Eos 400d ( Rebel XTI )

eduperez

I just implemented what I explained above, it will be available in the next nightly build; let's see if it works.

guffster

eduperez
I just implemented what I explained above, it will be available in the next nightly build; let's see if it works.

Very cool...

guffster

eduperez
I did the following test first (no hack involved here):

Set the camera to M mode, aperture to 1/1.8 and speed to 1/60; moved to Av and set aperture to 2.2; changed to Tv and set speed to 1/400. Now I can jump around these modes, and the camera will recall the correct aperture and speed that I had set for each mode. I also saved these settings as three presets.

Then I made a small modification to our code, so the when a preset is loaded from the card, only the AE value is read and applied, no other parameter from the preset is used. Now I set the camera to A-DEP mode and read those presets; guess what happens? When I change the AE mode, the camera also recalls the other parameters!

This means we could do the following:
[list]
[li]Presets can only be read while in A-DEP mode.[/li]
[li]When a preset is read, we write to the card the AE mode corresponding to such preset.[/li]
[li]When the camera boots, we check the current AE mode: if we are in A-DEP, we load and apply the last AE mode set by a preset; the camera will then recall the other parameters.[/li]
[/list]

I believe the nightly build is working as you suspected it would. Nice.

guffster

guffster

eduperez
I did the following test first (no hack involved here):

Set the camera to M mode, aperture to 1/1.8 and speed to 1/60; moved to Av and set aperture to 2.2; changed to Tv and set speed to 1/400. Now I can jump around these modes, and the camera will recall the correct aperture and speed that I had set for each mode. I also saved these settings as three presets.

Then I made a small modification to our code, so the when a preset is loaded from the card, only the AE value is read and applied, no other parameter from the preset is used. Now I set the camera to A-DEP mode and read those presets; guess what happens? When I change the AE mode, the camera also recalls the other parameters!

This means we could do the following:
[list]
[li]Presets can only be read while in A-DEP mode.[/li]
[li]When a preset is read, we write to the card the AE mode corresponding to such preset.[/li]
[li]When the camera boots, we check the current AE mode: if we are in A-DEP, we load and apply the last AE mode set by a preset; the camera will then recall the other parameters.[/li]
[/list]

I believe the nightly build is working as you suspected it would. Nice.

Nice find - this certainly makes coding a bit easier I would assume. 😁

Now for more implementation of Presets and A-DEP:

I did notice a possible issue and rightly so - Let's say you load Preset 5, and then watch your excellent work by setting the mode dial to A-DEP, let the camera auto power off, then half-press the shutter release button to bring it back alive and see all of your Preset 5 settings come back to life. All is working and good at this point.

Now move the mode dial to Av (or any other setting), possibly change ISO from 100 to 200, set metering to Evaluative, and snap a few more shots. Now move the mode dial back to A-DEP and take note that the camera AE mode is now the original A-DEP, take a shot or two to see how A-DEP works. Now let the camera auto power off, half-press the shutter release button to come back alive - we are back at Preset #5 again...

Need to work through the logical design of how this should really work, now that we have learned that the restoring of settings by the camera is now the easy part... 😎

eduperez

guffster
I believe the nightly build is working as you suspected it would. Nice.

I had to make a little change, however: presets can be read in any AE mode.

As we (still) cannot detect the position of the main dial, I had to use the current AE mode. But when user loads a preset, the camera is no longer in A-DEP mode, even if the dial says so; and thus no other presets can be read, unless the user moves the dial out of A-DEP and back again. However, the camera will only recall the last AE mode used if it starts in A-DEP mode, and not in other AE modes; this is still a bit confusing, but far less confusing than the alternative.

So, for the immediate future, two tasks remain in my "pending" list:

Figure out how to detect the real position of the main dial, and block the access to the presets menu accordingly-
Make all this optional, just in case some weird photographer from Mars decides to use the A-DEP mode.

eduperez

guffster
Nice find - this certainly makes coding a bit easier I would assume. 😁

Now for more implementation of Presets and A-DEP:

I did notice a possible issue and rightly so - Let's say you load Preset 5, and then watch your excellent work by setting the mode dial to A-DEP, let the camera auto power off, then half-press the shutter release button to bring it back alive and see all of your Preset 5 settings come back to life. All is working and good at this point.

Now move the mode dial to Av (or any other setting), possibly change ISO from 100 to 200, set metering to Evaluative, and snap a few more shots. Now move the mode dial back to A-DEP and take note that the camera AE mode is now the original A-DEP, take a shot or two to see how A-DEP works. Now let the camera auto power off, half-press the shutter release button to come back alive - we are back at Preset #5 again...

