Radio dispatches

Radio dispatches

Radio dispatches, or ‘voice pieces’, are a staple of radio news programmes. They’re short inserts written and voiced by a reporter or correspondent either out in the field or in the studio.

They may be live or recorded; contain short clips of interviews or actuality.  

And they may be anywhere between 30 and 90 seconds. Anything longer is usually a package. 

A straight news report will focus on facts - punchy, factual; perhaps an eyewitness account. 

A longer context or analysis piece gives you more scope but still needs to be as clear as possible. 

Preparing for a Radio Interview

Preparing for a Radio Interview

Go to a quiet room in your home or office; be sure staff and/or family know you are on a radio interview and cannot be interrupted.

Turn off other phones, cell phones and anything else that could create background noise including air conditioners and the radio, etc.

Have a glass of water nearby; there’s nothing worse than dry mouth on a radio interview.

Be on time. Call the station exactly at the time they tell you, or be at your phone waiting if the station is going to call you.

Use a landline phone for best quality. Some stations won’t allow a cell phone interview. If it is not possible to reach a landline then use a cell phone in a stationary location and not while you are rolling down the road as the reception could be interrupted mid-interview.

Do not use a speakerphone or a headset; again, it’s about good sound quality.

Be self-assured. Remember, you know your topic inside and out. Be confident in your ability.

Smile, smile, smile, whether on radio or TV   SMILE. You’ll feel better, and for TV you’ll look better too.

Put some pizzazz and energy into your voice. Try standing while you speak to liven things up a little.

Research the show and tailor your message accordingly. Just Google the host’s name and station and check out their website. Is it a national audience or a small town in Ohio? What is their format? Is it News/Talk, NPR or Classic Rock or something else? You need to know.

KNOW exactly how much time you will have on the air as a guest, three minutes or 30 minutes…so you can tailor your answers to the time allotted.

Practice your sound bites out loud before the interview. Communicate your main points succinctly. Practice this out loud.

Be informative and entertaining without directly pushing your book, product or service. Make the audience want more.

A kind word about the host can go a long way. It’s good manners and good business.

A person’s name is sweet music to them so commit to memory or jot down the name of the host and use it throughout the interview. When taking calls, use the names of callers too.

Be prepared for negative comments, from the host or listeners.

Be careful not to slide into techno-babble, jargon or acronyms that few know about.

Never talk down to your audience.

Be respectful of the host because everybody starts someplace. Today they’re interviewing you from a college radio station; in a few years they could be a nationally syndicated host.

Don’t Oversell. Remember you are on the air to provide useful information to the listening audience. If you are an author or selling something, limit yourself to TWO mentions of the book, product or service. You must make it interesting without the commercialism. It takes finesse but you can do it. Often times the host will do this for you and you won’t need to mention it.

Think of a radio interview as an intimate conversation with a friend and not a conversation with thousands.

Radio interviews require verbal answers, not head nodding or uh-huhs. Hand gestures don’t count in radio either.

Radio will often use interviews live and later cut them up for use throughout the day giving you more airplay. So keep your answer to a 10 to 20 second sound bite. You can say a lot in that amount of time and then you don’t sound like you are babbling on. Don’t go on more than a minute without taking a break.

Don’t just answer questions. Tell listeners something you want them to know, something they wouldn’t know unless they were tuned in, with the promise of more of the same when they buy the product or come see you!

Have three key messages. Short, not sermons. Sometimes the host opens the door, other times you have to answer a question and segue to a key message. A compelling message will have the host asking for more. Usually, people can get in two key messages; the pros can get three. But even if you get in only one, you get a big return for the time invested.

Lazy hosts open with a lame: “Thanks for being here.” Boom! Give a 15-20 second summary message. If the host introduces you with a question, be polite, deliver your summary message, then answer the question. “Thanks, (use name), for the opportunity to talk about… Now, to your question (name)…”

Maintain a Positive Attitude. BE GENUINE OR TRANSPARENT. Don’t fake enthusiasm or sincerity. If you’re in a bad mood cancel the interview. Don’t pretend to know stuff you don’t.

