Live view support for Capture One for iPad / iPhone Version 2.3.0

[Mexecutioner]

I tested this last night. Double tap zooms in to 100%, seems responsive enough.

You cannot zoom to 100% or any value in between by pinching. However, if you are zoomed at 100% you can then pinch to zoom in even more.

 

[Reginald Fluggelding]

SOLID KUDOS to C1 on this--this will make my workflow much nicer. Just did some testing, and found a few useful things out:

1. Using AP mode on the IQ4150 results in glacially slow (3MByte/sec) transfers.
2. Setting up a personal hotspot on the iPad and connecting the IQ4150 to it, or connecting to a real AP is much faster (~15MByte/sec in my office, in both cases). In an architectural/landscape workflow, this is acceptable, but I'm impatient, and...
3. Ethernet->USBC is faster still (100MByte/sec; i.e. full GigE speeds).

One can, and should, test for latency on this by firing up Live View on C1, moving your camera around (if shooting a static subject), and seeing how quickly the LV window updates. If connected via Ethernet, I'm seeing nearly instantaneous results; if connected via Personal Hotspot, there's minor lag but still entirely usable.

At present, C1 really doesn't like untethering and retethering to the same device over a different network. In a quick test, it seems that C1 has issues properly tearing down a tethered connection completely on the IQ4150. Haven't tried this on my other cameras yet, but: if one is tethered via WiFi and you want to switch to Ethernet, restarting C1 is usually in order. The great thing about using Personal Hotspot as your base station for this is that you can use the "swipe down from right corner" Control Strip to turn your hotspot on and off (or do it on the back, which is probably more battery efficient). I'll probably throw a few bugs at C1 around this and send logs when I get a chance to test it better, but I suspect that support for Retether is probably part of what's going on.

[pauses to catch my breath and throw my old POCP hat and nerd glasses on...]

Now, a few notes on iPad-IQ4150 workflow in general, since folks are asking. I've been using an iPad Pro 13" (2021) as my daily driver for architectural shooting the last year, and it's in general been working really well. I'm usually shooting mainly solo/with client-provided stylists with the iPad tethered while hanging off the tripod on a magic arm.

1. The Ethernet connection is a bit of a bugger for those of us who wish that everything would connect via USB-C and you didn't have to travel with a fistful of f***ing dongles, but it's got a number of advantages, not the least of which is that Ethernet cables are cheap, reliable, and available everywhere and in various lengths.
2. Not all USB-C to Ethernet dongles are supported on the iPad (or current Apple Silicon laptops). Apple silently deprecated some USB-C-Ethernet dongle drivers in recent macOS and iPadOS, so a device that was happily supported pre-Big Sur might not still be, and might not be on your iPad. Having used a 2017 Intel MBP as my tether device until about this time last year, I'm one to make sure there's at least a cheap docking adapter in every major bag I could possibly walk out my front door with that might contain my laptop, and about half of the adapters I owne(d) wouldn't light the Ethernet adapter up when I moved to an M1 Max laptop or connected them to my iPad. All would seem to indicate they've coalesced driver support between the two OS forks. So, if you're buying random Ethernet dongles off wherever, TEST FIRST before using them in anger, and make sure you're prepared to return what doesn't work. The usual "don't use cheap cables" digitech mantra also applies to dongles, particularly when a P1 back is involved.
3. Ethernet tethering is a power hog, on both the iPad end and the Phase end. I've beat the crap out of my HyperJuice 245W battery on location and it keeps on happily powering everything. (I'm moving to ALogic's Ark, which is rated similarly, is about 15% smaller/lighter, and has a USBA port as well, which is nice for the few things I use on the road that still insist on charging via a USBA-USBC cable rather than USBC directly. Looking at you, Godox 200 charger! ;-). I've gotten through entire 8-10hr+ days on location with that setup without it even skipping a beat.
4. While a male USBC to male Ethernet cable like the one @Paul Spinnler recommends above looks convenient, if you're doing long shoots, consider getting something that will let you also charge your iPad simultaneously. I usually use Belkin's USB-C/Ethernet and Charge adapter (https://www.belkin.com/usb-c-to-ethernet-charge-adapter/P-INC001.html) and it works great. So does the Anker 555 dock (https://www.anker.com/ca/products/a8383?variant=41698420949156) which also lets you plug in a USB-C camera or other device without disconnecting the dock, while charging from a power bank. I've also tested the 7-in-1 Dockteck (https://www.dockteck.com/products/usb-c-hub-7-in-1-usb-c-pd-ethernet); as a nice freebee, both of these docks also give you an easy way to ingest SD cards into C1 iPad on the road.
5. All of these let you free up your back's USBC port for charging/external power. Which, with a power bank with 2 USBC outputs, you can and should do.
6. In theory, the P1 back can also charge/power itself over Ethernet. USBC to PoE cables exist (that might also provide connectivity as well as power), but I've yet to test anything. If someone's come up with a USBC power splitter splitter that will also give you PoE + connectivity to the back on one cable and the ability to also charge your iPad, I'd love, love, love to know. (@buildbot, do you have anything hanging around? I seem to remember a thread on this...)

