Raspberry Pi Announces The $50 High Quality Camera

[uid313]

FWIW, 720p video requires a 0,92 MP sensor. 720p isn't that bad considering they're designed for video conferences. You can also easily find good quality 1080p webcams for $69 or less. The situation has improved quite a lot in 15 years. Webcams used to shoot 320x240 back then. Most webcams also shoot stills at much higher quality. For example the $25 entry level Logitech C170 can do 5 MP.

Yeah, but they're still pretty shitty. They don't do 4K, HDR, 60 fps with 240 fps slow motion capture. The webcams kind of seem suck in the past and is way behind what is available in phones.

[oiaohm]

Phone camera modules aren't that expensive, e.g. $34.95 for the SGS9 main camera:]

Really you cannot compare a smartphone main camera to one designed for a changeable lens. The silicon area of the sensor for one made for a lens is on a totally different scale and totally different production.

This new Pi camera was apparently in the works for 3 years(the lens are custom designed for it apparently vs using an existing product).

You have a mistake here the new Pi camera is not using custom designed lens neither was the prior Camera Modules. Comes with custom lens mount so you can fit a standard CS or C lens correctly including microscopes and telescopes. To be correct new Pi camera the smaller CS mount with adaptor there is a reason for this. The mount does have to be custom to the sensor to get the focus right.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_mount

C mounts are a pure ass in a lot of ways. You cannot do a adaptor from the larger C mount connect to a CS lens and have it work right.

You can mount C and CS lens without a mount as they have direct bolt mounting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23jE0l8PTKA

Yes the raspberry pi Camera Module V2 is in fact CS lens compatible as well but requires CS lens direct mounted and you have to remove the provided lens. Lens mounts allow you to turn and un-clip and change the CS and C lens. Mounted without a C/CS len mount requires undoing bolts to change lens and sometimes horrible spaces. Gets worse Camera module V2 if you add a C/CS mount you distance to sensor is wrong this is why the lens is mounted without spaces. So there is a chance that a party buying the new raspberry camera will have a CS lens or two lying around that will be perfectly compatible.

So they are using a pure standard lens with a standard define lens mount. The C and CS mount are more commonly used in security cameras and microscopes and telescopes. Yes security C and CS camera lens are well and truly mass produced and quite cost effective.

Yes its common in security cameras and microscopes with power driven focus and zoom for this to be on a independent cable than in the connection mount where you normal DSLR and other cameras have this though the mounting ring to make changing simpler. Also note that C and CS lens mounts are design to be single screw locked into the mountings as well not simple button releases. If you are not using a mount CS is 2 retaining bolts and if C its 4 retaining bolts. Yes C particularly mount is pain saver.

Working around security cameras you get to know C and CS mounts and if a security camera is some other mount lot of cases you just straight up replace them because lens replacement prices as different parties damage them will no be cost effective.

The K-70 seems nice, but not really worth over 1.5x the price? I guess it depends how long you see yourself with the purchase until replacing it. I'd buy neither personally since I'm broke AF 😂 but if I could afford it, the K-S2 makes more sense, the 96MP composite image sounds cool, but I dunno how gimmicky that is, if you think it's something you'd care about and can try it out for yourself or something, maybe that and the additional ISO range is worth throwing the extra cash for?

Little point something with a 16-30 MP sensor normally cannot do 30 frames per second video. 12-13MP is 4K and your 35+MP sensor is your 8K and there appears to be a sensor black hole in the middle for any decent speed capture. Yes the one the new Pi high quality pi camera is using is the 30 frames lower end at 4K capture.

https://www.apertus.org/axiom-beta-imagesensors Higher end 12-13MP 4K sensor you would be expecting to like 2.5 to 10 times faster 75-300 frames per second but these are also a lot more expensive also don't work with your cost effective to get C and CS lenes or you C or CS devices simply.

polarathene I know about this speed of capture problem because a relation I have likes taking flying aircraft a few frames per second don't cut it you need a camera that is able to do 30 fps at least to be able to rapid fire and get aircraft in shot at times. So its not just a resolution problem of the sensor sometimes a camera with a low resolution sensor is a better choice than a higher resolution sensor.

I do think this raspberry pi high quality camera for what it is not badly placed. Something that is designed to connect to what you will be using in education or lab setting providing a reasonable resolution with usable capture speed.

Yes connecting a raspberry pi Camera Module V2 to a microscope or telescope was not possible because you need the CS mounting ring for a lot of use cases. Same with a lot of suggestions use a webcam or phone camera same problem it don't connect to CS mounting. Yes a CS mount camera can put you back 200 USD at times without lens with custom firmware that can drive you nuts with glitches.

[polarathene]

You seem to be knowledgeable on this subject

Nah, not really 😅

I'm just a hobbyist on a budget so I don't pay the nice cameras too much attention, I mentioned the Sony A7R IV because my photogrammetry buddies were quite excited about it when it was making the rounds. I'd like to do some DIY embedded stuff with the not so great image sensors/lenses, one day if I can afford to get a sweet DSLR, I will

so do you mind answering a question? I'm considering spending the majority of my stimulus check on a decent camera, basically an $800+tax limit.

With that said do you think I should quit debating in my head and pick the newer K-70, the cheaper/older K-S2, or is there another camera in that price range you'd recommend?

Quick comparison after looking at the links for K-70 and K-S2, used this:
https://www.imaging-resource.com/cam...s/pentax/k-70/

The K-70 seems nice, but not really worth over 1.5x the price? I guess it depends how long you see yourself with the purchase until replacing it. I'd buy neither personally since I'm broke AF 😂 but if I could afford it, the K-S2 makes more sense, the 96MP composite image sounds cool, but I dunno how gimmicky that is, if you think it's something you'd care about and can try it out for yourself or something, maybe that and the additional ISO range is worth throwing the extra cash for?