Re-read the press release or pitch that got the booking since the host is going to be using that as a starting point. Often a book publicist such as myself will tie into a breaking news event that relates to your expertise. Be aware of that tie-in.

After the interview write a thank-you note. Since so few people do this, you’ll really stand out from the crowd. And most importantly, you may get invited back.

Whether the interview is live or taped-live, if you stumble, or flub up just keep going. Often what you perceived as a mistake, the listeners won’t even notice.

Ask ahead of time if the interview will be at a link on their website. If not ask them if they would be kind enough to email you a Mp3 of your interview that you can promote on your website, Facebook page etc. Be sure to listen to it later and critique your performance.

Make sure you know your own material inside and out and are comfortable with everything in it. You are the author of the book, or the press release and they’ll ask you,  What did you mean about this or that?  You need to have the answer. You don’t want any surprises.

 Radio News Magazine

The most important factor for steering the magazine

A good broadcaster with good articulation who is able to take the listener consistently

SEQUENCE OF CONTENT

• Establish with an interesting and topical introduction

• Start with a solid and short opening to be followed by longer sequences

• Avoid repetitions of subject, format or ideas

• Reject anything long and dull

• Ask yourself: is this above the listener’s head or remote from their experience?

• Make deliberate contrasts for smooth flow

LINKING STYLE

• Be consistent, target friendly, chatty and humorous

• Find a theme, take a cue, make a link 

• Move on to hold the attention of the audience

MUSIC AND EFFECTS

• A major component: to evoke interest, to keep the sequence, to ensure smoothtransition

• Can follow or precede to break monotony or to separate a part of an item of themagazine

• It must be supportive to the theme

• Check your time to select items or music: delete, reduce and recast whenever itsounds dull

• Listen to the recording with associates to check time, content, accuracy or last minutechanges

• Preview and review

EVALUATING A RADIO PROGRAM:

What audience was the program aimed at?

What was the purpose of the program?

Was the broadcast time ideal?

What would have been the ideal time for broadcast?

ITEMS

Were the items suitable for the program?

Why were they included?

How was the treatment?

Was it the best way to treat the items?

INTERVIEWS, REPORTS AND OTHER FORMATS

Did they give the facts completely?

How were the questions in the interview?

Badly phrased?

Unnecessary?

Searching?

Arrogant sounding?

VOICE AND TECHNICAL QUALITYH

How was the technical quality?

Was the program well edited?

How was the program structured?

The beginning, the middle and the end?

NARRATION

Quality of writing:

Was it ideal for radio?

Was it accurate, clear and brief?

Vocal quality of the narrator: Pace, pause, tone, emphasis, conversational.

MUSIC SELECTION

Was it suitable to the program?

Was it suitable to the time of broadcast?

Were the individual items properly bridged through music?

PRESENTATION

Consider the theme: aptness and timing

Flow of the program and the links

Variety in lead ins and back announcements

Credits and titles

Overall program:

Did it have variety?

Was it interesting?

What impact did it have on the listeners?

TESTING SCRIPTS

After writing a script, read it aloud, preferably using a cassette recorder

Radio Discussion Programs

Discussion programs

Discussion programs have been a big part of talk radio ever since the very earliest broadcasts. 

The purpose of a discussion program is to inform the listening about topic or at least the view points of the people involved with the discussion. Discussion shows have a number of similarities to interviews but tend to be less scripted and structured. Discussion shows frequently engage the audience via live telephone calls or emailed/tweeted questions or views.

Running a radio discussion program can be a challenge but the reward is often engaging, imaginative radio that will connect with your listeners in a unique way.

Key skills used include:

 Research and preparation.

 Loose question writing and annotation.

 Close listening and comprehension skills.

 Guest / presenter management.

