BackyardEOS ~ A new software for Canon DSLR

[guyroch]

Thanks Rabbit. Can you send me the debug.txt file located in the installation folder, it has more information. In you're in W7 the file is located C:\Users\<<Owner>>\AppData\Local\Vi rtualStore\Program Files (x86)\BackyardEOS.

Please send the file to backyardeos [-at-] yahoo [-dot-] com. It's simply tooooo long to post here.

Thanks.

Guylain

[guyroch]

BackyardEOS BETA Version 1.1.0 (Revision 22701) dated February 27, 2011 is currently available for download in the ‘Brave Souls’ section.

ALL license files are honored. Please use your purchased license file OR your active trial license file with this beta release.


And now we are 2…
I am no longer the sole developer of BackyardEOS! I have solicited the help of a long time friend and top notch software engineer, his name is Chris. As a direct result of having Chris help me, I’m able to deliver 2 major enhancements which were not scheduled for this release; Multilingual and Planetary Imaging! Thank you Chris!

Special thanks to Ferran Bosch for the initial Spanish translation.
Special thanks to François Bernier for the initial French translation.

Anyone willing to translate in any other languages just let me know.

*** Download & Complete Change Log ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/download


*** Quick 1.1.0 Overview ***
NEW: Canon 60D support added
NEW: Multilingual support; currently available in English, French, and Spanish
NEW: Planetary Imaging Mode, BackyardEOS has the ability to create AVI files
NEW: Complete control over image file names
NEW: Date Style image sub-folder added
NEW: Text File Delimited Weather Provider added
NEW: Tool tips added
NEW: Low Battery Alarm with configurable threshold added
NEW: Camera auto-shutoff override added
NEW: Continuous looping of your capture plan added
NEW: Continuous looping when snapping pictures in Frame & Focus added
NEW: Star HD improvement! BackyardEOS can resolve Bahtinov spikes better than EOS Utility
NEW: In-camera 5x zoom capability in live view mode added
NEW: Standard Deviation and FWHM added to file name and Exif data.
NEW: Saving Snap images in Frame & Focus is now optional
NEW: Enhance logging added
FIX: System freeze. In rare cases BackyardEOS would freeze when downloading images
FIX: Special characters in target name are now filtered out.

This is just a high level overview, please consult the ‘Brave Souls’ section for a complete list of new features and enhancements.


*** Download & Complete Change Log ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/download

[guyroch]

Good news, BackyardEOS is 90 days old!

I have decided to celebrate its early success by removing the time limit on the 90 day introductory low price.

The price is therefore permanently is set to $24 usd, until further notice! And I don't plan to issue a notice anytime soon

Thank you for your support and interest,

Guylain Rochon

[Heath (Heater)]

Hi Guylain,

Just purchased a copy after trial period. Can I use same downloaded software and just change the licence? Haveemailed you

Regards Heath

[guyroch]

Originally Posted by Heath

Hi Guylain,

Just purchased a copy after trial period. Can I use same downloaded software and just change the licence? Haveemailed you

Regards Heath

Hi Heath,

Yes, you can use the same copy (or download the latest copy).

The trial is fully featured and it's the same software as the purchase one. The only difference is that the license file limits the application to 30 days of use.

Thank you for your support and interest.

Guylain

[guyroch]

DOWNLOAD BETA RELEASE V1.1.0 (Revision 35198) dated March 24nd, 2011 is now ready for download

New feature: Daylight on/off is remebered between restart
New feature: Delay session plan start in imaging mode
New feature: Abort button delay
New feature: BackyardEOS is now available in German and Dutch.

Special thanks to Joerg Kroll for the initial German translation.
Special thanks to Matt van Domselaar for the initial Dutch translation.

