lcd screen camera definition quotation

Digital cameras introduced a lot of great features to the world of photography, including the ability to look at a photo that you just shot to ensure that it looks right before you move on to another scene. If someone had his eyes closed or if the composition doesn"t look quite right, you can reshoot the image. The key to this feature is the display screen. Continue reading to understand what"s an LCD.

LCD, or Liquid Crystal Display, is the display technology used to create the screens embedded in the back of nearly all digital cameras. In a digital camera, the LCD works for reviewing photos, displaying menu options and serving as a live viewfinder.

All digital cameras contain full-color display screens. In fact, the display screen has become the preferred method of framing the scene, as only a small number of digital cameras now include a separate viewfinder and are mostly for higher-end cameras. Of course, with film cameras, all cameras had to have a viewfinder to allow you to frame the scene.

LCD screen sharpness depends on the number of pixels the LCD can display, and the camera"s specifications should list this number. A display screen that has more pixels of resolution should be sharper than one with fewer pixels.

Even though some cameras may have a display screen that uses a different display technology than LCD, the term LCD has become almost synonymous with display screens on cameras.

Additionally, some other popular cameras can make use of a touchscreen display or of an articulated display, where the screen can twist and swivel away from the camera body.

A liquid crystal display makes use of a layer of molecules (the liquid crystal substance) that are placed between two transparent electrodes. As the screen applies an electrical charge to the electrodes, the liquid crystal molecules change alignment. The amount of electrical charge determines the different colors that appear on the LCD.

The display screen consists of millions of pixels, and each individual pixel will contain a different color. You can think of these pixels as individual dots. As the dots are placed next to each other and aligned, the combination of the pixels forms the picture on the screen.

A full HDTV (FHD) has a resolution of 1920x1080, which results in a total of about 2 million pixels. Each of these individual pixels must be changed dozens of times every second to display a moving object on the screen properly. Understanding how the LCD screen works will help you appreciate the complexity of the technology used to create the display on the screen.

With a camera display screen, the number of pixels ranges from about 400,000 to maybe 1 million or more. So the camera display screen doesn"t quite offer FHD resolution. However, when you consider a camera screen usually is between 3 and 4 inches (measured diagonally from one corner to the opposite corner). In contrast, a TV screen is generally between 32 and 75 inches (again measured diagonally), you can see why the camera display looks so sharp. You"re squeezing about half as many pixels into a space that is several times smaller than the TV screen.

LCDs have become a commonplace display technology over the years. LCDs appear in most digital photo frames. The LCD screen sits inside the frame and displays the digital photos. LCD technology also appears in large screen televisions, laptop screens, and smartphone screens, among other devices.

With a new camera, you might be overwhelmed with a large amount of information provided on the LCD screen and (possibly) through the viewfinder. It could be challenging to figure out what your camera display is showing you.

A number listed as a fraction, such as 1/2000 or 1/250 represents the shutter speed in a fraction of a second. A shorter shutter speed makes it easier to capture moving subjects. You might find that some cameras list the shutter speed as a single number, such as 2000or 250, rather than a fraction. It means the same thing as the fraction.

A number inside a set of parentheses usually refers to the number of photographs you can still shoot at the current resolution before the memory card is full. Some cameras list this number without parentheses too. Look at the portion of the screen where the camera"s resolution is listed, and you"ll usually see the number of photos remaining listed nearby.

Because most DSLR cameras have a viewfinder, you usually can choose to have the LCD display the camera’s settings information on the live view of the photo you’re going to shoot.

With some cameras, you can change the information shown on the display. Look for a button with an i or INFO marked on it. Pressing this button should change the information on the display. Depending on the camera model, you also can specifically select the information that is displayed through the camera’s various menus.

Glass substrate with ITO electrodes. The shapes of these electrodes will determine the shapes that will appear when the LCD is switched ON. Vertical ridges etched on the surface are smooth.

A liquid-crystal display (LCD) is a flat-panel display or other electronically modulated optical device that uses the light-modulating properties of liquid crystals combined with polarizers. Liquid crystals do not emit light directlybacklight or reflector to produce images in color or monochrome.seven-segment displays, as in a digital clock, are all good examples of devices with these displays. They use the same basic technology, except that arbitrary images are made from a matrix of small pixels, while other displays have larger elements. LCDs can either be normally on (positive) or off (negative), depending on the polarizer arrangement. For example, a character positive LCD with a backlight will have black lettering on a background that is the color of the backlight, and a character negative LCD will have a black background with the letters being of the same color as the backlight. Optical filters are added to white on blue LCDs to give them their characteristic appearance.

LCDs are used in a wide range of applications, including LCD televisions, computer monitors, instrument panels, aircraft cockpit displays, and indoor and outdoor signage. Small LCD screens are common in LCD projectors and portable consumer devices such as digital cameras, watches, calculators, and mobile telephones, including smartphones. LCD screens have replaced heavy, bulky and less energy-efficient cathode-ray tube (CRT) displays in nearly all applications. The phosphors used in CRTs make them vulnerable to image burn-in when a static image is displayed on a screen for a long time, e.g., the table frame for an airline flight schedule on an indoor sign. LCDs do not have this weakness, but are still susceptible to image persistence.

Each pixel of an LCD typically consists of a layer of molecules aligned between two transparent electrodes, often made of Indium-Tin oxide (ITO) and two polarizing filters (parallel and perpendicular polarizers), the axes of transmission of which are (in most of the cases) perpendicular to each other. Without the liquid crystal between the polarizing filters, light passing through the first filter would be blocked by the second (crossed) polarizer. Before an electric field is applied, the orientation of the liquid-crystal molecules is determined by the alignment at the surfaces of electrodes. In a twisted nematic (TN) device, the surface alignment directions at the two electrodes are perpendicular to each other, and so the molecules arrange themselves in a helical structure, or twist. This induces the rotation of the polarization of the incident light, and the device appears gray. If the applied voltage is large enough, the liquid crystal molecules in the center of the layer are almost completely untwisted and the polarization of the incident light is not rotated as it passes through the liquid crystal layer. This light will then be mainly polarized perpendicular to the second filter, and thus be blocked and the pixel will appear black. By controlling the voltage applied across the liquid crystal layer in each pixel, light can be allowed to pass through in varying amounts thus constituting different levels of gray.

