Leica SL Battery-life while Tethered

[eprom]

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Hello everyone,

 

I´m doing some tests with my SL tethered with LR and I´m really worried about the battery-life after half an hour testing. I have a job next week where I wanted to work tethered - I´ll better get a third battery:-/

What are your experiences?

 

Best,

Peter__

[tpf1952]

Get the third battery! A few weeks ago I did a two-day tethered shoot in a research laboratory. Granted they were long days -- at least 10 hours at a stretch, but on both days I had to switch to the third battery for the last hour. I brought my recharger along for the ride, but it ends up spending time by itself while I move from one location to the next. It's really easy to pack up and forget about the charger. Speaking of tethered, because I had to do multiple setups I had to reconnect to Lightroom many times. Sometimes it just wouldn't reconnect. Been alternating with Capture One in the last year for a variety of reasons; reliability of tethering one of them. Still a work in progress.

 

Tom

[eprom]

Hi Tom,

 

I´ll get the third battery. I´m not sure if I shoot with SL or S-E. Do you have experience with the S as well?  I think the battery of the S-E will last longer because of higher capacity and no viewfinder that has to be fed.

 

The connection between SL, S-E and LR seems very reliable with my system. I changed cameras some times for testing and the connection was easy to set up every time I tried it.

Is the workaround with C1 better? I suspect the workflow with hot folder is much slower than with LR directly tethered, isn´t ist?

 

I also tried tethering with Photo Mechanic but that sucked also.

 

Best,

Peter__

[steppenw0lf]

I usually use WiFi with the remote app (SL app). Maybe this is an alternative. The difference is mainly that the photos stay on the internal cards and I have to transfer the cards to a reader. But to me this seems ok. Actually for me it seemed faster than the tethered setup and with an iPad pro you get an acceptable screen size.

The camera lasts typically 3 hours (for me) so a second and maybe third battery is recommended. By chance the loading of a discharged battery also takes about three hours. So theoretically 2 batteries could provide unlimited usage (when loading and using them in turn).

[rsmphoto]

I use the SL often on all day shoots tethered with LIS -> LR CC (I have no issue with speed of image transfer). Definitely get the third battery. They don't last nearly as long as the S batteries - I'd say 1/2 - 2/3 as much. I shoot with both the S and the SL. There has been a small bit of infrequent funkiness going on b/t LIS and LR CC (using the SL, LR CC decided I wasn't an authorized user at one point, no issues with the S BTW) with all the connection/disconnections I do from shot to shot on location, predominantly it performs well. 

[eprom]

I was lucky to get an extra SL-battery - they are nearly sold out here in Germany.

Importing by WLAN-app is no solution for me because I shoot with SL and S-E an I can´t imagine that transferring dng is faster with the app - is dng-transfer supported at all?

 

Tethering supports only dng transfer. After importing I have to export Jpegs for the client. Exporting Jpegs from LR is boring slow. Is there an app that manages that faster? Might Photo Mechanic be a solution?

Do have any other suggestions?

 

Thanks,

Peter__

[steppenw0lf]

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The app does no transfer of dng. But it shows the image directly.

Best you try it out, it's simple. And much simpler than to describe it. It takes only a few minutes to try it.

You can even transfer the app image to a TV screen for the clients (to give them access to a large screen). I use an iPad, so I would need apple TV for the screen mirroring. (also called air play). You can also use an Android phone or pad - they have similar possibilities.

 

That's why I wrote that the app is for me faster than tethering.   

 

It it is not to your liking, then you can still go on searching for something else. But I do not know of another option - at least now.

[eprom]

@steppenwOLF:

 

It could be a solution if I would work only with the SL but I work with SL and S-E which does´t support WLAN.

I have to go the way via USB.

 

Thank you

[steppenw0lf]

You said tethering sucked. I do not see exactly why. Can you explain ?

The S-E has only USB 2.0 while the SL supports USB 3.0 . Could it be you use an old cable (only for USB 2.0) ? That would unneccesarily limit the speed of the SL.

[eprom]

I never said that tethering sucks - it works very reliable with my system and both cameras. I only was concerned about the battery-life of the SL while tethering.

I addition I asked if there is an other tethered workaround with an other app that is worth looking at.

[ski542002]

I just have 2 batteries for SL, and when tethering, I do have to swap batteries later in a long day. Having the charger is a security blanket for me! I have had intermittent issues with LR stability; sometimes locking up the app, and sometimes not transferring. My Canon bodies are much much more stable when tethering.

 

I'm having another issue ((related). Just purchased a new Macbook using USB-C (USB-3 port on Apple dongle to camera). Using the Apple dongle, my Canon bodies & SL, do not tether. The Canon is seen by LR, but nothing beyond that. The SL is not even seen by LR. I am able to transfer images from the SD card using my USB-3 card reader thru the USB port on the dongle, so at least that will work. I'm just hoping there's not something the camera manufactures have to tweak to make this connection work. Having taken Leica and Adobe a year to get their tether to work, I might as well return the new laptop and buy last years model, or go PC, yuck.

 

It's always something with tethering!