50D for stop motion! Trying something new...

[MattSepeta]

So a friend and I are going to try making some stop motion animations (totally inspired by Fantastic Mr Fox, which I just saw for the first time yesterday, AMAZING).

Tools to work with: 50D and a Macbook with aperture installed.

Is Aperture able to hear my camera and shoot tethered via USB? We want to be able to see the image on the Macbook immediately after snapping it, preferably a "live view" of the shot on the screen before we snap it.

If I remember correctly, LR is able to do this, but I am not sure if Aperture can..

I also quickly searched through google and came across some "dragon" software which helps with stop-motion.

Does anyone have any good tips or tricks or hints? Thanks!

 

[capoeirista]

I'm prety sure the software that came with my camera (admittedly the entry level 1000D) had a tethered/remote capture option. Perhaps this would be useful?

 

[HBOC]

Canon has Remote Capture software that is bundled with the software that came with the camera. Works pretty good, although i don't do studio work..

 

[cosmokanga2]

Aperture does allow tethered shooting with the images importing and viewable right after being shot. You can't change any of the camera setting through Aperture though and if you have Aperture 3 you could import the shot images into a video slideshow for quickly previewing the "motion".

 

[emorydunn]

As has been mentioned the Canon EOS Utility is the way to go. It will let you change every setting on the camera (ISO, shutter speed, aperture, and a few others) and do live view as well as let you focus the lens all from your computer.

If you don't have the original CD with the software then you can search online for ways to trick the updater you download from Canon's website into installing the software without the need for it to be already installed.

 

[MattSepeta]

Thanks!

Thanks alot guys, looks like I will be spending some time looking for my original discs... I may not have the disc that came with my 50D, but I am almost positive that I have the ones that came with my xTi 5+ years ago, will that matter, or will I be able to update that program enough?

 

[jampat]

Thanks alot guys, looks like I will be spending some time looking for my original discs... I may not have the disc that came with my 50D, but I am almost positive that I have the ones that came with my xTi 5+ years ago, will that matter, or will I be able to update that program enough?

IIRC, as long as you have one copy of EOS Utility installed, the updater is happy, it doesn't care what version. As someone above says, you can trick the updater into working without your original disk.

 

[toxic]

I dunno about the new cameras, but DPP stops tethering for me (5D) when the battery is "low" (as in not full bars), which is quite annoying. I think it uses up battery faster, too, since the camera is writing to a slow USB output.

 

[funkboy]

The latest beta of Lightroom 3 adds tethered shooting as well. It's a free download from Adobe Labs until the final release is out.

 

[Presha]

I currently use " On one software" It's pretty good,

 

[dzed]

You should really try Dragon Stop Motion. It is specifically designed for animating with live view Canon or Nikon DSLRs.

Once you start animating you will realize that just using a tethered shooting program is not really sufficient, or easy. You will be way more productive using stop motion software, and you will enjoy the process much more.