Wireless previews and tethered shooting with the Eye-Fi ProX2 memory card

I thought I’d write a few words about this wireless card because there are so many luke-warm reviews of it that I nearly decided against buying one. But after several weeks of using it I’m getting exactly what I need from it so I feel I have to redress the balance.

As a headshot photographer I’ve shot tethered or preview-by-wire for years using Canon’s free and solid Windows/Mac-based EOS Utility. It senses the camera as soon as you plug in the USB cable and you’re quickly ready to shoot. If you set it up to download Jpgs only and set your camera to shoot RAW + Jpg, the software will show full-screen previews of your images to a laptop or monitor so clients can review their shots. I’ve found this a very valuable tool for non-models, who benefit from a bit of show-and-tell. The software can also transfer the images straight to Adobe Bridge, which can then be used to view, review and rate the photos (EOS Utility only shows the most recently shot photo). Meanwhile your all-important RAW files stay on the memory card and can be transferred after the shoot.

When my venerable 2007 Dell laptop finally burned itself out I decided to try a tablet as an alternative and hoped that it could still serve for tethered shooting (as well as giving me a portable digital portfolio). I tried several apps that advertised they could do this, yet they proved to be in the early stages of development and their creators were more interested in recreating Live View functionality through a tablet than doing something so menial as downloading and displaying Jpg previews. This was surprising as the website of one of these apps (DSLR Controller) positively bristled with recommendations from major photography and computer magazines. Yet it was an incomplete beta version for which the developers were charging nearly £6.

Since Canon does not make an Android version of EOS Utility, the Eye-Fi Pro X2 8Gb card was the only remaining alternative. It has been superseded by a faster 16Gb model, but this was mysteriously not available on Amazon in the UK when I wrote this. Given that the 8Gb model costs only £32 it seemed like a small amount to risk, and my last real chance to get preview-by-wire (or preview-by-wireless in this case) to happen on my tablet.

At 3.5 stars, Eye-Fi’s average Amazon review is not particularly encouraging. I spent a lot of time looking through reviews and scouring the web for opinions. Not really to save money but to avoid the frustration of wasting time on another half-baked technology. It turned out that much of the bitching was from people expecting the card to transfer 12Mb Jpgs to their computers in real time or, funnier still, RAW files of 25Mb or more (the pro Eye-Fi handles RAW, but takes its sweet time).

I don’t think I found a review from anyone who was actually using the card for what I needed using my equipment. In the end it worked out fine. Setting up the card, despite the manufacturer’s efforts, was not perfectly smooth. I think the issue is that they want all of your photos to pass through their website where they can offer you printing services and flash ads at you. Having the photos whizz effortlessly from your camera to your computer or tablet would not allow them to do that. However it turns out that by using Direct Mode you can pretty much do just that and I now have the PC software disabled and deal only with the Android app.

Here’s a summary of my setup:

Canon 5d Mark iii (with firmware 1.2.1, which includes Eye-Fi support so you can monitor transmission on the camera).

Eye-Fi Pro X2 8Gb SDHC wireless card

Lexar Pro 32Gb 400x CF card

Android tablet running Jellybean and Eye-Fi app

Camera setup: RAW + Small JPG 2, RAW files record to the CF card, JPG to SDHC.

Eye-Fi app in Direct Mode using the card as a portable hotspot.

Performance:

I recommend that anyone interested in buying the card check out the EyeFi speed tests on YouTube – it will give you a more precise idea of how quick the file transfer is.

Overall, the performance is pretty good, but it is not immediate like using a PC with USB preview-by-wire. Nevertheless for the kind of work I do the system is good: reasonably fast and well-featured, and the absence of a wire is a great improvement.

When shooting a portrait session, I can complete shooting the client with one lighting setup and by the end the previews will be mostly on the tablet so they can be reviewed in breaks in shooting. Pretty good. I can shoot a short series of photos to demonstrate a posing idea to client and the system is responsive enough. But if I want to shoot one image and show it to the client right away, it isn’t quite quick enough. There’s a break in the rhythm of the shoot.

At the end of the shoot it’s great to pass the client the tablet and while they browse the images the whole shoot will finish downloading to the tablet.

The app can be set up to show the most recent image full-screen, which is essential. Flicking the image allows me to review previous shots in full screen. There is also a thumbnail view, although sadly the thumbnails can only be viewed as square so they’re not much use (in headshots they crop out part of the face). Original shape thumbnails are much more useful, which is why they’re used in software like Adobe Lightroom.

Sadly the app doesn’t have ratings, so that if I want to do a photo selection with the client the RAW images still need to be laboriously transferred to the main computer. It would be amazing to be able to rate images on the tablet and transfer the ratings into Lightroom.

During a theatre production shoot I was able to review most of the images from the first half during interval. It was a really useful exercise, giving me better feedback than zooming in on the 5d iii, which is a newly redesigned and thoroughly unsuccessful feature of the camera.

In both scenarios the ability to show tablet-size images to models and crew was really valuable, both as a technical and a motivational aid. I’ve found myself wondering what would happen if the DSLR didn’t come with a screen at all. For anyone using their camera for stills, this could be a reasonable solution, and the battery life improvement could be significant within an LED array to power.

Battery life was a concern before I bought the card – after all, it taps into the camera’s battery for its energy. To be honest I haven’t made any precise measurements but there isn’t a noticeable debilitating effect on battery life. I managed a 4.5 hour shoot recently and the battery held up fine using the card throughout.

Overall I’m really pleased with this card. It adds a really useful functionality to the camera for very little outlay (I can still remember when Pocket Wizard flash triggers cost £180 each!).

One thing left to try is how the card works in an older camera model with a single card slot. Can the app be told to download only Jpgs when in RAW+Jpg mode? It remains to be seen. Can the app handle two cards in two cameras? Now that would be impressive!