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How to use Auto Holy Grail with DslrDashboard

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#101 rameshtahlan
Many thanks Gwegner,
I have the paid version of LRT
and on my next outing i plan to use the qDSLRdashboard.
but before that i plan to to my apartment roof and practice a sunset.
i think hands of experimenting it the best way to figure out some things
Though, initially i had many doubts and questions.
but good thing i read all the comments in this forum
and i think every thing got answered, gathering than me asking questions that have already been asked.
So lets see, how my mini experiment with my qDSRdashboard goes.
I have however desoldered the focus wire in my Controller, and the difference is clearly visible
Just to experiment, on the controller i selected exposure time of 1 sec, and a wait or dead time of 2 seconds, and i could see the image and Histogram on the camera back screen before the next click took place.
Prior to desoldering the focus wire, i had to select 5 sec on the controller before I could see the image and histogram on the camera back screen.
So i guess, it should work for the qDSRdashboard also.
must try that now.

many thanks and all praise to Gwegner.
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#102 rameshtahlan
Fantastic.

today i decided to play with my Canon 7D and qDDB in my room, with lights and window curtains to simulate day to night
wow
this stuff is good
in the beginning once of twice the qDDB crashed, may be i touched too many things
but finally when i was confident that i was ready to go, well, it all went well

This is what i did.
Set up my camera to take a correct image in Manual, adjusted shutter to get a proper Histogram on the camera back screen, I noted the shutter sp and aperture. after autofocus, i put lens to Manual Focus.Then powered off Camera

then hooked up the External Controller with only one setting. Time Delay of 5 seconds. And kept the exposure time to ZERO.
Then hooked up Android to camera.
Powered on Camera.

qDDB activated automatically,
touched the USB icon and them Canon icon and i got the screen
Then at bottom i could see ISO to auto, and it warned me when i selected LR that i am in ISO Auto.
So i selected ISO to Manual and 100

All lights on in the room and curtains open
The clicked on Sample image, all looked good, image and Histogram were good.

i pressed the Start button on External Controller,
and the clicking started, and i could see image and Histogram
to be sure, i move the camera a few degrees, and sure enough, after a click or two
i saw the image also move to where the camera was now pointing.

Now i switch off all lights to simulate sunset.
and sure enough, the image became darker, but not enough as 1 ev for automatic change
so i clicked on + sign of Set Reference Now, and i could see the figures change and mage became brighter.
Now i closed the curtains, and the room became darker, so that it would be certainly more than 1 ev change
and sure enough
i saw in 1 or 2 clicks the qDDB changed the settings cause i had set 1 ev in the settings, and the image became good again.

This is amazing.
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#103 rameshtahlan
ONE QUESTION

I did all the experimenting in my room so far, simulating a sunset, with good success, and it is helping to understand and get confidence in qDDB functioning.
At the start of sunset simulation, the correct exposure worked out to 0.5 sec and f 4.0, with ISO at 100 in my room
but obviously this shutter sp will not work for Astrophotography to capture the Galaxy, for which 15 sec constant shutter is needed from day to night.
so now i wanted to simulate a time-lapse with a constant shutter of 15 seconds. The aperture still remains at 4.0 with ISO at 100, and i have set external Controller to 15 seconds interval and 5 seconds wait time.
and when i click with the camera, the image is badly washed out in my room with lights out, a curtain is partly open for just enough light to simulate late evening outdoors.
Since at start the ISO cannot be lowered less that 100 and aperture has to be at 4.0 and shutter also at 15 sec
how do i start the whole sequence without badly over exposed images.
have not understood how in the evening with a 15 sec shutter sp, and app wide open, how do i prevent over exposure on qDDB
HELP
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#104 rameshtahlan
IGNORE MY LAST QUESTION.

I was confusing some issue.
the External Controller only tells the camera to click at every 15 seconds and with a Dead Time of 5 sec as set once the qDDB is connected to the camera also.
This 15 sec on the external controller in this case is not the exposure. It is just the interval at which each image will be clicked to prevent acceleration at time of playback.
the exposure is controlled totally by qDDB, which may start at 1/4 of a sec or 0.5 of a second, and which are increased as time passes to get images of approx correct exposure all the way from day to night.
Fantastic.
it just took some time and repeated viewing of the tutorial video to clear up my complicated brain.

