Yeah. Things have changed. I'm not sure about other brands but all
aspects of the camera can be controlled via USB on my Canon.

Cheers,
Zik

On 01/07/06, Bob Axtell <engineer@cotse.net> wrote:
> Gus S Calabrese wrote:
> > On 2006-Jun 27, at 04:56hrs AM, xkrja wrote:
> >
> >
> > Hi Jan,
> > the thing is that I'm trying to find some kind of general solution
> > that can
> > work for many different cameras and brands. That is for cameras that
> > support
> > USB control of course. Hopefully, when I have the hardware, its just to
> > write different software for different cameras.
> >
> > All major brands (Olympus, Canon, Nikon) have freeware/software for
> > creating
> > your own software for controlling the camera from the PC and I hope
> > to get
> > help from that.
> >
> > Would you mind supplying some URLs for the freeware software ?
> > AGSC
> >
> > Gus S Calabrese
> > Denver, CO
> > 720 222 1309     303 908 7716 cell
> > I allow everything with  "spamcode2006"  in the subject or text to
> > pass my spam filters
> >
> >
> >
> You might have a tough job, dependent on what you are trying to
> accomplish. If you plan
> to control a camera in the field, like to take security or animal
> pictures, you might be disappointed.
> When I looked at that a few years ago, the USB channel was only used to
> pull pictures from the
> camera, nothing else. I was not aware of any digital camera whose USB
> port allowed you to actually
> snap pix with it. But then, I am an ole guy and sometimes fail to pay
> attention...
>
> There are two major issues when trying to use a digital camera for
> security or animal purposes. The
> first is that the camera tries to shut itself off all the time with a
> 3-5 min timer. The way you can prevent\
> that is by toggling the focus ring (the first contact when pressing the
> "shutter button", partially depressed).
> So, now, the camera is still on, so far so good.  Now you need to
> actually press the  shutter button to
> get a picture taken. Some  cameras have LANC capabilities, such as SONY
> VTRs and Video cameras.
> A few have the capability of being driven by a remote IR switch . Both
> LANC and IR are easily handled,
> but the inexpensive cameras require you to get inside the camera to make
> hard connections, a tough problem.
> The way we did it was to use optoisolators to isolate the camera signals
> from the control board.
>
> Is Olympus still making cameras? I thought they got out of that business...
>
> --Bob
> --
> http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
> View/change your membership options at
> http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist
>
-- 
http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist