Plain-English definitions of the terms behind tethered shooting and real-time cloud delivery — what they mean and why they matter.
Camera tethering connects a camera to another device — a phone, tablet or computer — so each photo transfers automatically the moment it's taken, instead of being offloaded from the card later.
Tethered shooting is the practice of shooting with the camera connected to another device, so photos appear on that device — and can be reviewed, backed up or delivered — as they're captured.
PTP (Picture Transfer Protocol) is the standard protocol cameras use to transfer images and accept commands over a USB connection, without needing vendor-specific drivers.
PTP/IP is PTP carried over a network connection instead of a USB cable, letting a camera transfer photos and accept commands wirelessly over Wi-Fi.
Wireless tethering connects a camera to another device over Wi-Fi rather than a cable, so photos transfer in real time without a physical connection.
Camera to cloud is a workflow where each photo is uploaded from the camera to a cloud destination — a storage folder, client gallery or server — as it's captured, rather than after the shoot.
RAW is the camera's unprocessed sensor data, offering maximum editing latitude in large files; JPEG is a compressed, processed image that's smaller and ready to use but less flexible to edit.
FTP photo delivery sends images from the camera or a device to a remote server over FTP/SFTP — the standard pipeline newsrooms and wire services use to file photos fast.
A client gallery is an online gallery where photographers share, proof and sell photos to clients — often branded, with download, favouriting and ordering built in.
A hot folder (or watched folder) is a directory monitored by software so that any file dropped into it is automatically processed — uploaded, synced or sent onward — without manual action.