Digital Imaging and Photography → [Tech] Camera to computer connection

I've seen photography sessions where cameras on a tripod are hooked up to a computer and when a picture is taken, the image is shown right away on the computer.

Is there a particular software to use and special connections?

the camera companies have matching programs, and various other companies have generic programs, some of which actually control the camera from the computer or smartphone.

but for a simple version, if your camera came with a video-out cable, you can just plug that into a video-in jack on any av tv that has the yellow video input jack.
or use the same video-out cable from the camera to connect to any of the many usb boxes or pci cards that have video-input or video capture.

can you please say more about what camera and computer you have?

That's called camera tethering.

1. Check the software that came with your camera, you may have something already.
2. Do a search and see if you're camera will support tethering
3. If the camera supports it and the software isn't provided by the manufacture do a search "Camera tethering YOURCAMERA"

I have a Nikon D40 with the packaged USB cable and the Nikon Software suite cd which I haven't used / installed.

I found this on google...

»www.diyphotobits.com/200 ··· r-nikon/

or do you have something else?

Can always use an Eye-Fi card as well.

I'd give their software a try.

»www.diyphotobits.com/dow ··· control/

Nikon, unfortunately, charges $160 for software that comes out of the box with Canon purchases. I still think Canon is a cheap ass company for not offering AT LEAST Adobe Photoshop Elements with every Consumer-grade DSLR, but I digress. Sucks that Nikon doesn't offer it for you for free.

pg 62 of their online manual shows a video out jack on the camera, and an optional cable that looks like a two-conductor mini plug to rca plug, which you may already have, or can adapt.

and dont the nikon cd's have a trial version of the tether/remote software and the raw editing software?

one other advantage of the nikon software is that it looks to see what lens you used and corrects lens aberrations automatically.

I saw that too, but that only mentioned about the ability of viewing pictures already taken and NOT like a simultaneous image preview when you take a shot.

the video and usb may or may not only do post-view, after the button is pushed. try it anyway.

you may be thinking of preview, live before the button is pushed. doesnt nikon call that "live view"?

even post view is useful, where you can see the image right after taking, on a big video monitor or computer monitor, though you are right, live big preview is much better.

»www.phaseone.com/en/Soft ··· are.aspx

thanks for the suggestion....

I wanna try to free one first and see how it fits my needs.

Lightroom 3 has this feature, and it has a free trial version.

Lightroom 3 trial