EMBEDDED VISION [Embedded sensors are]
disruptive and will change the game, because they will lower the price of image processing
boards annually, according to its CEO Olivier Saint-Martin, who spoke to Imaging and Machine Vision Europe at the show. Te system Twiga devised for Airbus was a
video recorder that could be positioned on the outside of an aircraſt for flight testing. Seven of these camera modules were attached to the outside of the new Beluga transporters to record the landing gear in operation, and how much ice builds up during flight, among other
factors. Te module for Airbus was based on Twiga’s Red Mamba video processing and streaming board, which includes a quad-core Arm Cortex-A9 processor. Once Airbus had the cameras, it then manufactured base plates with a 3D printer, so that the modules could be affixed to specific areas on the aircraſt. Saint-Martin said the cameras meant Airbus
could print the base and position the modules in a few hours, whereas it previously took the engineers a month to build flight test systems. Twiga has also built vision devices to help
partially sighted people read books – the camera is set up to stream video of the pages of a book to a computer screen, turning the text into a large font size. Twiga sells around 9,000 boards a year for this application, according to Saint-Martin. It will also sell around 6,000 modules in
CAMERA DEPLOYED AS STICKER OPENS UP IOT SENSING Allied Vision’s Alvium product line contains a custom ASIC
the coming year to an Austrian binocular manufacturer. Te OEM wanted to add a video system to its binoculars in order to stream video of birds, as seen through the binoculars, to the user’s smartphone. Tis is based on a MIPI 13-megapixel camera attached to the Red Mamba processing board. Saint-Martin commented during the trade
fair that 80 per cent of Twiga’s requests are to stream video to the internet. Video acquisition company Euresys
displayed its
Picolo.net HD1 video server, which streams video from one full HD source over an IP network. Marc Damhaut, CEO of the company, told Imaging and Machine Vision Europe that the
Picolo.net server had been used for embedded video recording for the police in some countries.
Swiss R&D centre CSEM has built a camera that can be deployed like a sticker, opening up new possibilities for surveillance and Internet of Things (IoT) sensors. The Witness IOT camera,
which was on display during the Vision trade fair in Stuttgart, is solar-powered and includes a specially designed CMOS image sensor consuming less than 700µW.
The camera can be deployed as an adhesive patch or magnet, a world first, according to CSEM.
‘Enabling a range of
applications from unattended surveillance and camera traps to wildlife observation, Witness perfectly embodies CSEM’s technological strategy,’ commented Alain-Serge Porret, VP of integrated and wireless systems at the Swiss research centre. ‘We aim to deliver autonomous, low-energy- consuming devices combining both intelligence and efficiency.’ Forthcoming versions will include VGA resolution, as well as embedded face recognition. The Witness IOT camera
8 Imaging and Machine Vision Europe • December 2018/January 2019
consumes less than 1mW of power in active mode, fully covered by a photovoltaic cell with an adhesive surface. The CMOS sensor has a dynamic range of 120dB, consuming less than 700µW at 10fps for 320 x 320-pixel resolution. Intelligent embedded software means the camera can be triggering according to what’s happening in the scene.
The camera records fixed images at 1fps and stores them in flash memory for USB readout.
Standards Te G3 vision group, led by the European Machine Vision Association (EMVA), has formed a standardisation group focusing on embedded vision products. Tis includes developing a soſtware framework so that code is compatible across different embedded platforms, as well as recommending interfaces between image sensors and system-on-chips, namely MIPI CSI-2 or Sony SLVS-EC. MIPI is a widely-used interface for mobile devices, whereas Sony’s SLVS-EC sensor interface is not supported as much by processors yet, but could be important for the future. Andreas Franz, CEO of Framos, said during
the VDMA panel discussion that vision is becoming a commodity in the consumer world. ‘Companies like Sony and Intel are coming more in this market, and that’s what I see as a risk for machine vision,’ he said. He added that machine vision firms can
compete within these new market conditions, through the service sold alongside the product, and also by combining hardware and soſtware. O
@imveurope
www.imveurope.com
Allied Vision
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