# Shoot Photos directly to the pc?



## agerone (May 23, 2009)

Hello guys,
I have a really big problem i don't get solved.

You know that, in making of videos you always see those fashion photographers that take plenty of flicks and they appear directly to the assistant's pc. Few days ago, a photographer made the same thing at the Germany's Next Topmodel finals. And I have now seen several times that people get the pics directly on the big screen to judge it. It isn't easy, I don't wanna say it's impossible, to find informartion on that.

What I want to know now is, how do you call this "procedure".
And after that, how do you do it? 
I have sony's first d-slr, the alpha 100. Of course some of you well say, "ahh that's a big load of **** you got there", but it does it's job. If i look up the menu i can't find anything, just the TRANSFER MODE like MASS STORAGE or PTP what i really don't know what the heck that is. If i connect the camera to the pc with a mini usb slot, i only can VIEW THE PICTURES but CAN'T PHOTOGRAPH ANYMORE.

A friend of mine has the Nikon D700, more professional than my camera, but even there we can't figure out how to view the pictures.

I have often see the pro photographers use Adobe Bridge to view them directly, but even that program won't work.

So please please tell me how to manage all that.


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## Josh66 (May 23, 2009)

agerone said:


> What I want to know now is, how do you call this "procedure".
> And after that, how do you do it?



It's called "tethered shooting", or shooting tethered - just use the word 'tethered' in your searches and it should improve your results greatly.

"how to shoot tethered with sony a100" should get you some results.

I just did a quick search - apparently you cannot do it with the supplied software.  It should still be possible though, you'll just have to buy another program to do it.


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## agerone (May 23, 2009)

thank you very much
i will look that up now
it's funny, my friend just understood how to do it, he uses a nikon tool that was in the package, but it's just a trial version and you have to buy it for about 130 bucks.


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## KmH (May 23, 2009)

agerone said:


> Hello guys,
> I have a really big problem i don't get solved.
> 
> You know that, in making of videos you always see those fashion photographers that take plenty of flicks and they appear directly to the assistant's pc. Few days ago, a photographer made the same thing at the Germany's Next Topmodel finals. And I have now seen several times that people get the pics directly on the big screen to judge it. It isn't easy, I don't wanna say it's impossible, to find informartion on that.
> ...


Nikon shooters have to buy Nikons 'Camera Control Pro' software to be able to do that.

Canon shooters get the software with their camera's.

I don't know what you have to do to shoot tethered with a Sony.


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## Josh66 (May 23, 2009)

It probably won't be in the camera menus anywhere - it's going to rely on external software.

You may have to change the communication mode of the camera though.  I'm not very familiar with Sony cameras, but I know the Canons have two communication modes - PC, and *something else* (lol, I can't remember what it's called).  I believe on Canon it has to be set to PC for this to work.


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## Moglex (May 24, 2009)

O|||||||O said:


> I believe on Canon it has to be set to PC for this to work.



Correct.

If the camera is not in the correct mode the software (on the PC) will tell you to change it and reconnect.


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## federerphotography (May 26, 2009)

Yeah, normally the other option is "mass storage device" or something similar.

Basically, it just has two options that has the camera:

1) Pretend it is a external hard drive / card reader
2) Actually be the camera


It needs to be on 'actually be the camera' mode for tethered shooting to work.


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## JerryPH (May 26, 2009)

agerone said:


> he uses a nikon tool that was in the package, but it's just a trial version and you have to buy it for about 130 bucks.



It is called Camera Control Pro.

I  own it, and have used it on occaission.  It integrates very well with LightRoom 2's Watched Folder technology.


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## kyen (Jun 20, 2009)

KmH said:


> Canon shooters get the software with their camera's.


 
I just reloaded my software to try it out!!:mrgreen:
Can this work wireless too? I have the canon 50D


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## JerryPH (Jun 21, 2009)

kyen said:


> KmH said:
> 
> 
> > Canon shooters get the software with their camera's.
> ...




