The conference was not over this afternoon and I had already received a few emails and SMS from friends telling me how great of an external screen the iPad could be. And now even Philip Bloom talks about it.
I am currently downloading the iPhone SDK3.2 to investigate the possibility but if it is doable, I am not the one who will do it! Way too complicated!
M. Jobs might call the iPad a magic item, transforming the iPad as an external monitor would require massive coding skills. Why? You would have to port the Canon desktop SDK to the iPad which is near impossible unless you are Canon and have access to the source code. OnOneSoftware did it for the iPhone with their DSLR Remote app by using a little trick: they use a computer as a proxy so they could piggyback on the existing Canon API. The next part would be to resize the feed in real time so it fits on the iPad screen, something I doubt the iPad has the CPU power to do. So you see, it is not really possible in the current context.
It is too early to tell, but one thing is for sure: if it is possible, it will be done! The market for such a product is too big for a developer to ignore! And who knows, maybe the solution will come directly from Canon! (wishful thinking!)
By the way, I am looking for a cocoa/Objectif-C dev for a totally unrelated top secret project…
I have always been a big fan of Chase Jarvis. The guy has style, shoot cool things (like Ninjas!) and is really engaged with the community.
So, as soon as I read about him releasing an iPhone app I knew it would be something cool and different. Basically, it replaces your ‘normal’ camera with a twist. Actually, two twists!
First it gives you a few (12) filters to apply to your picture, some classics (B&W) and some others more creative. While the effects are cool, this is not the first camera app to have these so lets move to the other cool feature: the social dimension.
With a single tap you can share your picture on various networks (Facebook, Twitter, email and thebestcamera.com). Actually, you can spam all these network with your pictures with a single tap. If you have nothing to do or need some inspiration, you can tap on the globe icon to see pictures taken by others. I just wasted a few minutes doing so and found a few very creative ones that made me feel like a very bad photographer… I think this is the most interesting part of the app. You can leave it open and pictures are going to fade/fade out in turns.
My only complain is that it does not use the geo location service. Since I use my iPhone camera mostly when doing recon for shoots, if I want to edit a picture before sending it to someone, I have to shoot it with the standard camera, then load it in The Best Camera.
I think the message Chase is getting is message across: the best camera is the one you have with you.
Chase back his claim by releasing a book displaying pictures he has taken with his iPhone. I guess he got the idea of this when he was tired of carrying his Hasselblad around…
By the way, anyone knows about a good camera app for taking recon shots? Something with geotagging, maps and voice notes would be perfect!
I received a reply from Mike Wong @ On One regarding my review of the DSLR Remote iPhone application. Mike had the generosity to go over each element I outlined in the wish list and to give us a glimpse of what is coming in the 1.1 update. So here is the relevant part of the email (with my comments).
Auto focus
Assuming that you are not shooting in Live View mode and that your lens is set to AF, the camera will automatically attempt to auto-focus when you press the fire button. You’re not alone in asking this question though so I’m going to be soliciting some feedback from users to find out more about what people are looking for here. As for focusing during Live View, that is something we have planned for a 1.1 update.
Yes, I was thinking about Live View.
Video recording
Also planned for the 1.1 release is to add start & stop for the video recording function on the 5D Mark II
YES! If we could change exposure settings while shooting, it would be even better 
Adding filters to the live view
I’m not sure how we would do this. I’ll share the feedback with the product team though.
Big screen mode
If you rotate the iPhone to landscape mode, the controls disappear.
Oups, my fault! When I tried to rotate my iPhone while I was testing the app and nothing happened. I will blame this on my iPhone then.
Bracketing Assistant
Another feature we have planned for the 1.1 release.
YES, YES!
Shortcuts to some user made presets
If you set up your C1, C2 and C3 buttons with a custom function and then move the dial to one of them, the camera shoots in those modes. You just can’t change into one of those modes from the iPhone.
Too bad, I guess we can’t get everything we ask for in a single update.
Thank you very much for the response Mike. If you have not done so yet, go get the app before the special pricing ends (in$ instead of 20$). Looking at the incoming features of the next release, it is a no brainer!
As stated a few days ago, I bought the DSLR Remote on the day of release, picking the Pro version. For a 8$ difference, I don’t understand how someone could go with the lower-end alternative.
Installation & Setup
On One Software really did a great job to make the setup process as easy as it could be. Basically, all you need to do is download and install the server application on your computer, plug the camera via USB, start the iPhone app and voila!
Note: If you are like me and dont read instructions, you might be looking for Liveview and the intervalometer for while. They are hidden under the FIRE button. You need to press the FIRE button and hold it for a few seconds to make the options appear. Took me a moment to figure that one out!
