18.2 Accessing the Camera

There are three possibilities for accessing the pictures on the camera. It depends on your camera and which protocol it supports. Usually it is USB mass storage, which is handled by the hotplug system, or PTP (also known as PictBridge). Some camera models do not work with either protocol. To support these, gphoto2 includes specific drivers.

It is easiest if your camera supports USB mass storage. Read the documentation of your camera if you are unsure if this is possible. Some support two protocols, like both PTP and USB mass storage. Unfortunately, there are also some that communicate with a proprietary protocol, which can complicate the tasks. If your camera does not support USB mass storage or PTP, the following descriptions will not work. Try gphoto2 --list-cameras and the information at https://www.gphoto.org/.

If your camera can be switched to a USB mass storage device, select this option. After you connect it with the USB port of your computer and turn it on, it is detected by the hotplug system. This takes care of mounting the device automatically, so it is easily accessible. The KDE desktop shows a camera icon after a successful mount.

After the camera is successfully mounted, see a new directory under /media, beginning with usb and lots of numbers. Each vendor and product has a number, so when you connect a device on your computer it has always the same name. Depending on what you have connected to the USB bus, find different entries. The only problem left is to find the correct entry for your camera. Try to list one of these directories (DCIM/xxx ) and see what happens. Each camera has a different tree structure, so there is no general rule. If you can see JPEG files in a directory, you probably found it.

After you find your correct directory, you can copy, move, or delete the files from your camera with a file manager, such as Konqueror, or simple shell commands (see “Important Linux Commands” (Chapter “Working with the Shell”, ↑Deployment Guide) and Section 1.4, Managing Folders and Files with Konqueror).