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Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

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Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#111

Post by KolenCh »

ciprian_craciun wrote: post #11

I am an amateur photographer, and I can't understand why the major camera brands (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc.) aren't open at least to the concept of SDK's to control their cameras (let alone opening the lens mount specifications)... It would make their cameras much more flexible and useful, thus perhaps gaining some users that currently use smartphones where it seems there is greater control over and integration…

In terms of mount spec, I think Four Third and the successor Micro Four Third is open specification, then the Sony E mount later (not at launch time) open the specification.

The later might not be true, may be it is specification available but not open.

And practically any mount has been reversed engineered in their electronic protocols. (Edit: but each company has their own secret sauce here.)

As a digression, there are open source projects for running softwares or at least custom firmware in cameras. Famous examples are 2 projects on Canon compact and DSLR lines. Others includes firmware on Panasonic cameras, and then apps on Sony cameras. Sony may have killed the app capability due to this in recent models (or may be they only killed it because the store isn’t profitable.) If true that proves your point that they hate people tinkering it.

Canon always has been silent about the custom softwares running on their cameras including the famous 5D Mark II for raw videos. But later on as there’s rumors that the ID C cinematic camera ($10,000+ specialized in cine) is not much different than the then current 1D mode (may be 1D X, can’t remember) and it may be possible to hack it and install the 1D C firmware on the 1D camera (which is a relative bargain around $6000 or may be more.) Those rumors call out the open source project for help, and Canon for the first time spoke about the subject and signal that they will sue if anyone tamper with their flagship camera. Then the open source project responded saying they are not interested.

So again it’s another support on how much they hate us to tinker with our camera.

I’m guessing it may be a Japanese culture thing. Nintendo also has similar behavior. But may be not.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#112

Post by KolenCh »

daleharvey wrote: post #73

This SDK only works on the top end Fuji's, the cheapest one supported starts at £850 (body only) Fuji has famously terrible app support, its a nightmare to set up and cuts out constantly, transferring images over wifi is slow and unreliable to the point of it being useless, the remote shutter is unreliable and doesnt have any of the extremely simple to program features that intervalometer's have. You can't shoot teth…

First sentence incorrect. £850 is not top end.

A typical high end camera product would starts at $2000, and nowadays more often than not is $3000+.

A quick search shows the top end of Fuji X mount is $2000+.

And that’s not even the top end of Fuji’s, which goes to the medium format GFX mount.

For your other points, I know you’re talking about app, but Fiji has been famous about their software support in terms of how long they continue to update their firmware. They even market it Kaizen. And it is an objective truth that you can verify by comparing to how often other brands upgrade their firmware (Sony is not bad but still not as good.)

There exists open source softwares on camera, just may be not Fuji (I don’t know.) If you want open source softwares running on camera which significantly increases its capability, try Canon’s. That one is the most mature.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#113

Post by m000 »

An interesting question here is: How would they know that you used the SDK?

Does the camera have non-volatile memory for saving that piece of info? Assuming that it does, how can they make that bit tamper-proof?

Not that tamper-proofing is undoable, but it would require a lot of expensive engineering, just to save them from replacing a few dozens of cameras that presumably may break because of incorrect use of the SDK.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#114

Post by formerly_proven »

KolenCh wrote: post #111
ciprian_craciun wrote: post #11

I am an amateur photographer, and I can't understand why the major camera brands (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc.) aren't open at least to the concept of SDK's to control their cameras (let alone opening the lens mount specifications)... It would make their cameras much more flexible and useful, thus perhaps gaining some users that currently use smartphones where it seems there is greater control over and integration…

In terms of mount spec, I think Four Third and the successor Micro Four Third is open specification, then the Sony E mount later (not at launch time) open the specification. The later might not be true, may be it is specification available but not open. And practically any mount has been reversed engineered in their electronic protocols. (Edit: but each company has their own secret sauce here.) As a digression, there…

> In terms of mount spec, I think Four Third and the successor Micro Four Third is open specification, then the Sony E mount later (not at launch time) open the specification.

