Downloading the Images from the Camera
So, you say you have a camera full of photos and you're ready to turn them into a panorama? You want me to tell you how to get them off of the camera and onto the computer so you can work with them? Good grief, I have to do everything around here!
All joking aside, downloading the photos from the camera is quite simple. Important: These instructions apply to the Olympus D-400 and D-460 cameras that ECN currently uses as of Summer 2003. If ECN has switched to a different model of camera, please inform Marian right away so that this article can be updated.
To download the photos, you will need to use a PC with the camera cable attached (see photo below) and the Camedia Master camera software installed. If the software is installed, you should see a shortcut icon labelled "Camedia Master" on your default desktop.
Double click on the icon to open the camera software. The software is laid out in three panes. The upper left is a list of folders on your computer. The lower left is a list of cameras. The right panel is a list of photos in the selected folder or camera. To view the images on your camera, first connect it to the computer using the camera cable. There is a small panel on the bottom corner of the camera that flips open. Under it are three ports. One is yellow, one is gray, and one has a pin in the center of it. The camera cable plugs into the gray port as show in the photo to the left.
Before you go any farther, browse through the file hierarchy on the left hand of the Camedia window and make sure that your "N:\" drive (your ECN home directory) is there. If it isn't, tell Marian so that you can get that taken care of immediately; it will affect everything you do on an ECN Windows PC. If it is there, browse through your N:\ drive and make sure that there is an "ECN" folder in place. Inside the ECN folder should be a lot of folders that you didn't create. If you have no ECN folder or your ECN folder is empty, complete the last step of the Getting Started tutorial.
From the desktop (NOT from within Camedia), open "My Computer", then your home directory (N:\ drive). Browse to your "ECN" folder, then to the folder labelled "VTour". Within the VTour folder, create a new folder. If you know the name of the lab whose pictures are on the camera, name the folder after the lab. Otherwise, name the folder with the date that the photos were taken. The name of the folder is just for reference later on, so it doesn't have to follow any conventions. If there are photos of more than one lab on the camera, create a folder for each one.
Now go back to the Camedia software. Turn on the camera by opening its front (yes, I know that it's dumb to require the lens to be exposed to download the photos, but that's the way it is). Connect the software to the camera by clicking on the "My Camera" icon in the bottom-left pane. The screen should look similar to the screen capture below (the camera icon is shown magnified). The photographs will take some time to display. The more photos that are on the camera, the longer it will take.
Once all of the images are displayed, you can begin downloading them to the folders you created. There are two methods for this. First, you can select the photos that you want to download (shift+click or ctrl+click to select multiple), right click on one of them and select "Download." A window will pop up that lets you browse to the folder where the photos are to be saved. Simply highlight the correct folder and click "OK." The alternate method is to select the desired photos, locate the appropriate folder through the navigation pane on the left, and drag the photos onto that folder. The photos will take a long time to download. When the photos are done downloading, double check the destination folder to make sure the files are there. If they were transferred properly, go ahead and delete the photos from the camera by selecting them and pressing the "delete" key. You can also right click on them and select "delete."
The photos are now saved in a public folder. You will be able to get to them from any ECN computer. Now you can get to the fun part: stitching the panorama.