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CHDK for Canon SX120 IS Camera ( Canon Hack Development Kit )

CHDK is not yet officially released for Canon SX 120 IS, but I found a development version which works for my Canon SX 120 IS.

About CHDK

For those who are wondering what a CHDK is, it is Canon Hack Development Kit. CHDK is an alternative firmware that is available for all Canon models. But it is not ported to all models including my Canon SX120 IS Camera. With CHDK we can shoot more professional photographs with ordinary Digital Camera. Features and interfaces with Digic 4 Processor which are not enabled by default in the firmware is enabled by using CHDK. Compared to other camera like Sony DSC H20, H50 or Nikon L Series, the one thing makes Canon cameras interesting is CHDK which has scripting support in it. For people who are interested in development, firmware and scripting, this is an exciting feature.

CHDK allows you to have much more features in your camera than the normal ones, For Eg, CHDK can be used to show live histogram, Time lapse photography, Motion Detection etc. With CHDK you can also do scripting to automate the process of taking photographs.

Although Canon has not acknowledged CHDK Firmware, trying out is harmless as it does not change the in built firmware. We can use CHDK without voiding the Camera Warranty, as the changes we make is only on SD Card.

The files for CHDK on Canon SX 120 IS are attached with this post. I downloaded this and used it back, now I do not remember the source, anyway thanks to someone for the CHDK partial port.

To install CHDK

• Make the card FAT 16 ( < 4 GB)
• Copy the contents in CHDK folder to your Memory Card.
• Make the card bootable using Card Tricks
• Insert the card into camera and press Play button to boot into CHDK

For detailed information about CHDK Installation see CHDK Wiki