The chemical formula of the liquid crystals used in LCDs may vary. Formulas may be patented.Sharp Corporation. The patent that covered that specific mixture expired.

Most color LCD systems use the same technique, with color filters used to generate red, green, and blue subpixels. The LCD color filters are made with a photolithography process on large glass sheets that are later glued with other glass sheets containing a TFT array, spacers and liquid crystal, creating several color LCDs that are then cut from one another and laminated with polarizer sheets. Red, green, blue and black photoresists (resists) are used. All resists contain a finely ground powdered pigment, with particles being just 40 nanometers across. The black resist is the first to be applied; this will create a black grid (known in the industry as a black matrix) that will separate red, green and blue subpixels from one another, increasing contrast ratios and preventing light from leaking from one subpixel onto other surrounding subpixels.Super-twisted nematic LCD, where the variable twist between tighter-spaced plates causes a varying double refraction birefringence, thus changing the hue.

LCD in a Texas Instruments calculator with top polarizer removed from device and placed on top, such that the top and bottom polarizers are perpendicular. As a result, the colors are inverted.

The optical effect of a TN device in the voltage-on state is far less dependent on variations in the device thickness than that in the voltage-off state. Because of this, TN displays with low information content and no backlighting are usually operated between crossed polarizers such that they appear bright with no voltage (the eye is much more sensitive to variations in the dark state than the bright state). As most of 2010-era LCDs are used in television sets, monitors and smartphones, they have high-resolution matrix arrays of pixels to display arbitrary images using backlighting with a dark background. When no image is displayed, different arrangements are used. For this purpose, TN LCDs are operated between parallel polarizers, whereas IPS LCDs feature crossed polarizers. In many applications IPS LCDs have replaced TN LCDs, particularly in smartphones. Both the liquid crystal material and the alignment layer material contain ionic compounds. If an electric field of one particular polarity is applied for a long period of time, this ionic material is attracted to the surfaces and degrades the device performance. This is avoided either by applying an alternating current or by reversing the polarity of the electric field as the device is addressed (the response of the liquid crystal layer is identical, regardless of the polarity of the applied field).

Displays for a small number of individual digits or fixed symbols (as in digital watches and pocket calculators) can be implemented with independent electrodes for each segment.alphanumeric or variable graphics displays are usually implemented with pixels arranged as a matrix consisting of electrically connected rows on one side of the LC layer and columns on the other side, which makes it possible to address each pixel at the intersections. The general method of matrix addressing consists of sequentially addressing one side of the matrix, for example by selecting the rows one-by-one and applying the picture information on the other side at the columns row-by-row. For details on the various matrix addressing schemes see passive-matrix and active-matrix addressed LCDs.

LCDs are manufactured in cleanrooms borrowing techniques from semiconductor manufacturing and using large sheets of glass whose size has increased over time. Several displays are manufactured at the same time, and then cut from the sheet of glass, also known as the mother glass or LCD glass substrate. The increase in size allows more displays or larger displays to be made, just like with increasing wafer sizes in semiconductor manufacturing. The glass sizes are as follows:

Until Gen 8, manufacturers would not agree on a single mother glass size and as a result, different manufacturers would use slightly different glass sizes for the same generation. Some manufacturers have adopted Gen 8.6 mother glass sheets which are only slightly larger than Gen 8.5, allowing for more 50 and 58 inch LCDs to be made per mother glass, specially 58 inch LCDs, in which case 6 can be produced on a Gen 8.6 mother glass vs only 3 on a Gen 8.5 mother glass, significantly reducing waste.AGC Inc., Corning Inc., and Nippon Electric Glass.

In 1922, Georges Friedel described the structure and properties of liquid crystals and classified them in three types (nematics, smectics and cholesterics). In 1927, Vsevolod Frederiks devised the electrically switched light valve, called the Fréedericksz transition, the essential effect of all LCD technology. In 1936, the Marconi Wireless Telegraph company patented the first practical application of the technology, "The Liquid Crystal Light Valve". In 1962, the first major English language publication Molecular Structure and Properties of Liquid Crystals was published by Dr. George W. Gray.RCA found that liquid crystals had some interesting electro-optic characteristics and he realized an electro-optical effect by generating stripe-patterns in a thin layer of liquid crystal material by the application of a voltage. This effect is based on an electro-hydrodynamic instability forming what are now called "Williams domains" inside the liquid crystal.

In the late 1960s, pioneering work on liquid crystals was undertaken by the UK"s Royal Radar Establishment at Malvern, England. The team at RRE supported ongoing work by George William Gray and his team at the University of Hull who ultimately discovered the cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals, which had correct stability and temperature properties for application in LCDs.

The idea of a TFT-based liquid-crystal display (LCD) was conceived by Bernard Lechner of RCA Laboratories in 1968.dynamic scattering mode (DSM) LCD that used standard discrete MOSFETs.

On December 4, 1970, the twisted nematic field effect (TN) in liquid crystals was filed for patent by Hoffmann-LaRoche in Switzerland, (Swiss patent No. 532 261) with Wolfgang Helfrich and Martin Schadt (then working for the Central Research Laboratories) listed as inventors.Brown, Boveri & Cie, its joint venture partner at that time, which produced TN displays for wristwatches and other applications during the 1970s for the international markets including the Japanese electronics industry, which soon produced the first digital quartz wristwatches with TN-LCDs and numerous other products. James Fergason, while working with Sardari Arora and Alfred Saupe at Kent State University Liquid Crystal Institute, filed an identical patent in the United States on April 22, 1971.ILIXCO (now LXD Incorporated), produced LCDs based on the TN-effect, which soon superseded the poor-quality DSM types due to improvements of lower operating voltages and lower power consumption. Tetsuro Hama and Izuhiko Nishimura of Seiko received a US patent dated February 1971, for an electronic wristwatch incorporating a TN-LCD.