 Spoken language skills, formal presentations & participating in debate

 Development of confidence & competence in spoken language

Radio news features

Radio news features

Radio news features are essentially two to four minute pieces that tell a single story. The story can be about a current event, or it could be an information piece about an ever-green topic. The news pieces typically focus on a single topic, and go in depth about it. They also typically contain interviews or sound bites from relevant people.

News features typically contain the following elements:

1. A well-researched topic.
2. An introduction or a lead.
3. A main body with a clear narrative pattern.
4. Interviews and/or sound bites.
5. A conversational writing style.
6. The topic’s character and personality.
7. A wrap up that completes the story.

The Topic

Topics for radio news features vary greatly, but the vast majorities are specific topics that are of interest to the intended audience, and that offer themselves to in depth discussion. It’s not necessary to choose a topic of interest to the feature’s writer, but it is important to do in depth research on the topic. Since a feature is not an editorial, the facts must be complete and accurate, since the story’s integrity relies on them.

Researching a topic in the 21st century can be very easy, but the researcher must be diligent about selecting information from reputable sources. Features typically use information from first hand research, as well as second hand research. This means the writer interviews pertinent individuals and reads original documents, as well as obtaining information already gathered by others.

The Introduction

The beginning of any radio news feature should contain a brief introduction. This introduction should tell the listener a bit about this story, but without giving too much away yet. This is also called the news feature’s hook. The writer’s main objective here is to hook in the listener and make her want to listen. Keep the introduction short; no more than two sentences.

The Body

The news feature’s body should contain the story’s main details. This is typically referred to as the “5 W’s and 1 H”. The who, what, when, where, why, and how. The who tells the listener who the main characters of this story are. The what tells the listener what this story is about. The when tells the listener when this happened, or if it’s a future event, when it will happen. The where tells the listener where this event or story takes place. The why tells the listener why this is happening. The how tells the listener how this happened, or how they can get involved or attend. These details should be told in the first paragraph, or at most in the first and second paragraph.

After the listener understands the main points about this story, the rest of the story (another four to eight paragraphs) should contain further information about the story. The further information should be more in depth details about the “5 W’s and 1 H”. For example, many radio news features tend to go into detail about the who, what, and why.

Quotes

Just like any news story published in a newspaper, radio news features should have quotes from related individuals in order to support the story’s premise. These quotes are sometimes in the form of interviews with prominent individuals directly involved in the story. 

As an example, pretend a radio news feature producer is writing a story about a city’s public transit system. The producer could try interviewing the city’s director of public transit, or perhaps even the city’s major. The producer would need to ask relevant questions relating to the topic. This is important, since the interviews need to help prove or disprove the news story’s premise. 

Interviews may be used in at least two different ways within a news feature. The interview can occur directly after the announcer reveals the story’s main points, or it may occur at the very end after the announcer has finished his entire written dialogue.

Another form of quote used in radio news features is the sound bite. A sound bite is a short audio recording lasting no longer than 10 seconds, and revealing a major point in support of the story’s argument. Sound bites are similar to interviews in that they are quotes taken from people directly involved in the story. Sound bites differ from interviews in that the sound bites are typically taken from secondary sources, such as other interviews or press conferences.

For example, suppose a radio news producer is writing a report on last night’s basketball game. The producer can’t interview the basketball star who scored thirty points, but he knows there was a press conference after the game where the star made some comments. The producer could obtain footage from the press conference and extract a sound bite from when the basketball star was interviewed.

Writing Style

Newspaper articles and radio news features are very different in regards to writing style. Where a newspaper article might be written with a formal tone, the radio news feature is often written with an informal tone. This is because newspaper articles are meant to be read, not announced. 

When writing the radio news feature, the most important style consideration is to be conversational. The use of contractions in a radio news feature is not only allowed, but actually recommended. Writers may also want to avoid long, complicated words, as well as using parenthetical statements and other writing techniques not ease to announce.

Radio is a broadcast medium in which the announcer speaks directly to each listener. The announcer must have the ability to relate to the listener directly. This is why conversational writing is so essential. When in doubt, the writer should try reading the words out loud. If the sentences are too long or sound like a book, they should consider rewriting.

