ESP8266 Community Forum

I have a camera that can operated with a phone app. It works well enough but will not do exactly what I want, which is simply to operate the shutter at a specific time in the future.

What I want to do is to hack into the camera's WiFi with an ESP8266, i.e. have it masquerade as the phone app, but I'm utterly clueless about where to start.

There is obviously nothing sacred about the WiFi per se. I can see it in the phone's settings but that is about as far as I can get. The camera can establish connection using a QR diagram on its screen, which I understand has the network name and password. I have read it but it looks like gobblydegook and it is pretty clear that Olympus is going to resist me all the way.

I don't expect any joy from the phone app. It won't do anything until it is connect to a "registered camera".

I am in the process of making an intervalometer using a ProMini and a DS3231, with cable-connect to the camera. It already has an ESP-01 but this is only used to check the RTC against the Internet during Setup, and I would rather it was better employed, and particularly as Olympus use some weirdo multi-purpose connector.

I hope somebody has already been down this road.....

How does the app connect to the camera? Is it via Bluetooth, or does the camera broadcast its own wifi AP?

Can you tell us the Brand and model of the camera at least?

So I noticed you said Olympus in your post, and I did a quick Google to find out more. Looks like it is indeed a wifi connection so you will be able to control it from an ESP8266 or your PC.

These repos came up in the search , you might want to start there:
Already built utility in Python:
https://github.com/joergmlpts/olympus-wifi

Library that shows protocol as well as does graphic stuff using Qt - the protocol is the interesting part
https://github.com/stv0g/libqt-omd

Thank you for the comment. The camera is indeed an Olympus - model OMD EM-1, and it connects via WiFi. It works with an Android app, OI.share, and, within its limitations, it is excellent. I made the connection with a QI code but I now have the normal SSID and password. This came off the camera screen.

Thanks for the links. The prospect of a foray into Python is a bit daunting, but I guess needs must......