In 1972, the concept of the active-matrix thin-film transistor (TFT) liquid-crystal display panel was prototyped in the United States by T. Peter Brody"s team at Westinghouse, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.Westinghouse Research Laboratories demonstrated the first thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal display (TFT LCD).high-resolution and high-quality electronic visual display devices use TFT-based active matrix displays.active-matrix liquid-crystal display (AM LCD) in 1974, and then Brody coined the term "active matrix" in 1975.

In 1972 North American Rockwell Microelectronics Corp introduced the use of DSM LCDs for calculators for marketing by Lloyds Electronics Inc, though these required an internal light source for illumination.Sharp Corporation followed with DSM LCDs for pocket-sized calculators in 1973Seiko and its first 6-digit TN-LCD quartz wristwatch, and Casio"s "Casiotron". Color LCDs based on Guest-Host interaction were invented by a team at RCA in 1968.TFT LCDs similar to the prototypes developed by a Westinghouse team in 1972 were patented in 1976 by a team at Sharp consisting of Fumiaki Funada, Masataka Matsuura, and Tomio Wada,

In 1983, researchers at Brown, Boveri & Cie (BBC) Research Center, Switzerland, invented the passive matrix-addressed LCDs. H. Amstutz et al. were listed as inventors in the corresponding patent applications filed in Switzerland on July 7, 1983, and October 28, 1983. Patents were granted in Switzerland CH 665491, Europe EP 0131216,

The first color LCD televisions were developed as handheld televisions in Japan. In 1980, Hattori Seiko"s R&D group began development on color LCD pocket televisions.Seiko Epson released the first LCD television, the Epson TV Watch, a wristwatch equipped with a small active-matrix LCD television.dot matrix TN-LCD in 1983.Citizen Watch,TFT LCD.computer monitors and LCD televisions.3LCD projection technology in the 1980s, and licensed it for use in projectors in 1988.compact, full-color LCD projector.

In 1990, under different titles, inventors conceived electro optical effects as alternatives to twisted nematic field effect LCDs (TN- and STN- LCDs). One approach was to use interdigital electrodes on one glass substrate only to produce an electric field essentially parallel to the glass substrates.Germany by Guenter Baur et al. and patented in various countries.Hitachi work out various practical details of the IPS technology to interconnect the thin-film transistor array as a matrix and to avoid undesirable stray fields in between pixels.

Hitachi also improved the viewing angle dependence further by optimizing the shape of the electrodes (Super IPS). NEC and Hitachi become early manufacturers of active-matrix addressed LCDs based on the IPS technology. This is a milestone for implementing large-screen LCDs having acceptable visual performance for flat-panel computer monitors and television screens. In 1996, Samsung developed the optical patterning technique that enables multi-domain LCD. Multi-domain and In Plane Switching subsequently remain the dominant LCD designs through 2006.South Korea and Taiwan,

In 2007 the image quality of LCD televisions surpassed the image quality of cathode-ray-tube-based (CRT) TVs.LCD TVs were projected to account 50% of the 200 million TVs to be shipped globally in 2006, according to Displaybank.Toshiba announced 2560 × 1600 pixels on a 6.1-inch (155 mm) LCD panel, suitable for use in a tablet computer,

In 2016, Panasonic developed IPS LCDs with a contrast ratio of 1,000,000:1, rivaling OLEDs. This technology was later put into mass production as dual layer, dual panel or LMCL (Light Modulating Cell Layer) LCDs. The technology uses 2 liquid crystal layers instead of one, and may be used along with a mini-LED backlight and quantum dot sheets.

Since LCDs produce no light of their own, they require external light to produce a visible image.backlight. Active-matrix LCDs are almost always backlit.Transflective LCDs combine the features of a backlit transmissive display and a reflective display.

CCFL: The LCD panel is lit either by two cold cathode fluorescent lamps placed at opposite edges of the display or an array of parallel CCFLs behind larger displays. A diffuser (made of PMMA acrylic plastic, also known as a wave or light guide/guiding plateinverter to convert whatever DC voltage the device uses (usually 5 or 12 V) to ≈1000 V needed to light a CCFL.

EL-WLED: The LCD panel is lit by a row of white LEDs placed at one or more edges of the screen. A light diffuser (light guide plate, LGP) is then used to spread the light evenly across the whole display, similarly to edge-lit CCFL LCD backlights. The diffuser is made out of either PMMA plastic or special glass, PMMA is used in most cases because it is rugged, while special glass is used when the thickness of the LCD is of primary concern, because it doesn"t expand as much when heated or exposed to moisture, which allows LCDs to be just 5mm thick. Quantum dots may be placed on top of the diffuser as a quantum dot enhancement film (QDEF, in which case they need a layer to be protected from heat and humidity) or on the color filter of the LCD, replacing the resists that are normally used.

WLED array: The LCD panel is lit by a full array of white LEDs placed behind a diffuser behind the panel. LCDs that use this implementation will usually have the ability to dim or completely turn off the LEDs in the dark areas of the image being displayed, effectively increasing the contrast ratio of the display. The precision with which this can be done will depend on the number of dimming zones of the display. The more dimming zones, the more precise the dimming, with less obvious blooming artifacts which are visible as dark grey patches surrounded by the unlit areas of the LCD. As of 2012, this design gets most of its use from upscale, larger-screen LCD televisions.

RGB-LED array: Similar to the WLED array, except the panel is lit by a full array of RGB LEDs. While displays lit with white LEDs usually have a poorer color gamut than CCFL lit displays, panels lit with RGB LEDs have very wide color gamuts. This implementation is most popular on professional graphics editing LCDs. As of 2012, LCDs in this category usually cost more than $1000. As of 2016 the cost of this category has drastically reduced and such LCD televisions obtained same price levels as the former 28" (71 cm) CRT based categories.

Monochrome LEDs: such as red, green, yellow or blue LEDs are used in the small passive monochrome LCDs typically used in clocks, watches and small appliances.

Today, most LCD screens are being designed with an LED backlight instead of the traditional CCFL backlight, while that backlight is dynamically controlled with the video information (dynamic backlight control). The combination with the dynamic backlight control, invented by Philips researchers Douglas Stanton, Martinus Stroomer and Adrianus de Vaan, simultaneously increases the dynamic range of the display system (also marketed as HDR, high dynamic range television or FLAD, full-area local area dimming).