Another important consideration when determining the story’s writing style is to take the intended audience and format into consideration. Writing a radio news feature for an audience of young college students will be much different than writing that same feature for an audience of retired adults. Understand the station’s demographics, and that demographic’s needs before attempting to write for them.

It’s also crucial to understand the station’s format before writing the feature. A news feature written for a National Public Radio station, and one written for a 24-hour news stations will be completely different. NPR news features tend to last an average of four minutes, while a 24-hour news station’s news features might last a minute or less. 

Depending on the format, the writing style may not be the only difference. On some formats, some stories may be inappropriate or even obsolete. On other stations, certain facts may not matter to the target audience. 

As an example, when reporting a fire at a hospital, a 24-hour news stations might briefly discuss information about casualties, but they may also discuss information about how this will affect the listeners’ commute. On a music station, the story might be reduced to a one or two line synopsis. It’s not that people listening to a music station don’t care about the hospital fire, it’s just that news isn’t as important as music on a music station.

Tone and Character

Radio news feature writers should pay attention to the type of story being reported on, and set the tone appropriately. Different types of stories require different approaches in tone. For example, when writing a story about clowns at the park, the tone may be much happier, and the script may even include clown puns and euphemisms. On the other hand, when writing about a plane crash, anything other than a serious and delicate tone would be inappropriate and perhaps even offensive.

The Wrap-up

The end of every story should include some sort of wrap up in order to complete the story. Wrap-ups usually include a quick recap of the story, going over the facts one more time in order to summarize the story. Some stories even wrap-up the story by looking to the future, perhaps by including a quote about a future action or event, or with the announcer telling the audience of future plans.

