▪ I. snap-shot, n.
(ˈsnæpʃɒt)
Also snap shot, snapshot.
[f. snap-.]
1. a. A quick or hurried shot taken without deliberate aim, esp. one at a rising bird or quickly moving animal.
| 1808 P. Hawker Diary (1893) I. 11 Almost every pheasant I fired at was a snap shot among the high cover. 1846 Greener Sci. Gunnery 164 Were a bird to spring in a situation where we could get only a snap shot. 1899 F. V. Kirby Sport E.C. Africa iii. 42, I got in a snapshot, tumbling her over like a rabbit. |
| fig. 1865 Pall Mall G. 2 Aug. 1 Our courts of law are distinguished from those of other countries by taking snap-shots at justice. |
b. One who fires such shots; a snap-shooter.
| 1845 F. Tolfrey Sportsman in Canada II. v. 131 It is capital practice is this snipe-shooting for a youngster; at least it makes a man a good snap-shot. 1887 Field 8 Jan. 41/1, I myself am a snap-shot. |
2. a. An instantaneous photograph,
esp. one taken with a hand-camera. Also
transf. and
fig.| [1860 Herschel in Photogr. News 11 May 13 The possibility of taking a photograph, as it were by a snap-shot—of securing a picture in a tenth of a second of time.] 1890 Rev. Reviews II. 489/2 The annexed snap-shots were taken with a hand camera. 1903 ‘O. Henry’ in Everybody's Mag. Aug. 194/1 You see a man doing nothing but loafing around making snapshots. 1930 [see hustle v. 5]. 1950 G. B. Shaw Farfetched Fables iii. 109 What are you doing here?.. Only hiking round the island. May I take a snapshot? 1975 P. Fussell Gt. War & Mod. Memory i. 10 British and German soldiers..meeting in No Man's Land to exchange cigarets and to take snapshots. |
| transf. and fig. 1897 Daily News 3 May 8/3 Your Yankee interviewer is a snap-shot incarnate. 1902 A. Dobson Richardson vii. 196 The language of literature seems to tend..towards the cultus of the short-cut and the snap-shot. 1928 Observer 17 June 10/2, I asked President Masaryk..if he could give me a snapshot of the difference between what he found when he came to Prague in 1918, and what he has the satisfaction of seeing now. 1962 M. McLuhan Gutenberg Galaxy 241 He [sc. Montaigne] bred up a great race of self-portrayers by means of the mental snapshot. 1978 P. O'Donnell Dragon's Claw iii. 47 Snapshots of sight and sound, of touch, taste, and smell. |
b. Computers. A record of the contents of some or all of the storage locations in a computer at a particular stage in the execution of a program (see
quot. 1963). Freq.
attrib.| 1963 Gregory & van Horn Automatic Data-Processing Systems (ed. 2) xii. 473 Some simplified forms of post⁓mortem routines give only a storage snapshot, which is a complete copy of all storage locations at the time the processor stopped. A snapshot routine may also list the instruction that caused the program to stop, the current contents of arithmetic units and indexes, and perhaps, several of the most-recently executed jumps thus indicating the path of program control. A differential snap⁓shot lists the contents of storage locations that have changed from their initial value or from their value in a prior snapshot. 1966 IFIP-ICC Vocab. Information Processing 85 When a trace program gives output only on selected instructions, or for selected conditions, it is called a snapshot program. 1973 C. W. Gear Introd. Computer Sci. vi. 244 An alternative is to take a series of snapshots at points in the program section. |
3. In various sports, a quick shot (of the ball, etc.) at goal.
| 1961 Times 29 May 4/3 [In Polo.] After Hanut had scored with a lovely snapshot to make it 3–2. 1963 Globe & Mail (Toronto) 21 Jan. 16/3 [In Hockey.] Hull responded by taking a quick pass from Balfour and scoring on a quick snap-shot. 1976 Oadby & Wigston (Leics.) Advertiser 26 Nov. 15/4 [In Football.] Saints hit back and a snapshot by Jim White hit the crossbar. |
4. attrib., as
snap-shot photograph(y,
snap-shot system, etc.
| 1892 Greener Breech-Loader 266 Dr. Carver shoots on the snap-shot system, shooting both barrels in quick succession at the pigeon. 1893 Hodges Elem. Photogr. (1907) 15 What is popularly called ‘snap-shot’ photography. 1894 Daily News 26 May 6/1 The book is illustrated with..interesting views, some of them from snapshot photographs. 1894 [see enlarger 1 b]. 1901 Merwin & Webster Calumet ‘K’ xv. 288 Young men with snap-shot cameras waylaid Bannon. 1967 J. Philip et al. Best of Granta i. 17 The winning photo in The Granta Holiday Snapshot Competition shows a couple kissing on a beach. 1977 R. E. Harrington Quintain iii. 24 He searched the terrain, storing quick snapshot impressions. 1977 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 23 June 25/3 The crudely chronological order of snapshot-sequences pasted in family albums. |
▪ II. ˈsnap-shot, v. [f. the n.] a. intr. or absol. To take snap-shots with a camera.
b. trans. To photograph (a person, etc.) by means of a snap-shot. Also
fig. ‘Freq. in recent newspaper use.’
N.E.D.| 1894 Amer. Ann. Photogr. 63 Many..think it just the thing to commence with a detective camera and snap-shot. 1898 Pall Mall Mag. Sept. 29 One of our party desired to ‘snap-shot’ the scene. 1907 Outlook 17 Aug. 206/2 All the peculiar attitude of our race toward dancing was suddenly snapshotted in that absurdity. 1932 Essays & Stud. XVII. 84 Thackeray found them [sc. the railways] vulgar, but amusing for the opportunities they gave of snapshotting people. 1980 Daily Tel. 21 Nov. 15/1 The play snapshots pretty sharply Jimmy's furtive park meetings with his waif. |
c. To shoot (something) quickly without taking deliberate aim.
| 1928 Daily Express 6 Dec. 19/3 Mr Blyth{ddd}was a fairly deliberate shot, and liked to take his high birds neatly and quietly, but could nevertheless snapshot a woodcock in thick covert with an effortless ease. |
Hence
ˈsnap-ˌshotter,
-ˌshottist, one who takes snap-shot photographs;
ˈsnapshotting ppl. a.| 1899 C. G. Harper Exeter Road 211 All trooped back to Amesbury, the *snapshotters disgusted beyond measure. |
| 1978 Nature 7 Dec. 647/2 Mr Sankhala also remarks that the *snap-shotting tourist is so preoccupied with shutter speeds, lens apertures and focussing that he fails to see anything around him. |
| 1891 Scottish Leader 28 Sept. 6 The Shah of Persia is an enthusiastic *snap-shottist. |