Bug fix: Text file delimited weather provider now accepts comma as a decimal point to support French weather station
Bug fix: Crosshair was not showing up in live view under specific conditions
Bug fix: BackyardEOS was randomly freezing when calling exiftool
Bug fix: A few other minor bug fixes

Change: Latest version of Exiftool is used
Change: Log files are now located in BackyardTEMP/logs folder

Performance: Live view CPU hogger on single core PC/Laptop is fixed
Performance: Better memory management handling images and building histrogram data
Performance: Better multi-threading handling on single and dual+ core computers when downloading and processing the images.

On single core computers: Limited multi-threading; priority is given the to current task and keeping memory consumption under control.

On dual+ core computers: Most of the post download processing is done in background threads.

Thanks,

Guylain

[Cosmic (Daniel)]

Hi Guylain,

Just a quick one im getting this error using a canon 550d.

20:21:34 Imaging session started.
20:23:35 Image download timeout, process terminated after 120 seconds of trying
20:24:32 Imaging session started.
20:26:33 Image download timeout, process terminated after 120 seconds of trying
20:26:39 Imaging session started.

Tryed different setting exposures and iso ect ect no change with imaging.

Maybe its got to do with the class SD im using...(class4)?

Thanks

Dan

[guyroch]

Hi Dan,

Which release are you using? 1.0.3 or 1.1.0 ?

Guylain

[Cosmic (Daniel)]

Originally Posted by guyroch

Hi Dan,

Which release are you using? 1.0.3 or 1.1.0 ?

Guylain

Hi there,

v1.0.3, ill give the beta a go and see if I have any luck that way. I'll report back.

Cheers

Dan

[Cosmic (Daniel)]

No change Guylain with the beta v. I'll keep trying to nut this one out as well in the meantime.

Cheers,
Dan


**Update, checking all the canon settings and Autofocus/Drive Mirror Lockup was Enabled. Disabled this setting and now the problem fixed. (I put this down to user error!!)**

Sorry about that Guylain.

Thanks,
Dan

[guyroch]

Thanks for reporting back Daniel, glad you're up and running now

Guylain

[guyroch]

I have promoted Version 1.1.0 (Revision 40115) dated April 4, 2011 to production status today.

Thank you for your support during the Beta testing period.


*** Donwload ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/download


*** Change log ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/change-log


Guylain

[White Rabbit]

Thanks Guylain, I really love this software and the new features are great.

Thanks for all you hard work.

Thanks
sandy

[Davros (Lauren)]

Just a quick question because i dont want to read through 6 pages of info here. Is there any chance of an MAC version?

[guyroch]

Originally Posted by Davros

Just a quick question because i dont want to read through 6 pages of info here. Is there any chance of an MAC version?

BackyardEOS is a .Net application. A native MAC version is therefore not for tomorrow. The only option for now is virtualization. Sorry!

Thank you for your interest,

Guylain

[astroJK (John King)]

Originally Posted by Omaroo

Hi Guylain

I've managed to get out and try it now that some of the clouds have dissipated near new moon. I like the software, but I'm having some issues at the moment with my 5D Mark-II (firmware 2.0.8) and BackyardEOS. Once I set multiple exposures to go past 200-seconds, or thereabouts, I receive multiple errors stating that the download process terminated after 90 seconds of trying. I'm confident that it's probably something I'm doing in my camera's settings rather than the software, and that you will come back quickly with a solution or at least a "watch for this" list.

When a timeout occurs, the exposure counter on the camera sits there flashing. It's set to bulb mode and I have turned off all auto-dark frame settings. "Pause" is set to "0".

BTW - what is the software expected to do with a capture plan that dictates multiple long exposures, and L.E. auto darks are actually set to on? Should Pause be set to the dark frame generation time expected if you are creating in-camera darks?

The following log is from a session I've just experimented with this morning, after downloading your latest version (18328).

Cheers - and thanks for a great tool
Chris

Greetings

I just got this app running myself and it's great
I spend most of my daytime hours fixing software, and I must say the interface is so crisp and just a real pleasure to navigate

Kudoes!

Anyways, I ran into this "Image download timeout, process terminated after..." also, and ended up tracking it back to the drive settings on my 550D.
It seems to only work in "Single shooting" mode. The timer and remote options seemed fail with this every time. Looks like you had intermittent fails though, so not sure if this will help you.

