Canon Camera Connect

★★★☆☆

You won’t be surprised that this app connects to Canon cameras.

I have a PowerShot SX710HS that I like to take along on hikes and nature walks because it’s still small enough for a wrist strap or pocket, but has an actual zoom lens which makes it much better than a phone for taking photos of birds and other wildlife. As long as I remember to start a location trace before I set foot on the trail, this app will use that trace when I’m done to add location data to the photos I’ve taken. (And that makes it simpler to add them to iNaturalist.)

It used to have a really narrow scope:

1. Record GPS and attach it to the camera’s photos.
2. Transfer photos direction to the phone.
3. Use the phone as a remote control for the camera.

It still does those things, but Canon has added some online services, and now the app requires a cloud login to function. Worse, at least on Android, the login process requires Google Chrome specifically. Not Android WebView, not your default web browser, but Chrome. I actually had to install Chrome on my deGoogled /e/OS phone last week so I could set this up!

I was pleasantly surprised to find that you can still opt out of data collection during setup, which is nice.

I also had to completely wipe my camera’s network settings in order to pair it with that new phone. I’m not sure whether that’s a problem with the app or the camera, but it’s not the first time I’ve had to reset them.

Some cameras connect over WiFi, others over Bluetooth. Mine used to be able to trigger a connection using an NFC tap, but the app doesn’t support that anymore. I also haven’t been able to get the camera and phone talking across a common WiFi network since the previous time I reset the camera’s network config. I used to be able to connect it to my home network or even to a cafe’s WiFi and send locations to the camera or photos to the phone, but since then I’ve only managed to get it to work with the camera as a hotspot.

It’s just slow and clumsy to start the camera’s hotspot, connect the phone to the hotspot, tell the phone to stay connected to the network despite the lack of internet access, launch the app, and tap Connect…especially when compared to the old method of tapping the camera against the phone and waiting a couple of seconds.

At least it still works.