Ideally without having to purchase an appropriate iPad and the C1 software I’d like to weigh up whether this is a viable system for me so hopefully with you experience you can help me out here.

My main issue is whether the iPad workflow will work well with session based workflow. Shooting to my laptop I have the full session there so I can start editing (and I don’t mean processing — I’m a pedant but get annoyed at all the people who now refer to processing as editing, I mean making selections/culling, rating photos) while I am onsite. The session is backed up as I go to an external SSD, meaning I have the files on the two camera cards, the laptop and the external SSD. Once I am back at my workstation I just clone my session and get straight to work. I often have to work over multiple days (not always consecutive) so I just clone the session back to my laptop including any files I have retouched and I work from the same session. I have smart folders setup and can quickly look at groups of photos while I shoot which helps with making decisions about what I need to work on more and also I can share that with the client to show where the narrative is heading.

I’m afraid with the iPad app i’ll not have that ability to seamlessly go between the iPad and my regular C1 sessions. My current workflow is very efficient and really the biggest downside is lugging a laptop around. Ive got a custom system for doing so (i’ll share it here at some point, still in development) but it’s still a lot heavier than carrying an iPad around.

Is there even a way to save the session, assuming there is some kind of session, directly to an attached SSD? The idea of uploading everything to the cloud for transferring, especially when travelling is a massive drawback. The latest project I am working on is at 199GB and pretty much any layered Tiff needs to be saved as PSB (I embed the PSBs in the tiff so I can see them in C1) so it’s going to get bigger.

I also have my back charging from the laptop, and the laptop is connected to a USBc power bank. I don’t believe there is a way to power the back from the iPad this way. I know you can connect a power bank to the IQ4 but I don’t want two cables coming out of it making things even more unwieldy, especially if I’m using sync cable and shutter release when I need the Copal shutter. Using ethernet sounds like a pain with connecting and reconnecting. I often just unplug my tether cable when I need to move around, one less thing to trip over, and it connects again instantly.

LCC I can do later but prefer to do it as I shoot — I have had the odd LCC fail that I thought was good and had to do it again. Usually there’s some stray light coming in from the back or something weird happening to mess it up. Doing it onsite is reassuring. I can also get a good look at whether I need to take the lens off and blow any obvious dust off. I usually add any movement details to the LCC shot. I need to be able to record my camera movement — mostly just for my 28HR so I can make corrections later. I’m doubting the camera movements panel is there.

 

[Ray Harrison]

Ideally without having to purchase an appropriate iPad and the C1 software I’d like to weigh up whether this is a viable system for me so hopefully with you experience you can help me out here.

My main issue is whether the iPad workflow will work well with session based workflow. Shooting to my laptop I have the full session there so I can start editing (and I don’t mean processing — I’m a pedant but get annoyed at all the people who now refer to processing as editing, I mean making selections/culling, rating photos) while I am onsite. The session is backed up as I go to an external SSD, meaning I have the files on the two camera cards, the laptop and the external SSD. Once I am back at my workstation I just clone my session and get straight to work. I often have to work over multiple days (not always consecutive) so I just clone the session back to my laptop including any files I have retouched and I work from the same session. I have smart folders setup and can quickly look at groups of photos while I shoot which helps with making decisions about what I need to work on more and also I can share that with the client to show where the narrative is heading.

