Aperture Tethered Camera Support - The Debate Continues
It seems that since Apple released Aperture 2, there have been ongoing debates on photography forums regarding Aperture’s tethered shooting support of the newer camera models from Nikon and Canon.
As a Nikon user, I was oblivious to the debate when I first wrote about the new tethering features in Aperture. However, after hearing about the lack of support for many Canon models, I decided to do a brief exercise looking at their support. What amazed me was the lack of support of not just the most recent Canon models such as the 1Ds III, but also models that were released over 2 years ago like the 30D.
I started to dig a bit deeper and found 2 sides to the story. I have not yet received a formal statement from either Apple or Canon (see below), but I thought I would share both sides of the arguments. Most comments are from various forums, and obviously give bias, so should be taken lightly.
What Evidence Supports Apple
The issue lies with Canon… I’ve heard different reasoning for this (Canon putting some proprietary blocks in the way or Canon’s SDK having some bugs that still need to be corrected). Hopefully, it’s the SDK issue or a firmware issue that can be updated or corrected.
The next comment was made from an Apple spokesman at a trade event.
… each camera needs to be reverse engineered for tethering because Canon is not willing to let go of the coding.
The Macworld review of Aperture 2 states the following.
Tethered shooting in Aperture works using a standard called Picture Transport Protocol (PTP), and as such, it requires supported cameras.
What Evidence Supports Canon
This comment was received from Canon’s customer support.
… while the transfer protocols for the camera and the image files are available to the software designers.
The Bibble software seems to support most, if not all of the Canon models. I guess the question here is that if Bibble can, why cannot Apple ?
The Follow Up
This is obviously not a closed case, so I have subsequently written to both Apple and Canon asking if they would be able to supply a comment that I can share with my readers. Fingers crossed they will respond.
For a more comprehensive list of supported cameras, take a look at this site. As you can see, Canon is very poorly supported by Aperture.
Tags: Apple Aperture, Photography Techniques
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