FAQs Foculus:
What is to know about FireWireTM interface?
How to convert Color (Bayer) Patterns?
Do FOculus series have a SIO (serial input/output) feature?
Do I need an extra power supply when I'm using a NET FOculus IEEE1394 camera with a notebook?
Performance of 1394 devices may decrease after you install Windows XP Service Pack 2.
How to run FOculus cameras with Linux?
Which are the results of tests regarding compatibility of FOculus cameras with Matrox framegrabber?
Which are the compliant system environments the FOculus cameras may be used in?
The correct adapter cable for Trigger-in, Strobe-out, Power-in and SIO
Are FOculus cameras compatible with MATHWORKS Toolbox?
What is to know about FireWireTM interface?
FireWire is a standardized serial communications bus similar to USB that allows digital devices to talk to one another at high speed. FireWire operates at a maximum speed of 400 Megabits per second and can handle up to 63 connected devices such as hard drives, monitors, printers, computers and cameras. A FireWire system has no need for a host controller; each device on the system can operate on its own but must follow strict rules about when it is allowed to talk.
Because FireWire is standardized, all FireWire compliant devices should easily plug and play. FireWire has also been designed to allow hot plug and unplug. Since each type of FireWire compliant device is assigned a worldwide identification number, there is little possibility of identification conflicts within the system.
FireWire was initially developed at Apple Computer and Apple still retains the FireWire trademark. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers formalized the rules for communication on a FireWire bus in a document called the IEEE 1394-1995 specification and you will often hear FireWire referred to as IEEE 1394. The IEEE 1394 document defines the electronic and software protocols used to transmit data over a FireWire system and also specifies the format of the cabling and connectors used with FireWire compliant devices.
The FireWire bus system is much different from the data interface that we use now. Currently, one camera interfaces with one frame grabber and communication between the two is optimized for this one-to-one relationship. With a FireWire bus system, many devices can share the communication line. To avoid conflicts between the devices, strict rules are needed to determine which device can talk and when it can talk. The IEEE 1394 specification provides the rules to ensure that communication between the devices on the FireWire bus takes place in an orderly fashion.
How to convert Color (Bayer) Patterns?
Color sensors capture images through an optical low pass filter placed over the individual pixel in Bayer mosaic layout. Imaged data are transferred by passing color processing which can save bandwidth gaining higher frame rate and flexibility of applying different Bayer Pattern on the PC side. Obtained Images can be processed in either of the following 4 different conversion algorithm can on the PC side.
"Binning" is defined as reading neighbouring pixel and combining them directly from the CCD of the camera. Binning has an advantage in the following situation and may further be used in various applications. Relative binning mode per camera is described in each camera specification.
— Low Light Operation: Combining neighboring pixel increases the area of the CCD. Increased image area achieves receipt of more light but lowers resolution. More signals within one pixel causes possible noise reduction.
— High Frame Rate Operation : Vertical Binning accelerates the speed of CCD data transfer rate by combining multiple vertical line per single horizontal line of the CCD resulting a significant gain in frame rate.
Vertical Binning
Vertical binning combines CCD pixels neighboring vertically to a single pixel increasing light sensitivity of the camera. Since CCD acquire data horizontally, multiple lines are acquired in case of vertical binning which results significant speed gain. Thus the vertical resolution is reduced and due to the increased CCD area over exposure may occur which may require adjustment.
Horizontal Binning
Horizontal binning combines CCD pixel neighboring horizontally to a single pixel increasing light sensitivity of the camera. However due to the nature of CCD transferring each horizontal line at a time there is no speed gain in horizontal binning. However light sensitivity increase may occur, due to the increased CCD area similar to vertical binning and horizontal resolution is reduced.
Full Binning
Full binning mode can be obtained by combining vertical and horizontal binning. First horizontal pixels are combined followed by a vertical conjunction of these pixels. This would increase light sensitivity by a factor of 4 in case of 2 x 2 ( Horizontal x Vertical ) binning. However as described above, only vertical binning would result speed gain while horizontal binning gives no speed gain thus speed gain results as similar to vertical binning. Resolution in this mode would be reduced both horizontally and vertically.
Cameras are defined of a certain resolution according to the image sensor while often a certain region maybe of an interest to the user. The partial scan mode provides the function to provide output of a certain region of interest (ROI) which may have advantage in data transfer speed resulting faster operation. As described in binning mode speed gain would occur only in vertical resolution decrease. Partial Scan is supported only in Format 7 by setting the following registers described in the IIDC1.31 specification. Unit size of the partial scan is described in the camera specification which user must consider in increment configuration.