I’m afraid with the iPad app i’ll not have that ability to seamlessly go between the iPad and my regular C1 sessions. My current workflow is very efficient and really the biggest downside is lugging a laptop around. Ive got a custom system for doing so (i’ll share it here at some point, still in development) but it’s still a lot heavier than carrying an iPad around.

Is there even a way to save the session, assuming there is some kind of session, directly to an attached SSD? The idea of uploading everything to the cloud for transferring, especially when travelling is a massive drawback. The latest project I am working on is at 199GB and pretty much any layered Tiff needs to be saved as PSB (I embed the PSBs in the tiff so I can see them in C1) so it’s going to get bigger.

I also have my back charging from the laptop, and the laptop is connected to a USBc power bank. I don’t believe there is a way to power the back from the iPad this way. I know you can connect a power bank to the IQ4 but I don’t want two cables coming out of it making things even more unwieldy, especially if I’m using sync cable and shutter release when I need the Copal shutter. Using ethernet sounds like a pain with connecting and reconnecting. I often just unplug my tether cable when I need to move around, one less thing to trip over, and it connects again instantly.

LCC I can do later but prefer to do it as I shoot — I have had the odd LCC fail that I thought was good and had to do it again. Usually there’s some stray light coming in from the back or something weird happening to mess it up. Doing it onsite is reassuring. I can also get a good look at whether I need to take the lens off and blow any obvious dust off. I usually add any movement details to the LCC shot. I need to be able to record my camera movement — mostly just for my 28HR so I can make corrections later. I’m doubting the camera movements panel is there.

The iPad workflow doesn’t support a classic session-based approach. You can create albums, but that’s as close as they currently get. They’re not really there on syncing either and the one-way sync that exists between the ipad and desktop is very slow, so much so I’d not use it. There is no lens/camera movement panel. It’s still pretty basic. I like it for the recently added live view and as a remote trigger but I still do everything else on the desktop. It’s slightly easier to carry around an ipad than a laptop (for me), but only just. I can connect my phone if I wish, which is nice in a pinch, but I favor the larger screen of the iPad.

 

[Reginald Fluggelding]

The iPad workflow doesn’t support a classic session-based approach. You can create albums, but that’s as close as they currently get. They’re not really there on syncing either and the one-way sync that exists between the ipad and desktop is very slow, so much so I’d not use it. There is no lens/camera movement panel. It’s still pretty basic. I like it for the recently added live view and as a remote trigger but I still do everything else on the desktop. It’s slightly easier to carry around an ipad than a laptop (for me), but only just. I can connect my phone if I wish, which is nice in a pinch, but I favor the larger screen of the iPad.

Hi Ray,
Thanks for the info. I guess i'll keep dreaming. It's a shame that C1 seem to be concentrating more on enthusiast type users at the moment. C1 has always been the 'pro' solution but this seems far from pro. I love my IQ4 and the advantages it gives me but the C1/Phase parting (and subsequent dumbing down mass market pursuit of C1) and then Phases's lackadaisical approach to making any updates to the IQ4 (infinity platform concept was and still is a selling point) is pretty disappointing. I was shooting a project this morning and thinking about how odd it is that it's slower and more cumbersome to shoot with Copal shutter (I had to catch some people walking through the frame and was getting backwards leaning weirdness using the e-shutter) on the IQ4 than it was with my 13 yo Leaf back. The IQ4 was $$$, and I guess they want to upsize people into their X-shutter system so Copal users be damned.

 

[cunim]

OK, my previous test of this product was a complete failure. Is it now better? Better is defined as having IQ4 LV via lightning - ethernet cable, zoomable LV, control over the back exposure controls, and a shutter trigger that works with both the back ES and with the LS in Phase lenses. Nice to have is if it is less clunky than Cascable. Does it do all that?

 

[Ray Harrison]

OK, my previous test of this product was a complete failure. Is it now better? Better is defined as having IQ4 LV via lightning - ethernet cable, zoomable LV, control over the back exposure controls, and a shutter trigger that works with both the back ES and with the LS in Phase lenses. Nice to have is if it is less clunky than Cascable. Does it do all that?

It now has zoomable LV with ethernet and WiFi (with the obvious drawbacks for the latter), exposure, AF and shutter controls with ES, X-shutter and LS lenses. It’s worth trying again, I feel, though it may be considered to still have a twinge of clunkiness.