Things I liked
1:1 zooming
Being able to zoom in at 1:1 is incredible. It allows you to review shots faster at the press of a button. The problem with the current implementation is that you either zoom at 1:1 or you dont. It is impossible to do fractional zooming like in the iPhone photo app.
Note: you can only zoom after the shot is taken and zooming is disabled in live view.
Liveview
Adjusting the exposure settings from the iPhone and automatically seen the update on the screen is very cool. Well, its like the first time I used liveview but now I can adjust the lights as I am looking at the result on the iPhone. Brilliant!
Time lapse (Intervalometer)
If there is one thing that I hate about Canon bodies, compared to those from Nikon, is how crappy their firmware are. Nikon gives its user more control over bracketing and allow them to set time lapses in ways that are even better than what you can do with the dedicated and over priced Canon remote trigger
Note: if you activate the bracketing, only one picture will be taken per interval period. My suggestion to the developper would be to add a check box to set the camera to take 3 (or even better, x) consecutive shots per interval.
Things missing / Wish list
Auto focus
You have to prefocus, even the AF button of the 5D can’t be used remotely. Blame it on the Canon API.
Video recording
While I would have been happy with just the ability to press the record button and have the camera starts recording, a more advanced version would be even better. I am thinking here about the ability to zoom while recording. Doing so would transform the iPhone into the perfect follow focus screen. And, while I am at it, what about plugging the iPhone directly into the camera? (On One Software said that is something they plan to explore once the new iPhone SDK is out, cool!).
Adding filters to the live view
This is a follow up to my previous point. If it was possible to have a high pass filter on top of the video preview, it would make follow focusing even easier/better. I doubt the iPhone has enough CPU power to do this but still, everyone is allowed to dream, no? A more realistic request might be to enable/disable zebra mode with the press of a button when shooting pictures.
Big screen mode
Once the parameters are set, the only required button is FIRE. Why not then hide all the other buttons and put the picture full screen? Even better, rotate it according to the orientation of the iPhone.
Bracketing Assistant
I love bracketing. I don’t know how many times it saved me when shooting outside or in HDR. Unfortunately, DSLR Remote does not offer a bracketing assistant. I would have loved to be able to set it up like the intervalometer: assigning a number of pictures to take and the variation in exposure between each shot. This feature alone would motivate me to bring a laptop in my bag the next time I go in the wild.
Shortcuts to some user made presets
I hate switching my camera settings, even more so if the menu I need to change is deeply nested into the custom functions. Wouldn’t it be great to click on one icon and have all your HDR landscape preferences loaded? Then click another to move into time lapse mode? Of course to be really useful the software would need to be able to access the camera custom functions and I have no idea if it is possible right now…
What I couldn’t test
I wish I had the wireless battery grip to see if it worked. I think it does since it allows tethered shooting but I would love to know if someone has tried it.
Conclusion
Should you get the application? At the current intro price of 10$, it is a no brainer. It is obviously a very first try and some more iterations will be required to satisfy the more demanding users. Yet, the current version does what it is advertised for, never crashed during the 200+ shots I took and saved me from round tripping between the camera and the light stands while adjusting lights to do some product shots.
I am happy.
Btw, there is a trouble shooting document here in case you run into any issues and a FAQ.
We talked about it a few days ago and now On one software just announced that DSLR Remote is now available for purchase on the iTune store. It is available in two format: lite (2$) or pro (10$ now, 20$ regular price).
I did not even take the time to read the differences between the two and picked the pro version. I will test is out for a day or two then post a review.
Old readers of the blog will remember that about two months ago I made post about my wish for someone to develop an iPhone app that would link to the Canon EOS utility and allow remote shooting via the iPhone.
Well, it seems like someone did it! On One Software are my new best friends! While the application does not allow remote capture of video (yet) it is still something that could be very useful. It is still a little bit far from Stu wishes, but it is the first step in the right direction.
The application is not yet int he App Store, thanks for Apple long approval process, but I will get it as soon as it is out and do a quick review!
For all the details, consult the On One Software announcement and their FAQ.
Stu at Prolost was faster than me to react to the possibilities offered by the upcoming iPhone OS. While his ideas are not really possible because of their CPU requirements, mine is more realistic: basically, I would like to be able to do remote shooting, with live preview, via my iPhone. That is all. Of course all of Stu ideas are great and I would like to see them too.
Apple said that they have opened the API to external hardware supplier. I cant wait to see how far they have gone because this could give us a lot of opportuinity!