Yes.  Look for WIRELESS USB technology.  It is new, slow, short range, but it does happen.  

A faster more reliable way is to USB 2.0 wire tether yourself to something like an EEEPC attached to your hip and shoot from there to your "server" at wireless-N speeds (up to 600mb/sec).


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## federerphotography (Jun 22, 2009)

agerone said:


> he uses a nikon tool that was in the package, but it's just a trial version and you have to buy it for about 130 bucks.



It is called Camera Control Pro.[/QUOTE]

Technically, you don't need CCP to shoot tethered (unless you want to control the camera from the PC as well).  All you need is a program that does 'watched folders' - which can be done by a multitude of different programs.


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## JerryPH (Jun 22, 2009)

federerphotography said:


> Technically, you don't need CCP to shoot tethered (unless you want to control the camera from the PC as well).  All you need is a program that does 'watched folders' - which can be done by a multitude of different programs.



For Nikon you do.  That is the app that tells the camera to save to a location outside of it's local storage media.  If another app does that it is cool, but the ability to save to another location other than the local storage card in camera is not an option in the camera menus, at least not on my D200 and D700.


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## federerphotography (Jun 22, 2009)

JerryPH said:


> federerphotography said:
> 
> 
> > Technically, you don't need CCP to shoot tethered (unless you want to control the camera from the PC as well).  All you need is a program that does 'watched folders' - which can be done by a multitude of different programs.
> ...



No you don't.  You only need CCP if you care to control the camera from the computer.  If all you want is to be able to press the shutter and have the file go to the computer, you don't need CCP.

Set the camera to be a 'mass storage device' and have the watched folder be the CF card in the camera, have the 'copied-to' folder be on the HDD.

Done.

The only added delay vs CCP is the writing of the image to the CF card - which is, what, half-a-second at most?


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## inTempus (Jun 22, 2009)

You can also try this, it seems to work well for some guys over on the Canon forums.

Amazon.com: Eye-Fi Pro 4 GB Wi-Fi SDHC Memory Card EYE-FI-4PC: Electronics


Doesn't require you to have a tether cable and it drops images into a folder on your PC within seconds.  It's also pretty configurable. 

I plan on trying one out here soon.


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## tsaraleksi (Jun 22, 2009)

You can buy a wireless grip for your 50D that will transmit files wirelessly at range to your computer. The trade off is that it's quite pricey.


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## JerryPH (Jun 22, 2009)

federerphotography said:


> No you don't.  You only need CCP if you care to control the camera from the computer.  If all you want is to be able to press the shutter and have the file go to the computer, you don't need CCP.
> 
> Set the camera to be a 'mass storage device' and have the watched folder be the CF card in the camera, have the 'copied-to' folder be on the HDD.
> 
> ...



  Would you believe I tried it out that way a year ago and totally forgot about that?  You are right, it does work that way too.

I think the write times would only be a 1/2 second "at most" if you are writing basic JPGs, not a 25mb RAW file... and then there is the time it takes to transfer it to the laptop folder before you see it on the screen out of the watched folder, so we are looking at least 2 times that number.  

Not the best way, but it does save you the cost of the software, I suppose.  

Since I have CPP and do like to control the camera from the laptop (it can focus and trigger the camera or focus or just trigger the camera without focusing as well as control aperture, ISO, profiles and other camera settings as well as save directly to the laptop HD in one shot, getting the file to the laptop faster), I just totally forgot about doing it the other way... and the "cool factor" is just a bit higher.


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## federerphotography (Jun 24, 2009)

JerryPH said:


> federerphotography said:
> 
> 
> > The only added delay vs CCP is the writing of the image to the CF card - which is, what, half-a-second at most?
> ...



haha, funny.



> I think the write times would only be a 1/2 second "at most" if you are writing basic JPGs, not a 25mb RAW file... and then there is the time it takes to transfer it to the laptop folder before you see it on the screen out of the watched folder,
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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