Turn on the Language Bar (in control panel, regional and language, languages, details, language bar)
(Optional) Train Microsoft Voice recognition (in control panel, speech)
Turn on the microphone (click the mic icon in the language bar)
Run DIYPhotobits.com Camera Control 2.1
Say “Voice command”
(optional) Say “What can I say” then scroll down to the bottom of the list where it says “Menus and Buttons” and expand that list, ensure that “Shutter release” is one of the listed commands
I thought it was well past time that I did some more explanation of how to use the new features in DIYPhotobits.com Camera Control 2.1.
Turns out my video skills need a bit of work though as I ended up putting together a 10 minute video, the YouTube limit, and only covered half the features. Still, I hope this is helpful both to see what sort of thing the script is useful for — in this case I’m covering self-portrait balancing flash vs ambient ala Strobist.
(Click through and view the high quality version if you want to read the text!)
Ok so here is DIYPhotobits.com Camera Control 2.0 — the Embarrassment release. I’ve named it that because I’ve had no time to work on it recently and so it still is a) very rough with major holes and b) fails to have all the obvious fixes and enhancements that I have discussed with people.
So why release it at all? Well because having control of the camera exposure from the computer is cool — and at the moment I have it sitting here on my PC working and maybe you’d like to have it on your PC working as well.
Two of my scripts let you press a key on the keyboard, or click with the mouse, and remotely release the shutter. But just like the built in Windows Explorer technique for doing these they both only are able to trigger JPG, even if the camera is set to RAW.
Until today. It turns out this is not that hard to fix. But the programatic technique is a bit of a laugh; because Windows Image Automation does not officially support RAW the NEF files on my Nikon D300 are typed as being of “undefined” type. Unlike JPG files which WIA does know are JPG files and are typed appropriately.
Since I first posted my free script that allows Nikon DSLRs to be shot tethered I’ve been very pleased with the response, it seems to have been helpful to many people. However I’ve hardly been very good at documenting how to use it. So in an attempt to fix that I’ve made this little video which shows how to use it.
This is my first video attempt so it is pretty basic — but it took me all afternoon to put together, so please excuse the rough edges. Hopefully I’ll work out how to do this better and perhaps make some videos explaining my hardware DIY projects which would also benefit from this type of explanation.