The LCD backlight systems are made highly efficient by applying optical films such as prismatic structure (prism sheet) to gain the light into the desired viewer directions and reflective polarizing films that recycle the polarized light that was formerly absorbed by the first polarizer of the LCD (invented by Philips researchers Adrianus de Vaan and Paulus Schaareman),

A pink elastomeric connector mating an LCD panel to circuit board traces, shown next to a centimeter-scale ruler. The conductive and insulating layers in the black stripe are very small.

A standard television receiver screen, a modern LCD panel, has over six million pixels, and they are all individually powered by a wire network embedded in the screen. The fine wires, or pathways, form a grid with vertical wires across the whole screen on one side of the screen and horizontal wires across the whole screen on the other side of the screen. To this grid each pixel has a positive connection on one side and a negative connection on the other side. So the total amount of wires needed for a 1080p display is 3 x 1920 going vertically and 1080 going horizontally for a total of 6840 wires horizontally and vertically. That"s three for red, green and blue and 1920 columns of pixels for each color for a total of 5760 wires going vertically and 1080 rows of wires going horizontally. For a panel that is 28.8 inches (73 centimeters) wide, that means a wire density of 200 wires per inch along the horizontal edge.

The LCD panel is powered by LCD drivers that are carefully matched up with the edge of the LCD panel at the factory level. The drivers may be installed using several methods, the most common of which are COG (Chip-On-Glass) and TAB (Tape-automated bonding) These same principles apply also for smartphone screens that are much smaller than TV screens.anisotropic conductive film or, for lower densities, elastomeric connectors.

Monochrome and later color passive-matrix LCDs were standard in most early laptops (although a few used plasma displaysGame Boyactive-matrix became standard on all laptops. The commercially unsuccessful Macintosh Portable (released in 1989) was one of the first to use an active-matrix display (though still monochrome). Passive-matrix LCDs are still used in the 2010s for applications less demanding than laptop computers and TVs, such as inexpensive calculators. In particular, these are used on portable devices where less information content needs to be displayed, lowest power consumption (no backlight) and low cost are desired or readability in direct sunlight is needed.

A comparison between a blank passive-matrix display (top) and a blank active-matrix display (bottom). A passive-matrix display can be identified when the blank background is more grey in appearance than the crisper active-matrix display, fog appears on all edges of the screen, and while pictures appear to be fading on the screen.

STN LCDs have to be continuously refreshed by alternating pulsed voltages of one polarity during one frame and pulses of opposite polarity during the next frame. Individual pixels are addressed by the corresponding row and column circuits. This type of display is called response times and poor contrast are typical of passive-matrix addressed LCDs with too many pixels and driven according to the "Alt & Pleshko" drive scheme. Welzen and de Vaan also invented a non RMS drive scheme enabling to drive STN displays with video rates and enabling to show smooth moving video images on an STN display.

Bistable LCDs do not require continuous refreshing. Rewriting is only required for picture information changes. In 1984 HA van Sprang and AJSM de Vaan invented an STN type display that could be operated in a bistable mode, enabling extremely high resolution images up to 4000 lines or more using only low voltages.

High-resolution color displays, such as modern LCD computer monitors and televisions, use an active-matrix structure. A matrix of thin-film transistors (TFTs) is added to the electrodes in contact with the LC layer. Each pixel has its own dedicated transistor, allowing each column line to access one pixel. When a row line is selected, all of the column lines are connected to a row of pixels and voltages corresponding to the picture information are driven onto all of the column lines. The row line is then deactivated and the next row line is selected. All of the row lines are selected in sequence during a refresh operation. Active-matrix addressed displays look brighter and sharper than passive-matrix addressed displays of the same size, and generally have quicker response times, producing much better images. Sharp produces bistable reflective LCDs with a 1-bit SRAM cell per pixel that only requires small amounts of power to maintain an image.

Segment LCDs can also have color by using Field Sequential Color (FSC LCD). This kind of displays have a high speed passive segment LCD panel with an RGB backlight. The backlight quickly changes color, making it appear white to the naked eye. The LCD panel is synchronized with the backlight. For example, to make a segment appear red, the segment is only turned ON when the backlight is red, and to make a segment appear magenta, the segment is turned ON when the backlight is blue, and it continues to be ON while the backlight becomes red, and it turns OFF when the backlight becomes green. To make a segment appear black, the segment is always turned ON. An FSC LCD divides a color image into 3 images (one Red, one Green and one Blue) and it displays them in order. Due to persistence of vision, the 3 monochromatic images appear as one color image. An FSC LCD needs an LCD panel with a refresh rate of 180 Hz, and the response time is reduced to just 5 milliseconds when compared with normal STN LCD panels which have a response time of 16 milliseconds.

Samsung introduced UFB (Ultra Fine & Bright) displays back in 2002, utilized the super-birefringent effect. It has the luminance, color gamut, and most of the contrast of a TFT-LCD, but only consumes as much power as an STN display, according to Samsung. It was being used in a variety of Samsung cellular-telephone models produced until late 2006, when Samsung stopped producing UFB displays. UFB displays were also used in certain models of LG mobile phones.

In-plane switching is an LCD technology that aligns the liquid crystals in a plane parallel to the glass substrates. In this method, the electrical field is applied through opposite electrodes on the same glass substrate, so that the liquid crystals can be reoriented (switched) essentially in the same plane, although fringe fields inhibit a homogeneous reorientation. This requires two transistors for each pixel instead of the single transistor needed for a standard thin-film transistor (TFT) display. The IPS technology is used in everything from televisions, computer monitors, and even wearable devices, especially almost all LCD smartphone panels are IPS/FFS mode. IPS displays belong to the LCD panel family screen types. The other two types are VA and TN. Before LG Enhanced IPS was introduced in 2001 by Hitachi as 17" monitor in Market, the additional transistors resulted in blocking more transmission area, thus requiring a brighter backlight and consuming more power, making this type of display less desirable for notebook computers. Panasonic Himeji G8.5 was using an enhanced version of IPS, also LGD in Korea, then currently the world biggest LCD panel manufacture BOE in China is also IPS/FFS mode TV panel.