So one new question emerges.
When i use my EDELCRONE Slider, how will i set the Dead Time. My cheap External Controller has the facility of Dead Time,
but with the slider i don't see any menu that allows me to set any kind of Dead Time. Cause now I will be in Move Stop Click, Move Stop Click kind of stuff going on.
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#105 aaronpriest
Light in the real world (sunset, sunrise, moonset, and moonrise) will not change as radically fast as switching a light bulb on and off in your simulation. You'll need to give it some time to catch up to such a dramatically quick change of light, but within a few minutes and several frames you'll notice the exposure will start catching up in your indoor tests. You'll have to make sure your interval is longer than your longest exposure by several seconds for long exposures at night. I give my D810 about 5 seconds over USB cable and a little longer over wifi; so if my longest exposure is 20 seconds, then my interval is at least 25 seconds. 

For my slider, I have a cable going from the shutter port on my camera to the trigger port on my eMotimo controller. As soon as the shutter is finished, it triggers the slider to move during that 5 second gap I mentioned above. If I need more time for things to move or settle, then I increase my interval to give me a longer gap between shutter clicks. It all stays in sync this way by having the slider triggered by the camera, which is triggered by either USB cable or wifi from DslrDashboard.
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#106 aaronpriest
I should also caution: the intervalometer in DslrDashboard is highly unreliable and crashes a lot with the LRTimelapse module doing the ramping. It's much better to use an external intervalometer or the built-in one in a Nikon camera. So it's better to reverse what I mentioned above and have the eMotimo or your slider trigger the camera, and just let DslrDashboard handle the exposure ramping and nothing else. But you can go either direction technically, at the risk of crashing DslrDashboard on a long timelapse. ;-)
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#107 rameshtahlan
aaronpriest

Many thanks for those inputs.
Ok so no using qdslr internal timer.
I allow the Slider to do the clicking, and set it to 35 sec if my exposures in the camera are set to 30 sec
OR
if i am doing day to night, set slider to 20 sec and exposure to 15 sec.
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#108 rameshtahlan
Did some experimenting with EDELKRONE Slider.
Unfortunately the slider does not allow you to set a Frame rate. Instead it asks you the following questions.
So i made some changes to my answers to the questions to get the system to work for a Sunset Time-lapse.
This is how EDELKRONE asked me the questions and what i answered.

How long are you here ? - 120min
Frame Rage needed ? - 25 fps
Final Video Length ? - 15 sec
Now i got a warning from EDELKRONE - Don't Exceed Shutter Speed 15 Sec.
So i guess for a Sunset time lapse, 15 sec max shutter speed would be ok, as i plan to use qDDB

Now my problem was and a worry, would i get that Dead Time of 3 to 5 sec for qDDB to read the Histogram
So i now start a stop watch to record the interval of each click, it came to 19.4 sec. So that was also good.
and i could see the Histogram and image change after every 3 clicks.
Then i realised, that the qDDB does give you the interval readout on the screen. No that was fantastic.
So now I absolutely ready and confident on a Sunset time-lapse for my trip to the mountains in mid November this year 2016.
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#109 rameshtahlan
Advise Needed.
On two of my earlier trips to the mountains i did a Galaxy time lapse with just an external timer.
I had about 20 sec exposure set, and a 4 sec delay so i could see the images after every click on camera screen
the ISO was about 3,200 if i remember correctly. and aperture was at f2.5 although i did have max aperture of 1.4 on the Samyang 24mm f1.4, However, at 1.4 i was surprised to see COMA effect in all the corners. I have read everywhere that the best lens for astrophotography is Samyang/Rokinon 24mm f1.4 ( manufacture is same), I finally got rid of COMA at about f2.5 or f2.8.
SO MY QUESTION.
Would it be better if i stick to 15 sec exposure, and use a higher ISO, although I could not notice any star streaks at 20 sec exposure.
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#110 rameshtahlan
With EDELKRONE Slider, one odd thing happens.
if i connect the Slider Trigger and qDDB to camera, and now power on the Camera, the image from Camera does not go to qDDB.
So i have to keep trigger cable from slider unconnected, and power up the camera and qDDB, and now connect Slider Trigger cable to camera, and all seems to work perfect.

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