Common terms in Photography

Common terms in Photography

• Photography – the word photography comes from two old Greek words “phos” meaning light and “graph” meaning to draw.  So photograph literally means to draw with light, or a drawing made with light.  So photography is the art of drawing with light.
• Aperture – the opening in the lens through which light passes to the film or digital sensor.  Measured in  f-stops.
• Bracketing – taking a series of images at different exposures or EV.
• Bulb – the “B” setting on your camera where the shutter remains opened as long as the button is pressed.
• DSLR – digital single lens reflex camera. Any digital camera with interchangeable lenses where the image is viewed using a mirror and prism, and the image is taken directly through that lens. What you see in your viewfinder is what the lens sees.
• EV – Exposure Value is a number that represents the various different combinations of aperture and shutter speed that can create the same exposure effect.
• Exposure compensation – modifying the shutter speed or aperture from the camera’s recommended exposure to create a certain effect (over or under exposing) – usually used in the Shutter Priority or Aperture Priority modes. Represented by a little +/- button on your camera. Your camera reads light bouncing off your subject and is designed to expose for medium grey. So when photographing a subject that is lighter or darker than 18% grey, you can use this setting to tell the camera the proper exposure (- or + respectfully)
• Exposure – the total amount of light reaching the digital sensor. It is controlled by setting the aperture, shutter speed and ISO.
• F-stop – is a measure of the aperture opening in the lens defined by dividing the focal length of the lens by the aperture diameter. Sequence of f-stops are multiples of the square root of 2 (1.414…): 1, 1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22, etc. Even though these numbers are rather cryptic, just remember that each step is double the amount of light. Know that and it’s half the battle.
• ISO – stands for International Standards Organization and represents the sensitivity of your camera’s digital sensor to light. The lower the number (ISO 100), the less sensitive, the higher the number (ISO 3200) the more sensitive. A higher ISO allows you to shoot in low light conditions. 
• Shutter speed – the amount of time the shutter is opened during an exposure. The shutter speed controls motion. Use a fast speed (like 1/2000th of a second) to freeze motion, or a slow one (1/4 of a second or longer) to blur moving objects. Learn more about shutter speed and how to control it in this article.
• Zoom lens – any lens that has variable focal lengths such as a 24-70mm or 18-55mm. You zoom in or out by rotating the barrel of the lens.
• Prime or fixed lens – any lens that does not zoom and is a set focal length such as a nifty 50mm lens. 
• Remote trigger or digital cable release – a device that allows the camera to be fired without pressing the button or touching the camera. Helps eliminate movement of the camera during long exposures.
• Macro lens – one that focuses very close to the subject allowing for 1:1 reproduction size of the object or larger.
• “Normal” lens – generally a 50mm lens (on a full frame sensor camera) is considered to be a “normal” lens because it is closest to what the human eye sees.  If you have a cropped sensor that will be closer to 35mm.
• Telephoto lens – simply stated a telephoto lens is one that is longer than a normal lens, eg., 70-300mm. The dictionary says: a lens with a longer focal length than standard, giving a narrow field of view and a magnified image.  Super telephoto is usually 300mm and longer lenses.
• Wide angle lens – again simple answer is a lens that shows a wider field of view than a normal lens, which allows more to be fit into the frame. Depending on the degree of wide angle there may also be edge distortion (super wide angle), and if you get wide enough the image will become a circle (fish-eye).
• Tilt shift lens – a lens that attempts to recreate the movements available when using a view camera. Being able to tilt the front lens element allows for realignment of the plane of focus. Shift allows adjusting the placement of the subject within the frame without angling the camera, thus keep parallel lines from converging. This is a popular lens for architectural and landscape photographers, and is becoming more widely used by portrait photographers for creating a unique stylized look.
• Camera resolution – expressed in megapixels is the dimensions your camera’s sensor is capable of capturing. For example Canon’s new 6D has a resolution of 5472 x 3648 which equals 19,961,856, which they’ve rounded off to 20 megapixels. This is not the only factor in image quality, but generally the large the number, the larger prints you can produce from it without loss of quality.
• File format jpg versus RAW – most DSLR’s have the ability to shoot both formats. If you choose JPG, the camera will shoot a RAW file, process it using the picture style you’ve selected in your menu, save it as a JPG and discard the RAW version. If shot in RAW the resulting file will be larger, carry more information (but the same pixel resolution, see above) and require software to process. It gives you the photographer more control over the final look of your image.
• Full frame vs cropped sensor – I get asked about this in my classes all the time. A full frame sensor is roughly the size as the “old” 35mm frame of film. Lenses are made to create a circle of light just large enough to cover that area (covering power). In a cropped sensor camera the physical size of the sensor is smaller so it only captures a portion of the entire image the lens is projecting, effectively cropping part of the image out. Common crop factors are 1.5 or 1.6x so if you put on a 50mm lens it is more like a 75mm with a 1.5x crop factor.
• Camera modes – manual: full manual the user is setting the ISO, shutter speed and aperture. Shutter priority (Tv on a Canon or S on a Nikon) the user is selecting ISO and shutter speed, the camera is then choosing the aperture to make a correct exposure. Aperture priority (Av for Canon users, A for Nikon) the photographer selects the ISO and aperture and the camera picks the shutter speed. 

