Live View Display

Live View Display

Select Live View from the Camera menu or press Ctrl+L to open the live view window. If the camera is not already in live view mode, the mirror flips up and the camera enters live view finder mode.

The main Remote Pro window remains accessible while live view is displayed. Press Ctrl+L from the main window to bring the live view window to the front. Closing the live view window causes the camera to exit live view mode, unless the live view image is also being displayed on the camera’s LCD. The window can be resized to display a larger image.

 

Camera LCD Control

On recent cameras, the LCD display can be turned on or off by right-clicking on the live view display and selecting Display live view on camera LCD, or by pressing Ctrl+D. Turning on the camera’s LCD enables the camera controls and activates the HDMI video feed (normally disabled when live view is selected from the PC).

If the LCD is accidentally left on after closing the live view window, press Ctrl+D to turn it off.

Note: The camera’s LCD cannot be controlled remotely on older camera models without HDMI connectors.

 

Zoomed View

 

Live view images can be displayed full frame or zoomed. A white rectangle shows the zoomed area. Move it by clicking and dragging on the image or in the navigation window in the bottom-left corner. Double-click the image or navigation window to jump to the zoomed area.

Double-click the live view image or uncheck the Zoom checkbox to return to full frame view.

 

Focusing

Focus the lens using the arrow buttons or the mouse wheel:

• <<< / <<< — shift focus nearer or farther by a large increment
• << / >> — medium increment
• < / > — fine adjustment

Hold Shift with the mouse wheel for large increments, Ctrl for medium, or no modifier for fine adjustment. The cursor left and right keys also work, with Ctrl and Shift selecting medium or large increments.

Note: The lens should normally be set to auto-focus for the focus controls to work. Some lenses (e.g. Canon EF 17-40mm F/4 L) can also be focused in manual focus mode. On Canon PowerShot cameras, the focus buttons and mouse wheel control the lens zoom instead.

 

Auto Focus

Press Ctrl+F to activate contrast-detect auto focus. The AF status is shown in the title bar as “AF: in progress”, then “AF: success” or “AF: fail”. Active focus points briefly appear in green (success) or red (failure).

In full frame view, the white rectangle defines the auto focus area — drag it to a new position to focus in a different area. In zoomed view, the central one-fifth area is used.

Hold Shift when pressing Ctrl+F to use fine adjustments only, for faster focusing when the image is nearly in focus.

Limitations: Live view AF takes several seconds and is not suitable for handheld shots or moving subjects. AF may fail if the image is very out of focus, the focus area has poor contrast, or the live view images are noisy in low light. Lenses that focus in large steps or focus by different amounts in each direction may prevent AF from achieving optimum focus.

 

AF Modes

Recent cameras support multiple AF modes in live view (e.g. quick mode, live mode, face detect). Select these using the AF Mode: dropdown in the main window. When set to Remote Manual, auto-focus is not activated when triggering the camera remotely from the PC.

 

Live Histogram

A live histogram can be displayed in the full frame view, showing the intensity and the red, green, and blue channels. Right-click the histogram to enable or disable each channel.

Note: The histogram is only available when live view exposure simulation is enabled in the camera’s custom functions and the full frame live view display is selected.

 

Electronic Level

An optional electronic level can be displayed for supported camera models (including Canon EOS 7D Mark II, 5DS R, 5DS, 5D Mark IV, 5D Mark III, EOS-1D C, EOS-1D X, EOS-1D X Mark II, 6D Mark II, 6D, 70D, and 80D). Right-click the live view display and select Display electronic level.

 

Focus Peaking (Experimental)

Hold down the F2 function key to enable live view focus peaking, which highlights areas in focus in red. The sensitivity can be adjusted in the Windows registry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\BreezeSystems\DSLRRemotePro\100\EvfFocusPeakingThreshold

The default value is 200.

 

Overlay Image

An optional overlay image can be displayed over the live view to help with composition — for example, registration marks for ID photos. The overlay must be a PNG file with an alpha channel, in landscape orientation with a 3:2 aspect ratio (e.g. 1024×680 pixels).

Right-click the live view image and select Load overlay image… to apply an overlay. An example file example_overlay.png is included in the Remote Pro installation folder.

 

Onion Skinning

Onion skinning displays the current live view image on top of a previous image to help line up consecutive shots. This is useful for stop-motion animation and panoramas.

To start onion skinning, right-click the live view image and select Onion skinning. By default, the background image updates each time a photo is taken. The background image can be saved and reloaded between sessions, or offset for panorama alignment (offset by 60% horizontally or vertically).

Note: Onion skinning is not supported with the Mirror image option.

 

Motion Detection

The live view display can feed images to Webcam Zone Trigger motion detection software, which instructs the camera to take a photo when motion is detected. Useful for security monitoring and wildlife photography. Webcam Zone Trigger is developed by Omega Unfold.

To use motion detection:

1. Connect the camera and run Remote Pro for Windows.
2. Run Webcam Zone Trigger and select Connect to Breeze Systems PSRemote software.
3. With live view active, the live view feed appears in Webcam Zone Trigger.
4. Select Add Trigger and drag the monitoring circle to the area you wish to monitor.
5. When motion is detected, the circle turns blue and a picture is taken (may take a few seconds).
   

 

Depth of Field Preview

Select the DoF preview checkbox to stop the lens down to the currently selected aperture to assess depth of field.

 

EVF Upscaling

The live view image size varies by camera model. By default, the live view window enlarges images to fit. This can produce pixelated results. To disable upscaling, right-click the image and deselect Allow EVF upscaling.

 

Mirroring and Rotating the Live View Display

Rotate the live view image using the orientation settings in the View menu of the main window. Mirror the image horizontally by right-clicking the full frame live view and selecting Mirror image.

 

Saving a Copy of the Zoom Region

When live view is active and this option is enabled, a second JPEG cropped to the zoom region is saved alongside the full-frame JPEG. The cropped file is saved with a _cropped suffix (e.g. IMG_0001_cropped.JPG).

Right-click the live view display and select Save copy of zoom region when taking photo to enable or disable this option.

Note: This option only works when live view is active and JPEG photos are saved to the PC. It does not work with raw-only image quality or when live view is not active.

 

Arranging Windows

Press Ctrl+A to automatically arrange the live view and main windows. Repeated presses cycle through three layouts:

1. Main window resized to show only the controls (left of screen), live view window filling the rest — best for viewing live view while adjusting settings.
2. Live view window filling the screen — best for composing and focusing.
3. Main window filling the screen — best for reviewing captured images.

 

Keyboard Shortcuts

Key	Action
Spacebar or F8	Take a picture
F9	Take a preview image
Ctrl+F	Activate contrast detect AF
Shift+Ctrl+F	Activate contrast detect AF using fine adjustments only
Ctrl+L	Close the live view window
Cursor left	Focus closer (small increment)
Ctrl+Cursor left	Focus closer (medium increment)
Shift+Cursor left	Focus closer (large increment)
Cursor right	Focus farther (small increment)
Ctrl+Cursor right	Focus farther (medium increment)
Shift+Cursor right	Focus farther (large increment)
Cursor up	Zoom the preview
Cursor down	Select full frame display
Ctrl+O	Toggle onion skinning on/off
Ctrl+B	Capture current live view image as onion skinning background
Ctrl+A	Arrange main and live view windows
Ctrl+Z	Zoom in/out
Ctrl+Tab	Cycle through: Controls+AF area display → AF display only → live view images only

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