Meaning & use
panning
The act of rotating a camera horizontally to follow a subject or scan a scene.
See it in a sentence
The director used slow panning across the valley to open the film's first scene.
Prospectors spent hours panning the riverbed, hoping to find flecks of gold in the gravel.
A note on using this word
"Panning" also refers to washing gravel in a shallow pan to separate gold, and informally, to criticizing something harshly.
Words with a similar meaning
This term is best learned through its definition and examples.
Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.
Another way to use it
2. noun
The traditional method of searching for gold by washing gravel and sediment in a shallow pan.
Panning for gold along the creek became a popular tourist activity during the festival.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “panning”, then compare your use with the examples above.