Contents

• Introduction
• Instructional Videos
• Installation
• Usage
• Uninstall

Introduction

StudioTether is a camera tethering application for Mac OS X.

LightroomTether is a plugin for Adobe Lightroom v2 which automates the running of StudioTether and importing of these photos into Lightroom. It provides an easy to use interface which automatically configures/starts StudioTether. Due to the integrated nature of the plugin, it provides much better performance than using Lightrooms "Auto Import folder" feature.

Instructional Videos

Coming soon! An exciting video manual showing you how to install and use StudioTether and LightroomTether

Installation

Installation is simple. Open the downloaded zip file, copy StudioTether.app into your /Applications folder and if you want to use the Lightroom plugin, use the Lightroom plugin manager too install it.

To allow automatic selection of the images in Lightroom as they are taken you need to enable "System Preferences->Universal Access->Enable access for assistive devices".

Usage

To use StudioTether, you run it. At first run it will ask you to set preferences. You can set a download folder (where images will be downloaded to), and optionally an application or shell script in which the image will be opened. You can also select "custom extensions" which will enable some more advanced settings; this mode will allow the control of the camera settings, "direct to PC" storage and if your lucky, LiveView!

To use LightroomTether you need to select "Lightroom->File->Plug-in Extras->Mountainstorm Tether". This will display a dialog allowing you to select where the images you take are downloaded to (and the custom extensions mode). This will configure and start StudioTether in the background. The images will be downloaded and imported into your Lightroom catalog at this location.

Once StudioTether is running you can turn on your camera. If its detected you will see a window with the cameras name that looks something like this (if "custom extensions" are disabled):

To take a photo, either press the camera shutter button or click the round grey button in the window. As the photo downloads a small green light will flash beside the [CF].

If "custom extensions" are enabled and you have a Nikon camera you will see a window like this:

This displays the current ShutterSpeed, FStops and ISO; you can click on these and select another value from the popup menu. You can also click on the [CF] and select PC, when selected photos will be downloaded directly to your computer and not onto the cameras memory card.

You can also click the small triangle. This will open LiveView mode and you should see high speed LiveView if your camera supports it. There's a zoom value in the bottom right; this you can click on and adjust as well.

If your using LightroomTether, as you take photos StudioTether will download them, the plugin will detect the images and import them into the Lightroom catalog. Whilst importing images Lightroom can be in either the Library or Develop modules. I personally use it with Lightroom in the Develop module, with "Show Clipping" enabled (keyboard shortcut J).

If you select the most recently imported image in the Lightroom catalog then next image to be imported will automatically be selected. This allows the use of the tool as both a solo tool, ideal for taking macro shots and for use where a photo editor wishes to evaluate the images as their taken.

When you done simply select the menu item again "Lightroom->File->Plug-in Extras->Mountainstorm Tether" to stop the session, this will stop StudioTether for you.

Uninstall

Removal is simply a case of deleting StudioTether.app and locating the plugin folder and deleting it (or doing it via the plugin manager).