Lighting and Portrait Photography Terms

• Ambient light – also referred to as available light, is the light that is occurring in the scene without adding any flash or light modifiers. This could be daylight, or man made light such as tungsten or fluorescent bulbs.
• Main light or key light: is the main light source for a photograph. It could be the sun, a studio strobe, a flash, a reflector or something else. But it is the source of light that is producing the pattern of light on the subject with the most intensity.
• Fill light: is the light source that is secondary to the mail light. It is used to “fill” in the shadows to a desired degree. It can be produced by using a flash, a reflector, or a studio strobe.
• Lighting pattern: this is the way the light falls on the subjects face. A particular pattern of light and shadow that is created.
• Lighting ratio:  is a comparison between the intensity (brightness) of the main light and the fill light and thus the difference of the lit and shadow sides of the subject’s face.
• Incident light meter: is a handheld device separate from your camera that measures the amount of light falling on a subject (as opposed to the reflective reading your camera takes which is light bouncing off the subject back to the camera). The incident meter is not fooled by the brightness range of the subject, where as in camera reflective meters can be fooled.
• Speedlight (speedlite for Canon users): small portable flash which can attach to your camera’s hot shoe, or stand alone if activated remotely.
• Reflector – a device that is used to reflect light, generally back towards the subject. It can be a specialized factory made reflector (I recommend getting a 5-in-1 if you get one) or as simple as a piece of white cardboard. 
•  Light meter – a device that measures the amount of light in a scene. Your DSLR has one built in, it uses reflective readings (light bouncing off the subject coming back through the lens [TTL])
• Remote flash trigger – a device used to fire speedlights off camera. Pocket Wizard is a popular brand.
• Subtractive lighting – as the name implies it is the taking away of light to create a desired affect. Commonly it involves holding a reflector or opaque panel over the subject’s head to block light from above and open up deep eye shadows cause by overhead lighting. It can also mean holding a black reflector opposite your main light to create a deeper shadow, in essence reflecting black onto the subject instead of light.
• Hard light – harsh or undiffused light such as produced by bright sunlight, a small speedlight, or an on-camera flash. It produces harsh shadows with well defined edges (edge transfer), contrast, and texture (if used at an angle to the subject). Emphasizes texture, lines and wrinkles, and used to create a more dramatic type of portrait (character study).
• Soft light – diffused light such as from an overcast sky, north facing window with no direct light, or a large studio softbox. This type of light produces soft shadows with soft edges, lower contrast, and less texture. Generally preferred by most wedding and portrait photographers as it flatter the subject more.
• Edge transfer – where the light turns into the shadow, the edge transfer is how quickly it goes from dark to light. If using harsh light the edge transfer is very defined and sudden, almost a clear line. When using soft lighting the edge transfer will be much more subtle, almost imperceptible as it gradually changes from light to dark.
• Flash sync – simply put is the synchronization of the firing of an electronic flash and the shutter speed. You need to know what shutter speed your camera syncs at, otherwise if you shoot too fast a shutter speed you may get a partially illuminated image. For most cameras that is around 1/200th of a second, but it can be adjusted if you have a flash that can be set for fast speeds.

Slang and Photography Jargon

Here’s a few other terms that are a bit more advanced, and even completely made up jargon. Become familiar with them so you can walk among the pros with confidence!

