This video is about how you can use your Sony
Mirrorless camera as a webcam to join online
meetings or to make video calls.
I myself use a camera of the A6000 series,
but it works the same with a full frame camera
like the A7III and it should also work with
a camera of the RX series like the RX100 or
RX0.
I also use a Mac.
It basically works with Windows as well, but
you have to use different software for Windows.
However, this video is about the setup for
the Mac.
And very important - you don't have to buy
any additional accessories for this and the
whole solution is completely free.
The basic question is why should you use your
big Sony camera for this purpose at all.
For one thing, you might have for example
a MacMini but no webcam.
Apart from that, it could also be that you
want to capture a special angle, which is
not possible with the built-in webcam.
A larger sensor also captures much more light,
which is especially useful in low light conditions.
And besides that - who wouldn't want to appear
in a videoconference with a cinematic image
with a blurry background.
And in case you are new here, my name is Werner,
I live in the Italian Alps and on this channel
I do filmmaking tutorials, and reviews of
consumer cameras.
Consider subscribing to the channel if you
are interested in these topics and have fun
with this video!
To achieve our goal you will need two programs
- Sony Remote, which is part of the Sony Imaging
Edge Desktop software, and CamTwist, a software
that manages video sources.
Both programs are free and don't worry, the
setup is quick and easy.
You can find download links for both programs
in the video description.
Once you have downloaded and installed both
programs, you need to connect your Sony camera
to your computer.
However, before we connect our camera to the
computer, we need to change a setting on the
camera.
In the setup menu of your camera you select
USB Connection and set it to PC Remote.
When you have done this you can connect your
camera.
For this we use a Micro-USB cable, ideally
the cable that came with the camera.
You can't use every cable for this, because
there are also micro-USB cables that are only
designed for charging devices and not for
transferring data.
But another data cable will do it as well,
of course.
Now you start the App Remote.
According to Sony all current cameras are
compatible with the app.
As you can see here in the app, I use the
relatively old Sony A6300 today.
If your camera doesn't appear here, it's probably
because of the cable or a wrong setting on
your camera.
Now double click on the camera and you will
see the camera image.
If the screen remains black and the live image
does not appear, it is probably because you
have set your camera to movie mode.
So you should select a photo mode, for example
the manual mode, before activating the live
image.
The amazing thing now is that you can manually
adjust all exposure settings here.
You can rotate the image, for example if you
prefer to shoot vertically, and you can change
the aspect ratio.
You can even see a histogram.
If you want you can now also switch to the
movie mode.
There are no problems with overheating in
this live view mode and the battery life is
quite good.
After all the camera is connected to the PC
Two words about the autofocus.
At least with my camera the continuous autofocus
doesn't work as usual, but that's no problem.
When you activate the AF button in Remote,
the camera focuses.
Then you can deactivate the button again if
you want to make further adjustments.
On my camera I also switch to manual focus
directly on the camera.
If I want I can now even refocus manually
on the lens.
In case you are interested in which lenses
and other accessories I use, I have put some
links in the video description.
When I am satisfied with my image, I start
CamTwist.
You can also do a lot with CamTwist and it
is really easy to use, even if it may seem
a bit confusing at first.
But for now we want to turn our live image
into a webcam.
CamTwist creates a kind of virtual camera
image and is later recognized as a camera
source by the video conference software.
If you select in the menu of Camtwist under
View the preview you can see how the current
virtual video image looks like.
Black - simply because we have not yet told
CamTwist what our video image should consist
of.
Our video image should be the LiveView image
of the Remote App.
We do this using Desktop Plus - by double-clicking
on it.
In the preview image of Camtwist you can see
that our desktop appears, but the whole desktop.
We do not want that.
So we select Confine to application window
and there we select Remote, the opened window
of the Remote App.
We don't really like that either, since we
only want to stream the video image.
So we select resizeable selection and select
capture area.
Now you can set the desired capture area.
But I wouldn't crop into the image too much
here.
This leads to a decrease of the image quality.
It is better if you set the lens correctly.
In the preview window you can see if the webcam
is actually set correctly.
With Effects you can now also add various
effects.
There are gadgets like the matrix effect or
useful things like the possibility to add
text.
You can also use the Picture in Picture feature
to combine different sources.
When we now start for example Google Meet
or Microsoft Teams, CamTwist should already
be recognized as our default webcam in most
cases.
If this is not the case, go to the appropriate
settings and select CamTwist as video source.
I have tested this setup with Google Meet,
Microsoft Teams and Skype and it currently
works fine.
With Zoom, however, there are problems with
the version 4.6.11.
For this reason I have reinstalled the older
version 4.6.8 with which it works.
Zoom has been criticized a lot lately because
of several security flaws.
Here you have to decide what is more important
for you.
But it is also possible that Camtwist will
be recognized in a later version.
The whole setup is of course not perfect and
compared to a normal webcam it seems complicated.
I also noticed that there can be a very small
delay in the image.
But depending on your needs it might be a
useful solution.
And that's it for today.
If the video was interesting for you, give
me a Like as feedback and see you next time!
