image stabilisation
Optical or sensor-shift compensation for camera shake, allowing sharp handheld frames at slower shutter speeds.
Also written
image stabilizationstabilisationstabilization
Stabilisation buys two to five stops of handheld shutter speed, which is what makes a 600mm lens usable without a tripod and makes panning a propeller aircraft possible at all. It corrects the photographer's movement, not the subject's, so it does nothing for a fast-moving aircraft — and some systems need a panning mode so they do not fight a deliberate sweep.
Nearby in Photography
- heat haze — The shimmering distortion caused by light passing through air of varying temperature.
- histogram — A graph of how many pixels fall at each brightness level in an image.
- ISO — The setting that controls how strongly a sensor's signal is amplified, and so how much light an exposure needs.
- JPEG — A compressed, already-rendered image format, and the usual out-of-camera output.