They're not. MFT can be licensed by "anyone", Sony E can be licensed only for producing lenses under additional NDA-covered criteria. DSLR mounts were sometimes licensed in a somewhat similar fashion, e.g. Tokina had a license for Nikon's F-mount.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#115

Post by Goz3rr »

m000 wrote: post #113

An interesting question here is: How would they know that you used the SDK? Does the camera have non-volatile memory for saving that piece of info? Assuming that it does, how can they make that bit tamper-proof? Not that tamper-proofing is undoable, but it would require a lot of expensive engineering, just to save them from replacing a few dozens of cameras that presumably may break because of incorrect use of the SD…

I have no idea what the exact hardware inside of the camera is, but almost every microcontroller has something like eFuses or one time programmable memory in this day and age. Not a lot of expensive engineering required, just a few hours of software development for the camera firmware and SDK developers. It'll be good enough for most warranty cases you can now hand wave away.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#116

Post by formerly_proven »

ciprian_craciun wrote: post #11

I am an amateur photographer, and I can't understand why the major camera brands (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc.) aren't open at least to the concept of SDK's to control their cameras (let alone opening the lens mount specifications)... It would make their cameras much more flexible and useful, thus perhaps gaining some users that currently use smartphones where it seems there is greater control over and integration…

> I am an amateur photographer, and I can't understand why the major camera brands (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc.) aren't open at least to the concept of SDK's to control their cameras (let alone opening the lens mount specifications)...

I don't know about the other brands but Nikon cameras have implemented PTP in full forever which allows you to set virtually every option remotely, albeit over USB. I'm assuming the other brands are similar, because that's how tethered shooting works. There is no camera-specific SDK or driver needed for this. The bluetooth and Wifi stuff is proprietary ad vendor-specific as far as I know, though.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#117

Post by detaro »

EMIRELADERO wrote: post #32
detaro wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do all modifications that do not involve things banned in the second quote?

And what would those entail? How could one modify an SDK without disassembling or even debugging?

Even just adapting examples or build scripts would be "modification", that was the kind of thing I was thinking of first.

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#118

Post by anta40 »

astrange wrote: post #91
Maursault wrote: post #43

I, for one, can forgive FujiFilm... because, even though recently finally discontinued, they gave us FujiChrome Velvia 100 (& 50).

They also make medium format mirrorless cameras, which are a great way to feel superior to all the people who think "DSLR" is what you call a high-end digital camera. I can't quite bring myself to spend the money to get a GFX 100S though.

The price for 2nd hand GFX 50S or 50R is very tempting.

For enthusiasts like me who rarely make huge prints and mostly only post on social medias, 50 MP is waayyy more than enough :D

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#119

Post by Manuel_D »

mdoms wrote: post #106
Manuel_D wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And isn't that normal? If you remap your ECU to use a different fuel mixture that voids the warranty right? That's what google results overwhelmingly say. And it makes perfect sense. Users might alter the firmware to run at a suboptimal setting that increases wear. Would you expect a manufacturer to honor warranty if you bolted on a turbocharger?

No, not right.

I'm seeing sources indicating that yes, it will void warranty. Both in the US [1] and K [2]

1. https://carperformanceboss.com/ecu-tuning-warranty-legal/

2. https://hyperchips.co.uk/will-a-car-remap-affect-my-warranty....

Re: Using FujiFilm SDK on a Camera Voids Its Warranty

#120

Post by KolenCh »

formerly_proven wrote: post #114
KolenCh wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In terms of mount spec, I think Four Third and the successor Micro Four Third is open specification, then the Sony E mount later (not at launch time) open the specification. The later might not be true, may be it is specification available but not open. And practically any mount has been reversed engineered in their electronic protocols. (Edit: but each company has their own secret sauce here.) As a digression, there…

> In terms of mount spec, I think Four Third and the successor Micro Four Third is open specification, then the Sony E mount later (not at launch time) open the specification. They're not. MFT can be licensed by "anyone", Sony E can be licensed only for producing lenses under additional NDA-covered criteria. DSLR mounts were sometimes licensed in a somewhat similar fashion, e.g. Tokina had a license for Nikon's F-mou…

Sorry and thanks for correction.
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