How do camera shutters work, and how are DSLR and smartphone shutters different?
Asked 3/15/2018
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I’d like a simple explanation of what a camera shutter does. How does a DSLR shutter work compared with a smartphone camera, which I’ve heard may use an electronic shutter? Also, is there anything comparable to a shutter in the human eye?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
8y ago
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The main difference between the shutters of a DSLR and a smartphone is that the first is a mechanical device, whereas smartphones use a purely electronical 'shutter' (the small size of the camera in a smartphone would make a mechanical shutter hard to produce).
That said, at least some modern cameras provide a hybrid system. They have a full mechanical shutter system, and exposition starts through opening the shutter, but is ended like an electronical shutter (by timed readout of the sensor pixels). Suggested advantages are less wear on the mechanical shutter, and less noise when taking a picture (electronical shutters are silent)
At least in theory, electronic shutters can allow (much) shorter exposition times than mechanical shutters. See this article for some explanations of the different shutter systems.
The human eye has no equivalent to a shutter (the eye lids work more like a lenscap), and works in a different way from a sensor pixel. Very basically, the receptors in the eye fire when hit by a photon, and then need some time to recover. They do not accumulate photons for a fixed time.
The human eye does change sensitivity in low light conditions, which is why your eyes take a few minutes (up to 20 min) to adapt when going from a lighted room into a dark one (or outdoors at night). There is also some adaptation to the colour of the ambient light: white paper appears white under sunlight, in shadow, or under incandescent lighting, but those different light sources have very different colours (as shown when taking pictures of such a sheet with your camera's whitebalance set to a value other than 'auto')
Originally by user72870. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user72870
8y ago
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A shutter controls how long the camera records light for an exposure.
In many DSLRs, this is done with a mechanical shutter: physical curtain(s) open and close in front of the sensor. The timing of that movement determines the exposure. Mechanical shutters make some noise and have moving parts that wear over time.
Smartphones typically use an electronic shutter instead of a mechanical one. Rather than opening and closing physical curtains, the sensor starts and stops recording electronically. This is compact, silent, and avoids mechanical wear, which suits the tiny size of phone cameras.
Some modern cameras use hybrid behavior: exposure may begin with the mechanical shutter and end electronically, reducing noise and wear while keeping some benefits of a mechanical system.
Electronic shutters can also allow very short exposure times compared with purely mechanical shutters.
As for the human eye: it doesn’t have a true shutter like a camera. The closest equivalent is the eyelid, which blocks light entirely when closed, but it isn’t used to time visual exposure the way a camera shutter does. The pupil controls how much light enters, more like an aperture than a shutter.
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