In 2011, LG claimed the smartphone LG Optimus Black (IPS LCD (LCD NOVA)) has the brightness up to 700 nits, while the competitor has only IPS LCD with 518 nits and double an active-matrix OLED (AMOLED) display with 305 nits. LG also claimed the NOVA display to be 50 percent more efficient than regular LCDs and to consume only 50 percent of the power of AMOLED displays when producing white on screen.

This pixel-layout is found in S-IPS LCDs. A chevron shape is used to widen the viewing cone (range of viewing directions with good contrast and low color shift).

Vertical-alignment displays are a form of LCDs in which the liquid crystals naturally align vertically to the glass substrates. When no voltage is applied, the liquid crystals remain perpendicular to the substrate, creating a black display between crossed polarizers. When voltage is applied, the liquid crystals shift to a tilted position, allowing light to pass through and create a gray-scale display depending on the amount of tilt generated by the electric field. It has a deeper-black background, a higher contrast ratio, a wider viewing angle, and better image quality at extreme temperatures than traditional twisted-nematic displays.

Blue phase mode LCDs have been shown as engineering samples early in 2008, but they are not in mass-production. The physics of blue phase mode LCDs suggest that very short switching times (≈1 ms) can be achieved, so time sequential color control can possibly be realized and expensive color filters would be obsolete.

Some LCD panels have defective transistors, causing permanently lit or unlit pixels which are commonly referred to as stuck pixels or dead pixels respectively. Unlike integrated circuits (ICs), LCD panels with a few defective transistors are usually still usable. Manufacturers" policies for the acceptable number of defective pixels vary greatly. At one point, Samsung held a zero-tolerance policy for LCD monitors sold in Korea.ISO 13406-2 standard.

Dead pixel policies are often hotly debated between manufacturers and customers. To regulate the acceptability of defects and to protect the end user, ISO released the ISO 13406-2 standard,ISO 9241, specifically ISO-9241-302, 303, 305, 307:2008 pixel defects. However, not every LCD manufacturer conforms to the ISO standard and the ISO standard is quite often interpreted in different ways. LCD panels are more likely to have defects than most ICs due to their larger size. For example, a 300 mm SVGA LCD has 8 defects and a 150 mm wafer has only 3 defects. However, 134 of the 137 dies on the wafer will be acceptable, whereas rejection of the whole LCD panel would be a 0% yield. In recent years, quality control has been improved. An SVGA LCD panel with 4 defective pixels is usually considered defective and customers can request an exchange for a new one.

Some manufacturers, notably in South Korea where some of the largest LCD panel manufacturers, such as LG, are located, now have a zero-defective-pixel guarantee, which is an extra screening process which can then determine "A"- and "B"-grade panels.clouding (or less commonly mura), which describes the uneven patches of changes in luminance. It is most visible in dark or black areas of displayed scenes.

The zenithal bistable device (ZBD), developed by Qinetiq (formerly DERA), can retain an image without power. The crystals may exist in one of two stable orientations ("black" and "white") and power is only required to change the image. ZBD Displays is a spin-off company from QinetiQ who manufactured both grayscale and color ZBD devices. Kent Displays has also developed a "no-power" display that uses polymer stabilized cholesteric liquid crystal (ChLCD). In 2009 Kent demonstrated the use of a ChLCD to cover the entire surface of a mobile phone, allowing it to change colors, and keep that color even when power is removed.

In 2004, researchers at the University of Oxford demonstrated two new types of zero-power bistable LCDs based on Zenithal bistable techniques.e.g., BiNem technology, are based mainly on the surface properties and need specific weak anchoring materials.

Resolution The resolution of an LCD is expressed by the number of columns and rows of pixels (e.g., 1024×768). Each pixel is usually composed 3 sub-pixels, a red, a green, and a blue one. This had been one of the few features of LCD performance that remained uniform among different designs. However, there are newer designs that share sub-pixels among pixels and add Quattron which attempt to efficiently increase the perceived resolution of a display without increasing the actual resolution, to mixed results.

Spatial performance: For a computer monitor or some other display that is being viewed from a very close distance, resolution is often expressed in terms of dot pitch or pixels per inch, which is consistent with the printing industry. Display density varies per application, with televisions generally having a low density for long-distance viewing and portable devices having a high density for close-range detail. The Viewing Angle of an LCD may be important depending on the display and its usage, the limitations of certain display technologies mean the display only displays accurately at certain angles.

Temporal performance: the temporal resolution of an LCD is how well it can display changing images, or the accuracy and the number of times per second the display draws the data it is being given. LCD pixels do not flash on/off between frames, so LCD monitors exhibit no refresh-induced flicker no matter how low the refresh rate.

Color performance: There are multiple terms to describe different aspects of color performance of a display. Color gamut is the range of colors that can be displayed, and color depth, which is the fineness with which the color range is divided. Color gamut is a relatively straight forward feature, but it is rarely discussed in marketing materials except at the professional level. Having a color range that exceeds the content being shown on the screen has no benefits, so displays are only made to perform within or below the range of a certain specification.white point and gamma correction, which describe what color white is and how the other colors are displayed relative to white.

Brightness and contrast ratio: Contrast ratio is the ratio of the brightness of a full-on pixel to a full-off pixel. The LCD itself is only a light valve and does not generate light; the light comes from a backlight that is either fluorescent or a set of LEDs. Brightness is usually stated as the maximum light output of the LCD, which can vary greatly based on the transparency of the LCD and the brightness of the backlight. Brighter backlight allows stronger contrast and higher dynamic range (HDR displays are graded in peak luminance), but there is always a trade-off between brightness and power consumption.

Usually no refresh-rate flicker, because the LCD pixels hold their state between refreshes (which are usually done at 200 Hz or faster, regardless of the input refresh rate).

No theoretical resolution limit. When multiple LCD panels are used together to create a single canvas, each additional panel increases the total resolution of the display, which is commonly called stacked resolution.

LCDs can be made transparent and flexible, but they cannot emit light without a backlight like OLED and microLED, which are other technologies that can also be made flexible and transparent.

