Tutorial Tuesday- What is a "point and shoot"?

This week's welcome:

Welcome to the first week of Tutorial Tuesday! Each week I will be writing a lesson, giving a challenge to go along with the lesson, and giving a list of further reading if you would like to keep learning about the week's topic. Also I will provide a way to pin the lesson so that you can come back to it easily and share it with others. 

This week's lesson:

 "What is a "point and shoot" and why would I need to know what one is?"

Let's start with the second part of the question, "why would I need to know what one is?". Well, knowing what a point and shoot is will save you some time and frustration in the future. Also, it's something you should learn about, if you haven't already.

Onto the first part of the question, "What is a 'point and shoot?'". According to Dictionary.com "point and shoot" means: "of or denoting a camera that does not require manual adjustment of shutter speed, focus, aperture, etc." Basically, a "point and shoot" is a camera that normally cannot shoot in full manual mode. Also, if you are just beginning in photography, this is probably the kind of camera you have. Here is an example of a "point and shoot":

{via}

While point and shoots are not what most professionals primarily use, they are a great starter camera. Most point and shoots do have some settings you can change. For example, on my point and shoot you can change the ISO, exposure, White Balance, and a few other options. Don't worry if you don't  if you don't get what all these terms mean, we'll discuss them later on. So to some it all up, a "point and shoot" is a compact camera that is easy to use, does not have the ability to change lenses, does not normally have full manual setting available, and is a great camera option for beginners. 

 
This week's challenge:

This week's challenge is to take a point and shoot(film or digital) and then play around with it using automatic settings. Choose your favorite non-edited photo and link it up below:
 
Further Reading*:
Point and Shoot camera- Wikipedia
Point and Shoot Cameras- BH inDepth
Compact vs. Digital SLR Cameras- Cambridge in Colour 

Want to find out about more interesting photography articles throughout the week?

*Note: I do not necessarily agree with or support these websites. Please visit them at your own risk.