[guyroch]

Release Candidate v1.2.0 (37857) dated July 6th 2011. is now ready for download.

*** Donwload ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/download

*** Change Log ***
http://backyardeos.binaryrivers.com/change-log

New Feature - Legacy cameras support (20D, 30D, 350D, 400D)
New Feature - Shoestring DSUSB and DSUSB2 serial cables support
New Feature - Hap Griffin serial cables support
New Feature - Generic serial cables support
New Feature - Mirror lock for cameras that support in-camera mirror lock
New Feature - Ability to add up to 25 plan items in one single plan with scrollable items
New Feature - Battery AC Power reconginition
New Feature - New licence key entry screen
New feature - Quick preview the 1st image in your plan.
New feature - Security ACL change to EVERYONE for all downloaded images
New feature - Lastest Exiftool 8.59 integration
New feature - Ability to force Netbook resolution 1024x600
New feature - Display imgages in a presentation fashion using the full screen
New feature - Fit Zoom in Frame & Focus; Planetary, and Drift Alignment added
New feature - FWHM star pattern is plotted live in Frame & Focus
New feature - FWHM or STDEV (Standard Deviation) feedback for live focusing
New feature - Ukrainian suppo
New Feature - Progress Center BIG display configuration
New Feature - Date and time can now be inserted into the image file name independant of the timestamp
New Feature - Camera name can now be inserted into the image file name
New Feature - The ability to display a grid in image mode to help frame your target
New Feature - Dithering between X images configuration
New Feature - Ability to take full manual images (AV + TV) in MANUAL dial mode
New Feature - Ability to save images to COMPUTER and COMPUTER+CARD. Default is COMPUTER
New Feature - Ability to save images in RAW and RAW+JPG format. Default is RAW format
New Feature - Current f/stop value is maintained with taking BULB images with a lens

Change - Minor histogram tweak
Change - Minor UI tweaks
Change - Stacking live view frames using StarHD is more sensitive
Change - Minor performance increase activating the camera shutter
Change - Minor tweaks driving camera lens

Bug Fix - Navigating away from BackyardEOS while the Setting dialog was visible
Bug Fix - Histogram was not correctly displayed for over exposed images
Bug Fix - Serial cable random error when trying to end a bulb sequence
Bug Fix - Device Busy error on some camera models when saving images on computer and camera card
Bug Fix - Mouse coordinates where not properly displayed in live view frame & focus
Bug Fix - Zero based index error was fixed for cameras with a 'B' dial mode; 5d Mk II, 7D, and 60D
Bug Fix - A few other minor fixes and tweaks

Performance - Snaping an image in frame & focus is now faster
Performance - Significant changes to background multi-threading processing of downloaded images


Thank you again to all the brave souls out there who have given their time to test any 1.2.0 beta releases in the past few weeks.

Guylain

[stephenb (Stephen)]

I've registered and downloaded the trial version (with the hope to purchase the full version) but it is asking me for a License Key. Can I confirm this will be sent to me? or is this only for the Full version?

Regards,
Stephen

[guyroch]

Originally Posted by stephenb

I've registered and downloaded the trial version (with the hope to purchase the full version) but it is asking me for a License Key. Can I confirm this will be sent to me? or is this only for the Full version?

Regards,
Stephen

Did you request your 30 day trial via the web site? If not you need to fill the form on the web site. I will generate and send you your licence file shortly after.

Keep me posted,

Guylain

[stephenb (Stephen)]

Originally Posted by guyroch

Did you request your 30 day trial via the web site? If not you need to fill the form on the web site. I will generate and send you your licence file shortly after.

Keep me posted,

Guylain

Hi Guylain, I'll send you a PM regarding the trial and my details.

In the meantime, I know you are pumping so much time and effort into BackyardEOS but dare I ask.... Has a future Apple app crossed your mind or been suggested already? (now ducking for cover )

Regards,
Stephen