Need to work through the logical design of how this should really work, now that we have learned that the restoring of settings by the camera is now the easy part... 😎

Yes, I am afraid that we are going to have inconsistencies like these popping out forever... but nice catch anyhow! Two proposals come to my mind:

Completely sacrifice the A-DEP mode; as soon as the camera enters A-DEP, we recall the last preset used.
If the user leaves A-DEP, delete the info we stored previously, so it does not get reloaded later.

Both options have their drawbacks, however...

guffster

eduperez
Yes, I am afraid that we are going to have inconsistencies like these popping out forever... but nice catch anyhow! Two proposals come to my mind:
[list]
[li]Completely sacrifice the A-DEP mode; as soon as the camera enters A-DEP, we recall the last preset used.[/li]
[li]If the user leaves A-DEP, delete the info we stored previously, so it does not get reloaded later.[/li]
[/list]

Both options have their drawbacks, however...

Seems to me that if you are able to "detect" a mode dial change by the user, and also (in future code) you are able to "detect" the current camera mode dial AE setting then you are mostly there.
Then by making the A-DEP feature optional by a menu choice such as "Use A-DEP for Presets: Yes/No" to either allow our "Mars" users 😀 to use original A-DEP (the "No" setting); or use A-DEP for Presets (the "Yes" setting) and follow the steps you have indicated in your last 2 posts then we have a pretty solid foundation to build upon.

eduperez

guffster
Seems to me that if you are able to "detect" a mode dial change by the user, and also (in future code) you are able to "detect" the current camera mode dial AE setting then you are mostly there.
Then by making the A-DEP feature optional by a menu choice such as "Use A-DEP for Presets: Yes/No" to either allow our "Mars" users 😀 to use original A-DEP (the "No" setting); or use A-DEP for Presets (the "Yes" setting) and follow the steps you have indicated in your last 2 posts then we have a pretty solid foundation to build upon.

It was a bit harder than what I expected, but I think I have it now; A-DEP now means "presets":

Presets can only be read at A-DEP (this is just to remind users to put the dial there).
Whenever the camera enters into A-DEP (or boots with the main dial in A-DEP) the last preset (if found) is recalled.
This behaviour cannot, at this moment, be configured out.

Of course, all this will be available in the next nightly build.

guffster

eduperez
It was a bit harder than what I expected, but I think I have it now; A-DEP now means "presets":
[list]
[li]Presets can only be read at A-DEP (this is just to remind users to put the dial there).[/li]
[li]Whenever the camera enters into A-DEP (or boots with the main dial in A-DEP) the last preset (if found) is recalled.[/li]
[li]This behaviour cannot, at this moment, be configured out.[/li]
[/list]

Of course, all this will be available in the next nightly build.

Great work - I did about 20 minutes of testing and things are looking right on target. I really like how this feature works now - and as I mentioned a few days ago this will turn out to be one of my most favorite things about 400plus. Now I just need to print a little label to fit on the camera mode dial to cover up the A-DEP text and replace it with P-Set!

guffster

A bit more playing and testing and I was able to get the camera in a state where the mode dial was set to A-DEP and pressing the DIRECT PRINT button at the Shortcuts menu would not show the Load presets menu... (no blue light or anything - it was like the DIRECT PRINT button had become inactive).

Have not been able to reproduce this again yet but will try more. I remember I had loaded a preset, then changed a few settings, saved a preset, turned the mode dial to a different AE setting, returned the mode dial back to A-DEP setting and let the camera sit for quite a while (10 minutes or more), before half-pressing the shutter to bring it back alive - then somehow I experienced the inability to see the Load preset menu any more from A-DEP. I also noted that the order of my Shortcuts menu was no longer saved to the custom order I had previously saved it to - it had returned back to the default order.

Not trying to purposely break anything here, just testing and enjoying the new features and noted these conditions and wanted to report back my findings...

eduperez

guffster
A bit more playing and testing and I was able to get the camera in a state where the mode dial was set to A-DEP and pressing the DIRECT PRINT button at the Shortcuts menu would not show the Load presets menu... (no blue light or anything - it was like the DIRECT PRINT button had become inactive).

Have not been able to reproduce this again yet but will try more. I remember I had loaded a preset, then changed a few settings, saved a preset, turned the mode dial to a different AE setting, returned the mode dial back to A-DEP setting and let the camera sit for quite a while (10 minutes or more), before half-pressing the shutter to bring it back alive - then somehow I experienced the inability to see the Load preset menu any more from A-DEP. I also noted that the order of my Shortcuts menu was no longer saved to the custom order I had previously saved it to - it had returned back to the default order.

