I’m afraid I’m probably not going to be able to support Nikon LiveView in DIYPhotobits.com CameraControl. It isn’t available via PTP or WIA but only via the Nikon SDK which I don’t have access to (and probably couldn’t program even if I could).
However here’s an great thought to get a similiar experience – at least in a studio situation.
Basically use the video out of the camera to to send to another monitor, while at the same time also tethering.
I haven’t tried this — nor I suspect has the person suggesting it — but it sounds like it would be good, presuming you have the two monitors required.
So exactly what should happen if you are in the middle of a tethered – via usb cable – shoot and someone trips over the wire?
First, it shouldn’t rip the cable out of the camera and damage the usb connector on either camera or computer.
To that end it helps to put some sort of knot or fastening at both ends so the strain will not be taken by the USB connectors. For the camera end it probably makes sense to attach to the camera strap or perhaps a tripod head plate, while on the PC end it may be as simple as clamping to the table. Read more...
This is not mine and I haven’t tried it but I appreciate the nice simple approach, perhaps because it is like mine, of a script wrapper around some standard functionality.
See this post where appollux explains the scripting necessary to get tethered shooting working on Linux, or probably any similiar *nix system.
It really makes me want to go ahead and implement some more interesting features now that the basics are taken care of for most people. But first I really have to do that bamboo monopole — I suffer from terrible handshake it seems.
A lot of people ask and I don’t know — it probably does work as it is using a standard Windows way of talking to the camera — WIA — but I don’t have the hardware to test it.
If a camera supports a “PTP” or “MTP” mode — and if when plugged into a PC it is visible in My Computer under the section for Scanners and Cameras
(not as a removable disk drive) then it is liable to work. The only big gotcha I can see is that some cameras — all the P&S I’ve tried — will not let me press the shutter button while they are plugged into the PC. It seems that ability is a DSLR thing. Read more...
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. Read more...
Also called the “Tethered Remote Bridge” script this addition to my scripting library lets me remotely release the shutter on my D300 or D40, while tethered via USB to my Windows PC. Then the image is downloaded and displayed in Adobe Bridge within 3-4 seconds.
I was thinking about this after reading Terry White’s post about the topic, though he is more interested in Mac vs PC (or Mac vs Windows really). Interestingly he was able to do a Mac vs Windows test on the same hardware which of course makes it much more valid test. The interesting conclusion is that the Camera-to-Lightroom total speed is almost identical, though the download vs import speed varies a lot. Read more...
Update: The With Bridge version provides almost instant image viewing in Adobe Bridge without any keypresses. If you use Bridge instead of Adobe Lightroom then download that version. I’ve also made a video to show how to use this script.