As an inherently digital device, the LCD can natively display digital data from a DVI or HDMI connection without requiring conversion to analog. Some LCD panels have native fiber optic inputs in addition to DVI and HDMI.

Limited viewing angle in some older or cheaper monitors, causing color, saturation, contrast and brightness to vary with user position, even within the intended viewing angle. Special films can be used to increase the viewing angles of LCDs.

As of 2012, most implementations of LCD backlighting use pulse-width modulation (PWM) to dim the display,CRT monitor at 85 Hz refresh rate would (this is because the entire screen is strobing on and off rather than a CRT"s phosphor sustained dot which continually scans across the display, leaving some part of the display always lit), causing severe eye-strain for some people.LED-backlit monitors, because the LEDs switch on and off faster than a CCFL lamp.

Only one native resolution. Displaying any other resolution either requires a video scaler, causing blurriness and jagged edges, or running the display at native resolution using 1:1 pixel mapping, causing the image either not to fill the screen (letterboxed display), or to run off the lower or right edges of the screen.

Fixed bit depth (also called color depth). Many cheaper LCDs are only able to display 262144 (218) colors. 8-bit S-IPS panels can display 16 million (224) colors and have significantly better black level, but are expensive and have slower response time.

Input lag, because the LCD"s A/D converter waits for each frame to be completely been output before drawing it to the LCD panel. Many LCD monitors do post-processing before displaying the image in an attempt to compensate for poor color fidelity, which adds an additional lag. Further, a video scaler must be used when displaying non-native resolutions, which adds yet more time lag. Scaling and post processing are usually done in a single chip on modern monitors, but each function that chip performs adds some delay. Some displays have a video gaming mode which disables all or most processing to reduce perceivable input lag.

Dead or stuck pixels may occur during manufacturing or after a period of use. A stuck pixel will glow with color even on an all-black screen, while a dead one will always remain black.

In a constant-on situation, thermalization may occur in case of bad thermal management, in which part of the screen has overheated and looks discolored compared to the rest of the screen.

Loss of brightness and much slower response times in low temperature environments. In sub-zero environments, LCD screens may cease to function without the use of supplemental heating.

The production of LCD screens uses nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) as an etching fluid during the production of the thin-film components. NF3 is a potent greenhouse gas, and its relatively long half-life may make it a potentially harmful contributor to global warming. A report in Geophysical Research Letters suggested that its effects were theoretically much greater than better-known sources of greenhouse gasses like carbon dioxide. As NF3 was not in widespread use at the time, it was not made part of the Kyoto Protocols and has been deemed "the missing greenhouse gas".

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The Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) technology uses light emitting crystals to display images. The crystals are regulated by a computer and are able to show various light colours, and intensities as required. This modulation allows an array of such crystals to form a display. Most modern DSLR cameras use LCD screens to display the images taken by the camera. LCD screens on cameras are in ‘True’ colour (True colour = 16,777,216 colours).

DSLRs, bridge cameras, point-and-shoot cameras and compact cameras all have LCD screens although not all have true colour displays. The sharpness of the LCD screen depends on the resolution of the screen. This is the number of pixels the LCD can display. High resolution screens appear on the high-end cameras and are more expensive. Owing to crystal size only a certain number of crystals can appear in the limited size of the screen on the back of a camera. The high-end cameras may have resolutions approaching 5 million pixels. However, compared to the ability of some cameras to image at resolutions over over 40 million pixels (40 Mega-pixels) there is inevitably a loss of some resolution in the image displayed on the back of a camera.

In simple terms, a live view LCD is the large LCD on the back of the digital SLR camera that lets you preview the photo you"re about to take. This provides you with a second way of composing your photos - the first would involve looking through the viewfinder. Thus, Live View is the alternative (electronic) viewfinder to using the (optical) viewfinder on a DSLR camera that you would normally use.

Bring your creativity to life with the Nikon D5600 digital camera. It features 24.2 effective megapixels, an EXPEED 4 image-processing engine, and has an ISO range of 100-25600 that captures beautiful and vibrant images and time-lapse movies even in low light situations. With Bluetooth and the Nikon SnapBridge app of the camera you can transfer the images to your compatible smart devices. Enjoy ease-of-use and intuitive control with the D5600’s touch interface.

Scroll through images swiftly with the all-new frame advance bar, or easily trim an area of the image by pinching it out. The touch feature lets you make adjustments to a pre-assigned camera setting using your thumb, without looking away from the viewfinder, including auto sensitivity control on/off switching.

The camera features a vari-angle touch screen LCD monitor, which not only allows users to shoot self-portraits, but also makes low-angle and high-angle shooting easier, even when holding the camera in a vertical orientation.

Handy and economical, the Sony Alpha 24.3MP Digital SLR Camera lets you take your imaging beyond the capability of a DSLR. Ideal to be carried for your hiking and trekking trips, the Sony mirrorless camera has a large image sensor and bright lenses that make the best use of the light you have. The smart image processor ensures sharp, low-noise images even without a flash. The rechargeable battery, tiltable screens and customization make it an easy upgrade for any image enthusiast.

Sony A5100 is a perfect camera for travellers due to its amazing quality of pictures and videos. Moreover, its rotating screen helps to provide a good reference while selfies.

It works in real-time, which means that you can check details, such as the degree of background blur (bokeh), brightness and color vividness on the rear LCD monitor before you press the shutter button.

The Panasonic Lumix DC-FZ10002 is a hybrid camera that lets you capture stunning pictures. It boasts of a superior 16x optical zoom LEICA lens with the minimum aperture extended to F11, a high-performance sensor, creative 4K feature and a responsive shooting. The FZ1000 II captures crisp and clear images with minimal noise, thanks to the 1-inch incorporated High-Sensitivity MOS sensor.

The viewfinder is your window to the world as a photographer – despite advancements in camera technology, the humble viewfinder remains relatively unchanged.

An electronic viewfinder is a small display that shows the scene you have in front of the camera. With an electronic viewfinder (EVF), you can see exactly what your sensor sees.

With some cameras, you can connect an external camera screen (see our guide) which mimics the EVF’s display, allowing you to see fine details and colours even clearer.

