What’s the French word for Camera ?
Camera can be translated in French in different ways – so be careful!
📸 The French word for a camera to take pictures is “un appareil photo”.
We often only use the word “appareil”, but we never use the word ‘camera’ for a camera to take pictures.
🎥 The French word for a movie camera is “une caméra”. More French movie vocabulary.
📹 The French word for a video camera, a camcorder, is also “une caméra”. We sometimes say “une caméra vidéo”.
J’adore mon nouveau smartphone. Il a un super appareil photo et une bonne caméra.
I love my new smartphone. It has a great camera and a good video camera.
Photo vs photographer in French
The French words for photo(graph) and photographer can also be confusing:
- une photo – a photo, a photograph
- une photographie – a photo, a photograph
- la photographie – (the art of) photography
- un/une photographe – a photographer (the person)
A new approach to learning both traditional and modern French logically structured for English speakers.
French Photography Vocabulary
- La photographie (l’activité) – photography
- Se mettre à la photographie, se lancer dans la photographie – to take up photography
- Une photo – a photograph / a picture
- Prendre une photo – to take a photo
- Photographier, prendre en photo – to photograph
- Un photographe, une photographe – a photographer
- Un appareil photo – a camera
- L’objectif – lens
- Un objectif macro – a macro lens
- Un appareil photo numérique – digital camera
- Un (appareil photo) argentique – a film camera (as opposed to digital)
- La pellicule – film
- La chambre noire – darkroom
- Brillant – gloss
- Mat – mat
- Sous-exposé – underexposed
- Surexposé – overexposed
- Flou – out of focus, blurry, blurred
- Net, nette – sharp
- L’agrandissement – enlargement
- Le logiciel pour modifier les photos – photo editing software
- L’épreuve, le tirage (sur papier), le résultat – the (paper) print
- Un tirage noir et blanc – a black-and-white print
- Un tirage couleur – a color print
- Une photo (en) noir et blanc – a black-and-white photo
- Une photo couleur – a color photo
- Une diapositive – a slide (“diapositive” is a very old-fashioned English word as well)
- Une vue panoramique – pan shot
- Mettre au point, faire une mise au point – to focus
- Le filtre – the filter
- Tons de dégradé du noir au blanc – gradient tones from black to white
- Un gros plan – a close-up
I invite you to practice some of this French photo vocabulary in my free French story with English translation.
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