Shooting with Nikon D4 [Case Solved]

[doakley]

First of all I like your program and want to use on August 21. I'm having a problem similar to other posts I've read. When I run the program it skips photos. I am using a Nikon D4 which can shoot 10 frames per second. When I used the Configuration Wizard I started at .5 seconds for time between shots and have changed it to 1.5 seconds. The skipping occurs mostly when the program is running the sequences for Diamond rings and Bailey Beads. Since the shutter speed is faster than 1.5 seconds, it doesn't seem to me that there is insufficient time to run the program. The only thing I can think of is poor communications from an iMac, but I don't know why that would be. Do you have any suggestions?

Thank you

[xjubier]

The only thing I can think of is poor communications from an iMac, but I don't know why that would be. Do you have any suggestions?

It isn't the Mac or SEM, it is just the camera and its firmware that replies "busy" when receiving a command, so just a limitation of the way Nikon and Canon as well design the tethered shooting part of their camera firmware.
Ways to mitigate this delay:
1) Use the fastest possible memory card, in your case the fastest XQD card. For example with the D500 you can do an exposure every 0.5 second or even 0.2 second.
2) When doing bursts, use the TAKEBST command as it will execute a real burst and not a loop of single exposure. Set the frame-rate to 3 fps not to fill the buffer too fast and delay the exposures after the burst.
3) The last technique could be using a USB shutter control cable, not supported yet but coming soon. However this technique is far from perfect and does have some drawbacks.

The script created by the script wizard is just there to get you started but since the wizard was designed new actions and features were added to SEM but not to the wizard. What you need to do is modify manually the script in TextEdit, you have the available actions there.

[szigler511]

I am no expert with SEM, and I am very new to this so please take what I am about to say with a grain of salt. However I thought it might be nice to attempt to contribute back to the community rather than to just take from it, so here goes.

First, I am using a D810, not D4, so the experiences on these cameras will surely be different. However, maybe this will be helpful. I used the SEM log file (available in Window, Solar Eclipse Maestro Log) to determine how quickly I could expect my camera to successfully capture images. I found that, each time SEM successfully captured a series of images with the TAKEBKT command, a line appeared in the log file like this: “Camera #1: capture complete.” I found that, if I timed the next command so that it occurred after “Camera #1: capture complete” was written to the log file, my script never missed an exposure in the TAKEBKT command. On the other hand, if the next command was sent to the camera before “Camera #1: capture complete” appeared in the log file, then I lost images. So, through trial and error, I determined the fastest timing of commands I could send to the camera and still see the “Camera #1: capture complete” message in the log file after each TAKEBKT command. Since then, I’ve never lost an image. I don’t know how universal this approach is to other commands like RAMPUP or TAKEBST. Also, I don’t know if it is the best way to eliminate lost images in a sequence, but it really helped me and maybe it will help you too.

I also found that memory cards made a HUGE difference. SD cards are just too slow for my desired sequences on the D810. I upgraded to a 1066x CF card and use it only and now my sequences work much better.

Good luck!
Steve

PS, I’m sure Xavier will correct any mistakes I made here, so thanks Xavier in advance for that. But hopefully you're off working on the next release instead.