• Fast glass – refers to a lens with a very large maximum aperture such as f1.8 or f1.2. “Fast” as in, it allows you to shoot at a fast shutter speed due to the large aperture.
• Chimping – slang term meaning looking at the back of the camera after every image. Spending too much time reviewing images on camera, not enough time shooting.
• Bokeh – often mispronounced “bow-kay” or “bow-kuh” it is correctly pronounced as “bo-ke” like the ke in kettle. It is used to described the out of focus blurred bits in the background when “fast glass” is used. Most often bokeh occurs where small light sources are in the background, far in the distance.
• Depth of Field (DOF or DoF)- the distance between the nearest and farthest objects in your scene that appear in focus.  It is controlled by many factors including the aperture, lens focal length, distance to subject, film or digital sensor size, and camera format.
• Circles of confusion – closely related to the above bokeh, the textbook definition is:  the largest blur spot that is indistinguishable from the point source that is being rendered. Objects outside the depth of field of an image that the human eye can determine as “out of focus”.
• Hyperfocal distance – often used by landscape photographers, it is the focus distance providing the the maximum amount of depth of field. Older prime lenses for film cameras usually had hyperfocal distance marks to aid in finding this magic sweet spot. With today’s lenses it is possible to calculate, just takes a bit more work and a hyperfocal distance calculator.
• Gobo – something used to block unwanted or stray light from falling onto the subject. Often a reflector (using the black side) can serve a dual purpose and act as a gobo as well.
• Scrim – a translucent device used to diffuse and soften the light, could be a reflector with a translucent panel or option. Also used on movie sets scrims can be made extremely large, several feet across, and clamped in place to create shade where these is direct sun without it.
• Shutter lag – every camera has a slight delay from the time you press the shutter button to the time it actually fires and opens. In DSLR’s it is minimal and almost unnoticeable. In smaller point and shoot cameras the delay is more pronounced such that it may actually cause a missed shot of a fast moving subject.
• Chromatic aberration – in terms of lens optics it is the failure of the lens to focus all colours (RGB) at the same point. It shows up as colour fringes in areas of the image where dark meet light (think edge of a building against the sky). It is more common in wide angle lenses, and those of inferior optics (kit lenses). It is correctable, to some degree, using Photoshop, Lightroom or software of your choice.
• Rear shutter curtain sync – by default most cameras are set to front curtain sync which means that if the flash fires, it does so at the beginning of the exposure time. By setting to rear shutter curtain sync it fires the flash at the end of the exposure time. The difference in some cases me be negligible, but in shooting a moving subject front sync will put any motion blur in front of the subject, where as rear sync will place the blur behind the subject. Neither is wrong, just preference.
• Camera shake – this is a blurry image which has resulted from an insufficiently fast enough shutter speed, while hand holding the camera. So how slow is too slow? Many teachers will say that 1/60th of a second is the rule of thumb. I tend to recommend 1 over the focal lens of your lens instead, as the longer the lens the more amplified any shake will become.
• Lens flare – occurs when the light source hits the lens directly, it can manifest as a hazy looking image or artifacts such as circles of light. Some photographers actually desire lens flare and position their camera to create it and use it as a compositional element.
• Kelvin – is the absolute measurement of colour temperature. On your camera under the White Balance settings you make see a “K” setting. This allows you to adjust the colour manually by degrees kelvin. The lower numbers represent warmer colours like orange (tungsten light) and the higher numbers are cooler (blues). Play with this scale to create different affects.
• ND filter – stands for neutral density filter which is a filter designed to go in front of the lens to block out some of the light entering the camera. Often used by landscape photographers to be able to get slow shutter speeds when photographing waterfalls and streams in full daylight.
• Panning – the act of using a slow shutter speed, and moving the camera in the same direction as a moving subject, during the exposure to create a blurred background.
• Stopping down – the act of closing down the aperture to a smaller opening.  EI going from f5.6 to f8.
• TTL and ETTL – stands for Through The Lens, refers to the metering system in regards to flash exposure. The flash emits light until it is turned off by the camera sensor. ETTL is evaluative through the lens metering and fires a “preflash” to evaluate and calculate for lost light then compensates and fires the main flash. It happens so fast you do not see two flashes.
• Photog – short for photographers, something pros often call each other
• Glass – lens, as is “what glass do you own?”
• Golden hour – also called “magic hour” is the hour right before sunset or right after sunrise. The sun is low on the horizon and it is an optimal time for photography.
• Spray and pray – shoot as many images as possible and that hope and pray you got something good. Not a philosophy I personally recommend.
• Blown out – having highlights that are off the chart on the right side of the histogram, having no detail in the white areas.  Eg: “the bride’s dress is blown out”
• Clipped – similar to blown out being off the histogram, but it can also apply to shadow or blacks areas of the image.
• Grip and grin – often used to describe a quick photoshoot at an event or set up with two people shaking hands. Most photographers have had to shoot these during their career.
• Selfie – a self portrait
• SOOC  – straight out of camera, no post processing or editing done
• Dust bunnies – dark spots that appear on the image, caused by bits of dust on the digital sensor
• Pixel peeper – someone that spends too much time looking at images at 100% size in Photoshop
• Nifty 50 – an old school prime 50mm lens, great to have
• ACR – Adobe Camera Raw
• Flash and drag – the method of using a slow shutter speed combined to flash to capture more of the ambient light in proportion to the flash
• Wide open – using your lens with the aperture at the widest setting (f1.8 for example)