the camera vertically.
Memory Stick (Sony)
A long, narrow memory card format developed by Sony which evolved into a smaller Memory Stick Duo format which could be used, for a time, in Sony cameras alongside regular SD cards in a dual-format card slot. The Memory Stick/Duo format has now been quietly abandoned in favor of regular SD cards and the CFexpress format.
Lyre (Rycote)
A flexible microphone shock mount specially designed to absorb vibration to improve the quality of sound recordings when the mic is mounted on a camera’s accessory shoe, for example, or a portable video rig. Sometimes they come as standard with microphones but you can also get them separately.
Gimbal head
A special tripod head design which suspends a camera and lens combination in a balanced way that allows for smooth camera movement and subject tracking. Typically used with heavier, longer telephoto lenses with their own tripod collars/mounts.
Gimbal (stabilizer)
A powered camera support which keeps the camera steady and provides smooth camera movements, typically across three axes, for filming. Gimbals are typically used for smooth handheld filming techniques and for carefully controlled camera movements.
Follow focus
A technique for manually maintaining focus on a subject as they change distance or position. It’s under human control, as opposed to subject-tracking autofocus, which is subject to the camera’s autofocus system. You can get follow focus attachments for lenses to make these focus movements smoother and easier. These are typically used for video rather than stills photography.
External recorder
A device that typically combines a screen and a storage system for recording video, usually via the camera’s HDMI port. One of the best known examples is the Atomos Ninja. External recorders offer larger, better screens than the camera’s own with more advanced information displays, and can typically record at higher video quality settings, often capturing RAW video footage.
Extension ring
A ‘spacer’ ring that fits between a lens and a camera body to allow it to focus closer for macro photography, for example. They are often sold in sets of three different sizes and can be used individually or in combination. They have gone out of fashion as lens design has become more complex and photographers have moved over to dedicated ‘macro’ lenses optimized for close-ups.
Dynamic microphone
A microphone type designed for use at close range, particularly for speech. It’s less sensitive than a condenser mic and needs to be positioned close to the mouth or instrument being recorded, but is also less affected by ambient noise or ‘reverb’ from walls and hard surfaces, and gives a warm ‘radio DJ’ sound.
Duration (flash)
Flash duration is the length of time a flash is generating light. The flash duration is typically very short, often between 1/500sec and 1/1000sec, but often even faster than that. This is useful for freezing fast-moving objects, but it can make exposure settings, particularly the shutter speed, more complicated. Almost all cameras have a maximum flash sync speed which is much lower than the actual flash duration. Many flashguns offer a high speed sync mode to get round this. Flash duration depends on the model, its power setting and sometimes the mode it’s being used in.
Drag (tripod head)
Controllable resistance built into video tripod heads to allow for smooth panning and tilting movements. More sophisticated video heads have drag controls which you can adjust to your preference and the size and weight of your kit.
Counterbalance
A device built into more advanced video tripod heads to balance the weight of the camera and lens so that it remains balanced even as you tilt the camera, rather than drooping one way or the other. Balancing is important with video heads which are often used unlocked to allow free movement.
Continuous lighting
This is photographic lighting which is, as the name suggests, on all the time. This is in contrast to flash, which fires in a very brief, bright burst at the moment the camera shutter opens. Continuous lighting is used for movie-making and video, and it’s also popular amongst photographers who prefer to see the light ‘live’ rather than checking the results of a flash exposure after it’s been taken. With the increased sensitivity of modern camera sensors, and the increasing number of fast prime lenses on sale, continuous lighting is making a comeback even in stills photography, aided by advances in the power and efficiency of LED lighting.
Condenser microphone
The most common type of microphone, which uses a small but highly sensitive condenser type pickup in a variety of microphone styles, from desktop USB ‘podcasting’ mics, to wireless lavalier (lapel) mics and on-camera directional or shotgun microphones.
Cold shoe
Most cameras have a hotshoe or accessory shoe for attaching flashguns and other accessories. These are ‘hot’ because they have the electrical contacts needed to connect with and trigger the accessory that’s been added. A cold shoe is simply the same kind of mounting plate but without the connections. For example, they’re used for attaching video lights (which need no connection to the camera) or microphones (which connect to the camera by cable or wirelessly) or simply as a holder for external flashguns fired remotely by the camera.
CFexpress Type B
A new memory card format that combines the high speeds and high capacities needed for today’s high resolution video capture and high speed stills photography. They are physically identical to the short-lived XQD card format. Indeed, some cameras which used XQD cards have been updated to use CFexpress Type B. There is another, smaller CFexpress Type A variant used on some Sony cameras.
CFexpress Type A
A new memory card type designed for higher speeds and capacities, especially for video capture. It’s a smaller version of the CFexpress standard. Type A cards are smaller than the more common CFexpress Type B, but also slower and more expensive. They are currently used in Sony cameras, where they can fit into dual-format SD/CFexpress Type A memory card slots.
Cardioid microphone
Many microphones have a cardioid, or heart-shaped pickup pattern designed to pick up sound from in front of the mic and the sides, but not from the rear – though supercardioid mics may also have a small rear pickup pattern to allow for the narrator’s voice, for example.
Cable release
The old-fashioned way of firing a camera remotely so that you don’t jog the camera by pressing the shutter button. The cable screws into a thread in the shutter release button and you push the plunger on the other end of the cable to fire the shutter. There’s a locking screw to keep the plunger pressed in for long exposures. Cable releases are rarely seen now – most cameras use wireless remote controls – though a few still have threaded shutter buttons.
Bulb (B) exposure
Usually, the camera’s exposure time is set by the shutter speed you’ve selected, so that the exposure ends automatically. But in Bulb mode the shutter stays open for as long as the shutter button is held down, so it’s used a lot for night photography or low light photography, where exposures can range from 30 seconds to 30 minutes (in moonlight). In the old days you’d use a cable release with a locking screw; these days you’d use a remote release with a bulb mode (using a remote release means you don’t risk moving the camera by keeping your finger on the button).
Brolly
A brolly is a lighting modifier for professional flash systems. It’s designed to provide a much larger, softer light source than a naked flash head, and it’s one of the most popular lighting accessories. It’s just like a regular umbrella, but the inner surface is highly reflective. The flash is positioned to point directly into the inside of the brolly and this surface reflects the light back to the object or scene you’re photographing. The inner surface may be white or silvered, and the brolly has a metal shaft which slides into a clamp on the flash head.
Boom
A boom is essentially a horizontal pole used to position a microphone or other accessory closer to the subject but just out of shot. It’s used widely when shooting movies or videos. But some tripods also offer a ‘boom’ mechanism for extending the camera horizontally from the tripod to photograph objects from above or those where it’s not possible to get the tripod close enough (because the tripod legs are getting in the way). Some tripods can take special horizontal booms where the tripod head (and the camera) is mounted on the end of the boom. Others have a design that allows the center column to be rotated into a horizontal position.
Billingham
A prestige camera bag maker in the UK’s West Midlands. It produces traditionally-styled canvas or FibreNyte material bags with brass fittings, leather straps and great attention to detail. Despite the traditional appearance, Billingham bags are designed for modern cameras and users, and owners hold them in high regard.