With optical viewfinders, the image may be different from the view because you’re not seeing the effect of the settings. In other words, if you change camera settings like aperture or shutter speed, it won’t be reflected in the viewfinder.

It depends on the type of photography that you do, but the general answer would be yes. We’re getting used to taking a picture using only an LCD screen because of our smartphone cameras. However, in most situations, a viewfinder will help you improve your framing and composition.

Most DSLR cameras have an optical viewfinder. That means that you see the same thing as your lens, which means that it’s not affected by the exposure settings.

Photographers look through the viewfinder to get a better view of what they are shooting. For example, when you’re shooting on a bright sunny day, you can’t see many details on the LCD screen.

Yes, you can buy an external viewfinder for your camera. There are electronic and optical viewfinders on the market, and they can be attached to your camera via the hot shoe.

The main difference between viewfinders and LCD screens is in the way you see the scene that’s in front of you. On the LCD screen, you can see a digital representation of it, like looking at the tv. With an optical viewfinder, you’re seeing things through a piece of glass – it can be compared to looking through a window or a pair of binoculars.

Also, with a viewfinder (both OVF and EVF) you don’t have to deal with glare, you have a steadier hold of the camera, and you get better peripheral vision when you shoot.

The viewfinder helps you to frame and compose in the best possible way. Many photographers can’t live without a viewfinder on their camera, whether it’s electronic or optical.

It depends on the camera brand and model. Most entry-level mirrorless cameras don’t have a viewfinder. However, if you can spend a little bit more, you’ll find mirrorless cameras with built-in electronic viewfinders.

Hopefully, this article cleared up some of your doubts about viewfinders and how they can be used to take the possible image with your camera – whether it be analogue or digital.

A viewfinder is the little display unit on top of a DSLR or mirrorless camera. It is an essential component of a camera because it is the “window” through which a photographer looks to compose the photographs. Not all cameras have it, in that case, the photographer will use the rear LCD screen.

Whatever you see through the viewfinder is the exact image you will capture. Furthermore, it also lets you focus more accurately when shooting. When you use the viewfinder, you will bring the camera close to your eye, allowing for a more accurate and stable shoot.

When using the LCD screen instead, you’ll keep the camera distant from you. As a result, you risk missing focus or obtaining a blurred photo due to camera shaking.

The viewfinder is a tiny rectangular screen built into almost all modern DSLR and mirrorless cameras. It’s a useful tool, mainly when shooting action photography. With fast-moving subjects, it helps the photographer frame images accurately.

The viewfinder displays significant camera settings. It shows focus points, the light meter, exposure information, shutter speed, aperture, and ISO, among other settings.

When the light passes through the lens a mirror bounces it to a prism that directs it to the viewfinder. This system is the pentaprism. Full-frame and professional DSLRs feature a pentaprism, while APS-C cameras have a pentamirror. The pentamirror as the name suggests uses a mirror to reflect the light to the viewfinder. They are less bright than pentaprisms.

Curiosity: pentaprisms are probably the reason why single lens reflex (SLR) cameras have been a success. Older systems could have the image turned the other way around or flipped.

In old rangefinder cameras, the viewfinder and the lens were separate from each other. The downside was that it created a parallax effect with subjects too close to the camera.

The Optical Viewfinder (OVF) is built-in in DSLR cameras. The light passes through the lens (TTL), hits a mirror that reflects it into the viewfinder via a pentaprism. The picture you see through this viewfinder tends to be sharp and bright since it’s the same image seen by the lens.

In the Electronic or Digital Viewfinder (EVF), the light passes through the lens. Before hitting the sensor, it’s processed and displayed on the viewfinder LCD as a digital image. The EVF is in mirrorless cameras and consumes battery power, unlike optical viewfinders.

Holding the camera up to the eye has certain advantages. It’s useful to see info such as the histogram, focus peaking, and image playback. Access to these settings while looking through the viewfinder makes shooting easier.

For this reason, mirrorless cameras have made DSLRs look old in this regard. But on the other side, DSLR cameras benefit from a real live view with no time delay. Besides, on a DSLR, the battery lasts longer thanks also to the optical viewfinder not consuming power.

If you intend to take pictures only to e-mail them to distant friends, upload them to sharing sites, or print them at snapshot size, a camera of most any resolution will do. Even so, having more pixels gives you greater flexibility—you can print sharper pictures at larger sizes or crop and print small sections of pictures.

These days, it’s hard to find a camera with a resolution of less than 10 megapixels, which is overkill for most shooters. As a rule of thumb, 5 megapixels is enough to make a sharp 8-by-10-inch print; and 8 megapixels is enough to make a sharp 11-by-14-inch print. A 10-megapixel camera can produce acceptable prints of up to 13 by 19 inches, though they may lose some detail. Images from a 13-megapixel camera look good at 13 by 19 inches and can be pushed to 16 by 24 inches. Many digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras today offer 16-megapixel sensors—all the better if you want to creatively crop your images.

If you only share your shots digitally, couldn’t care less about cropping and resizing your shots, and/or want to save a lot of space on your storage card, we recommend lowering the default resolution of your camera’s photos to either 5 megapixels or 8 megapixels. Most cameras let you change the capture resolution to a lower setting, but check to see whether the model you have in mind allows you to do it.

Cameras with larger sensors and lenses normally take better shots, regardless of the unit’s megapixel count. Bigger sensors normally create better images, especially in low light, as do higher-quality lenses; this is why DSLRs take such stunning photos. In general, you pay more for a larger sensor.

If you can’t get any hands-on time with a camera before deciding whether to buy it, check the specs to see how big its sensor is. It’s not the only piece of hardware that factors into a camera’s overall image quality, but it’s usually a great indicator of how good your photos will look.

Even if the camera you’ve decided to buy has some drool-inducing specs, shutter lag may prevent you from capturing the perfect shot. When it comes to shutter lag, a camera can let you down in a handful of ways: a slow shot-to-shot time, a slow startup-to-first-shot time, and a laggy autofocus that has trouble locking in on a crisp shot.