Pan/Tilt is a function used to move a camera up and down or left and right. However unlike the mechanical Pan /Tilt which is carried out by physically moving the camera up and down, this functions by using smaller video mode than the CCD’s effective pixel and moving the image up and down. This results of a cut off pixel from the whole image which user can specify by the Pan/Tilt command. Pan/Tilt range and values depend on the characteristic of each CCD used in the camera respectively as per the following tables. Note that at Format 7 mode, the pan/tilt value must be set at non-format 7 mode before operation.
Pan/Tilt details for the camera models are described in the NET FOculus user manual.
Do FOculus series have a SIO (serial input/output) feature?
FOculus Series are equipped with SIO(Serial input/output) feature described in the IIDC 1.31 specification. By using the serial interface, users can execute commands by writing data in a specific address in the FireWire address range. SIO can be further used as a RS232 interface which supports pass through and NET GmbH command (camera control commands).
Do I need an extra power supply when I'm using a NET FOculus IEEE1394 camera with a notebook?
If you are using a notebook, you should ensure that the camera is being properly supplied with power. Many of the built-in IEEE1394 connectors on notebooks and the connectors in add-on IEEE1394 PCMCIA cards only have a 4 pins instead of the normal 6 pins. The two missing pins are for the wires used to supply power to the camera. If your notebook's built-in connector or the connector on its PCMCIA card has only 4 pins, it will not supply power to the camera and your camera will not work. In this case, you can purchase an adapter cable (ZY-FO-Trigger-xM) from NET with extra power input.
Performance of 1394 devices may decrease after you install Windows XP Service Pack 2.
After you update your computer to Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), the performance of your 1394a or 1394b FireWire devices may be greatly decreased. A digital camera that uses S400 speed is an example of such a device.
This problem occurs if you connect a 1394a or 1394b FireWire device to a 1394b port. This problem occurs because Windows XP SP2 changes 1394b ports to S100 speed when you upgrade.
The following file is available for download from the Microsoft Download Center:
Download the Update for Windows XP (KB885222) package now
How to run FOculus cameras with Linux?
Necessary Linux Kernel Version 2.6.11.12 http://kernel.org.
FOculus cameras achieve the DCAM/IIDC-standard which is the specification for digital video cameras on the FireWire-Bus). Employing Library "libdc1394" FOculus cameras run with Linux.
l libdc1394 is a library that is intended to provide a high level programming interface for application developers who wish to control IEEE 1394 based cameras that conform to the 1394-based Digital Camera Specification
http://sourceforge.net/projects/libdc1394
libraw1394 provides direct access to the IEEE 1394 bus through the Linux 1394 subsystem's raw1394 user space interface
http://sourceforge.net/projects/libraw1394
Coriander is a full-featured GUI for IEEE1394, IIDC-compliant (aka DCAM) digital cameras. It includes camera control, video display, saving, FTP and V4L export.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/coriander
Which are the results of tests regarding compatibility of FOculus cameras with Matrox framegrabber?
-Grab Images using all the formats available
-Trigger grabs for all the formats (Mode 0, edge detection)
-Change the value of digitizer control (Pan, Shutter, Tilt, Brightness, Gain, Sharpness, Gamma, Grab Scale, and Input Gain)
Some minor issues including:
-The bytes swapped in MONO16 modes (For both Mil 7.5+HOTFIX25 and Mil8.0 1230), which is fixed in Mil8.0 1416
-When trigger mode is enabled, the port must be set to HARDWARE_PORT1 instead of HARDWARE_PORT0 (This only occurs in Mil 8.0 Build 1230)
- The bytes swapped issue for MONO16 modes it has been fixed by the upcoming Driver Update 11 (DU11) for MIL 8.0 Build 1230.
Which are the compliant system environments the FOclus cameras may be used in?
NET Cameras are IIDC compliant cameras which may be used in various application such as amcap, DirectX SDK, Windows XP capture utility, Application supporting Twain interface or WDM. Currently our API is compatibel with the software libraries i.e. MVTec's Halcon & Active Vision Tools, National Instruments IMAQ(labview) or MIL 8.0(Matrox). Please check each application before using the camera and refer to the relative software function for proper operation.
The correct adapter cable for Trigger-in, Strobe-out, Power-in and SIO
Find the following drawing for adapter cable of FOculus Serie ZY-FO-Trigger-Xm
Find the following drawing for adapter cable of FOculus S Serie ZY-FOS-Trigger-Xm
Find the following drawing for adapter cable of FOculus T Serie ZY-FOT-Trigger-Xm
Are FOculus cameras compatible with MATHWORKS Toolbox?
FOculus Cameras work with CMU driver, therefore they are likely to be compatible with MATHWORKS Toolbox (CMU driver)