Not trying to purposely break anything here, just testing and enjoying the new features and noted these conditions and wanted to report back my findings...

Looks like there is a bug in the code that tracks the position of the main dial: our code was thinking that the dial was in a different position, and thus did not allow you to enter the presets menu. About the shorcuts: there are frequent changes in the format of the settings file between versions of the hack; when that happens, our code will not load an older version of the file

Please, keep reporting your findings, they are very valuable to the developers!

eduperez

I have just remembered that presets store all settings, and that includes the order of the shortcuts menu; this is "by design", because which shortcuts are more useful may depend on the situation. You probably saved a presets before reordering the shortcuts, and a presets recovered later that (non)order.

I think we need an option to decide which settings are included in the presets.

guffster

eduperez
I have just remembered that presets store all settings, and that includes the order of the shortcuts menu; this is "by design", because which shortcuts are more useful may depend on the situation. You probably saved a presets before reordering the shortcuts, and a presets recovered later that (non)order.

I think we need an option to decide which settings are included in the presets.

Good catch, that is exactly what happened with the lost Shortcut menu ordering...

Still trying to determine exact steps of how I got the no-show of the Load preset menu while in A-DEP mode. I'll keep testing as I have time.

It would be nice to have a wiki doc out in the repository (once Preset code is complete) that shows all of the settings that are saved / restored for a Preset (not the actual values, just what settings are used with Presets). I have looked over the code and see most of them. I might add an Issue as an enhancement to also load/store the camera "Auto power off" value. I didn't see that one in code. Do you have access to this setting?

eduperez

guffster
It would be nice to have a wiki doc out in the repository (once Preset code is complete) that shows all of the settings that are saved / restored for a Preset (not the actual values, just what settings are used with Presets). I have looked over the code and see most of them. I might add an Issue as an enhancement to also load/store the camera "Auto power off" value. I didn't see that one in code. Do you have access to this setting?

Yes, once we have options to select which parameters are read from the presets, we will have to document them.

And yes, too; the following "interesting" parameters are not used:

auto_power_off
view_type
review_time
auto_rotate
lcd_brightness
date_time
file_numbering
language
video_system
picture_style_mode
histogram
disp_afpoint
color_space

We know how to save them (we are already saving them to the card, actually), but still have to figure out how to apply them (almost trivial, probably); but I do not think all of these should be used: does it make sense to change the language with a preset, for example?.

0xAF

does someone knows what are those SecretFlags for ? there are 2 secret flags which seems to change some normal events to another event... still dont know what they do ... but if someone knows, this can save me reading the disassmebled code ...

eduperez

guffster
Still trying to determine exact steps of how I got the no-show of the Load preset menu while in A-DEP mode. I'll keep testing as I have time.

Looks like the camera does not do a full restart when the card is removed and inserted again; then, we boot directly in the last mode set by a preset, and we cannot detect where the dial is.

guffster

eduperez
We know how to save them (we are already saving them to the card, actually), but still have to figure out how to apply them (almost trivial, probably); but I do not think all of these should be used: does it make sense to change the language with a preset, for example?.

My choices for inclusion in each Preset setting:

auto_power_off
view_type
review_time
~~auto_rotate~~ --- This one I could go either way on (does not matter)
lcd_brightness
~~date_time~~
~~file_numbering~~
~~language~~
~~video_system~~
picture_style_mode
histogram
disp_afpoint
color_space

JoeNeptune

The presets are amazing.
I can't think of any kind of photographer not finding them useful.
Is there any reason to limit them to a quantity of only 5?
Do you think it would be useful to have them be easily shared, edited and/or imported?
I would bet the amount data in one preset file is so small it might fit just within then length of the file name.

eduperez

JoeNeptune
The presets are amazing.
I can't think of any kind of photographer not finding them useful.

Thanks!

JoeNeptune
Is there any reason to limit them to a quantity of only 5?

There are only 5 rows in a menu, and I thought 5 would be enough; even the most expensive cameras have less.

JoeNeptune
Do you think it would be useful to have them be easily shared, edited and/or imported?

Presets are stored as files in your card... do whatever you want with them.

JoeNeptune
I would bet the amount data in one preset file is so small it might fit just within then length of the file name.

You lost the bet: a filename is 8+3 characters, and just the parameters for a couple of scripts are longer than that.

Kekk_400D

Couls someone post some example of preset? Just for my better understanding.

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