You can check for only one of these problems by scanning a camera’s spec sheet: To get a sense of a camera’s shot-to-shot time, look for the camera’s “burst mode” or “continuous shooting” count in shots per second. This is the number of shots a camera will take in rapid-fire succession as you hold the shutter button down. If you’re interested in shooting a lot of sports or action photography, look for a camera with a continuous shooting mode of at least 3 shots per second

Bear in mind that a camera’s listed continuous-shooting speed usually refers to situations where the flash is turned off and the focus and exposure are locked during the first image of the batch. Some higher-priced cameras have continuous autofocus enabled from shot to shot. Other cameras have very high continuous shot rates, but usually they significantly reduce the resolution of each photo in order to speed up image processing and write speeds.

The other forms of shutter lag are important reasons for you to get some hands-on time, if possible, with any camera before you buy it. Check to see how long the camera takes to power on and snap a first shot; generally, anything close to a second is considered fast. Another good hands-on, in-store test is to see how long the camera’s autofocus system takes to lock in on a shot after you press the shutter button halfway down. If the camera searches in and out for more than a second, you’ll be better off with another camera for sports or spur-of-the-moment casual shots.

To some users, a camera’s weight and its ability to fit in a pocket may be more important factors than its resolution. Slim cameras are convenient, but they frequently have tiny dials and few buttons, and these characteristics make changing settings somewhat trying. Smaller cameras usually don’t have manual controls, instead relying on automated in-camera settings that pick the right in-camera settings for your shot. These auto modes normally do a great job, but you have less control over the look and feel of a photo.

Inexpensive cameras often lack a powerful optical zoom lens, but that’s changing. Among the new breed of $200-range cameras are a few pocket megazooms: compact cameras with optical zoom lenses as powerful as 10X optical zoom.

If we had to choose between a point-and-shoot camera with stronger optical zoom and one with higher resolution, we’d take the model with the more powerful zoom lens—it means that you won’t have to magnify your subject and then use software to crop the image (and discard some of the resolution as a result).

If you’re buying a DSLR or a compact interchangeable-lens camera, both the zoom range and the stabilization features depend on the lens you’re buying. A few DSLRs and interchangeable-lens compacts have in-body image stabilization, meaning that your images will be stabilized by in-camera mechanics (usually, the sensor physically moves to compensate for shake) regardless of which lens you attach. If your camera doesn’t have in-camera stabilization features, you can obtain optically stabilized lenses, but they’re a bit more expensive.

Fixed-lens cameras now offer zoom ratings beyond 40X. These lenses are great for nature or sports photography, but unless the camera has good image stabilization (look for a camera with optical image stabilization) or a very fast shutter, you may need a steady hand or a tripod to avoid blurry pictures at extreme telephoto lengths. Before you buy, you should try a camera’s autofocus at full zoom: We’ve tested some models that were slow to focus at full zoom.

Also note that not all high-zoom cameras are created equal. You know how you have to ask everyone in your group shot to gather in close to get in the shot? A wide-angle lens can solve that problem, so pay attention to the wide-angle end (lowest number) of the optical zoom range, as well as to the telephoto end (highest number). If you take a lot of group shots or landscape shots, the wide-angle end of the lens is even more important; it lets you capture more of the scene when you’re zoomed all the way out. A good wide-angle lens starts at about 28mm or less on the wide-angle end; the lower the number, the wider-angle the lens.

Be wary of advertised zoom ratings—many vendors quote “extended zoom” or “simulated zoom” counts. These combine the optical zoom (which moves the lens to magnify the subject) with digital zoom, which merely magnifies your image digitally by cropping and zooming it. Optical zoom gives you all the benefit of the camera’s maximum resolution, combined with the ability to focus in tight on faraway action.

All digital cameras take .JPEG images by default, which compresses your photos and compromises the details in each shot. Many DSLRs, mirrorless interchangeable-lens cameras, and premium compact cameras allow you to shoot in RAW mode.

Shooting in RAW preserves all of the data in your images without compression, letting you bring out more detail in your image during the editing process. However, it also means that the file sizes on your images will be much higher. If you plan to shoot in RAW mode, make sure that you have a high-capacity storage card to hold all of the extra data. You may also need special software for each camera in order to view RAW images.

For close-ups and other situations where a camera’s autofocus doesn’t quite cut it, switching to manual focusing can help you get the shot. Low-end cameras often omit manual focusing, which forces you to trust the camera’s autofocus system and lose a bit of control over the look of your shot. It’s a good idea to test a camera’s autofocus before you buy; some cameras struggle to lock in on a focus point at full telephoto or in macro mode, meaning that you may not be able to capture your perfect shot.

If you have an existing storage card that you’d like to use with your new camera, make sure that it’s compatible with your new purchase. Most cameras on the market today use SD (Secure Digital) or SDHC (Secure Digital High Capacity).

To complicate matters further, some smaller cameras support MicroSD or MicroSDHC cards, a smaller version of the SD card format that isn’t compatible with full-size SD slots. Older Sony cameras take MemoryStick cards, and older Olympus cameras use the XD card format; both companies’ new cameras now support SD/SDHC cards. What’s more, many higher-end DSLRs have a larger-format CompactFlash card slot.

Cameras may use one or more of several types of batteries: Typically, brand-new cameras use proprietary rechargeable batteries that can cost from $25 to $65 to replace. Lower-priced and older cameras use standard AAs—either nonrechargeable alkaline ($5 for four) or rechargeable nickel metal hydride (NiMH, about $14 for four)—or high-capacity disposable CRV3s (around $10 apiece; some cameras take two).

With their big LCD screens and whiz-bang features such as Wi-Fi and GPS, some digital cameras quickly drain batteries. That limits the time you can use the camera while you’re out and about. Battery life and camera cost often aren’t related: Some inexpensive cameras have great battery life, and some expensive ones use up a charge quickly. Either way, it’s a good idea to buy spare batteries.

The majority of today’s cameras can capture 1080p high-definition video. Most of them record this full-HD video at 24 fps or 30 fps, and a few of them capture 1080p video at a brisk 60 fps, which usually translates to smoother-looking video. If you plan on shooting a lot of video with your camera, here are some things to consider:

• Does your video-editing software support the format your camera records in? Most camer