[polarathene]

Phone camera modules aren't that expensive, e.g. $34.95 for the SGS9 main camera: https://www.eetasia.com/18032605-gal...-bom-revealed/

It's the supporting costs though, I've seen people say how there's a bunch of NDA stuff and IP/patents. Pretty sure I have a link or two on such discussions if you're interested, one was about someone wanting to use their old smartphone camera for a project by taking it out of the board, or something, and some comments explain how much of a hassle it would be to get the thing working well. Even RPi devs are under NDA for some parts of their OmniVision camera support at least, I suppose the same with Sony, and they mentioned in a long running forum post about things that'd be useful but they're not able to share.

This new Pi camera was apparently in the works for 3 years(the lens are custom designed for it apparently vs using an existing product).

Would be nice for more hand me downs on the sensor tech to be more usable for a hobbyist

[polarathene]

https://www.uctronics.com/index.php/...ra-module.html This is a price of a fixed 13MP focus for a raspberry pi yes around 50 dollars as well.

Here's a similar 13MP sensor for $19: https://store.pine64.org/?product=ro...standard-model

You can see how it compares to that arducam sensor specifications here: http://image-sensors-world.blogspot....tion-13mp.html

So cheaper and better. Both sensors are capable of auto focus btw, so not sure what you mean by fixed focus? The arducam you linked only mentions it as programmable and lacking support for things like 3A algorithms.

Note how, the arducam IMX135 doesn't have native linux driver with V4L2 support, the IMX214 does(assuming the linked store page info is out of date, the driver support arrived in late 2018): https://github.com/torvalds/linux/bl...a/i2c/imx214.c

They also offer m12 lens mount version for $3 more: https://store.pine64.org/?product=ro...unt-lens-model

Available at a cheaper rate on alibaba if you order enough(as low as $12): https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...784679018.html

This RPi high quality camera is not what you would call a webcam class should come clear by the end of this section. CS mount means it not that you have 50 USD for the main part and 25 USD for the lens then the raspberry pi to drive it I would say you would use a 55 dollar raspberry pi 4 to drive it. You are looking at a 130 USD device without casing.
https://www.kurokesu.com/main/2016/0...ves-autofocus/
Now lets say we put a USD 50 to cs lens power drive so powered focus and zoom, Yes you have spent less than 200 USD dollars you can spend the difference on casing. One little catch here this solution will have more focus distance and zoom distance than fairly much all your webcams on the market.

With the RPi HQ cam, they offer a 6mm CS-mount lens or 16mm C-mount lens, here's a 5-50mm varifocal lens with camera module and USB(albeit it's not interchangeable for different lens and it's an 8MP module, IMX179..): https://www.amazon.com/Varifocal-Meg.../dp/B07MJFZK4S

For $76, that isn't all that bad of an example price wise(few comments indicate yellow tinge, so probably not a great buy). I'm sure if you look around though, you'll find plenty of other options, you don't have to just reference what RPi is offering. Why do you need a RPi 4 to drive this camera? A RPi Zero is probably plenty if we're talking about a DIY webcam here? Casing for such can be fairly cheap too.

Note, I've looked into the RPi lenses with the HQ cam and they affect the Field of View and output resolution, you don't get 12MP with either of them. The 6mm lens offers FoV of 63 @ 3MP, while the 16mm varies from ~20-45 degrees @ 10MP. The 6mm is intended for macro photography and the 16mm for long-range/zoom usage, so neither is particularly useful for webcam usage?

That gets clarified here(you could have a 12MP image, but quality degrades beyond the given range): https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/new...omment-1527959

Why are we bringing a motorized drive into this comparison and cost? It's a nice feature, but generally for a webcam, manual focus adjustment of the lens isn't a big deal due to typical usage, I've had products that required that in the past.

Basically I see RPi high quality camera as in the entry level digital camera price range with changeable lens(this is a feature that normally does not exist this cheep). Yes for diy nature and cost of casing and the fact it still a compromise on image quality still a toss up if this is a good or bad idea. Webcam devices are not what RPi high quality camera competing with and are really not competitive against RPi high quality camera.

I assume with the right lens, it could still be used as a webcam if one wanted to, but I wasn't aware that reduces the image resolution(not an expert by any means on this stuff). From what I've read, while this sensor is capable of 4k video, none of the Pi boards are able to handle that amount of data from the sensor, you'd need an actual ISP for that(which tends to be in SBCs priced around $50+, for it to be "cheap", you need to go DIY at a lower level, and you can get the BOM down, but generally at the expense of having to produce a lot of units that it defeats the purpose afaik).

Happy to be corrected, but my understanding is that if a board has an ISP, it'll be more compatible with a variety of camera sensors(with the linux driver support), while those lacking it try to support specific sensors via GPU(or perhaps purely CPU software) drivers targeted to their devices. You can find quite a few boards that seem to only permit a selection of camera modules. With the Pi, and open-source nature, that might be wider if someone adds support for the modules, as seems to be what vendors like arducam do? (they also mention something about userland driver support and some gotcha with that on newer Pi hardware)

The Pi products are known to handle ISP via the GPU, and that apparently has some limitations (link also points out that they're still under NDA for quite a few things with the camera products they support): https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/v...c.php?t=109137

The RPi's are also only capable of 1080p streaming, not 4k(limit of their GPU h.264 encoder, that applies to RPi4 too):

https://picamera.readthedocs.io/en/r...ardware-limits
https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/new-product-raspberry-pi-high-quality-camera-on-sale-now-at-50/#comment-1528003

So performance on the Pi products with the same sensors suffers, vs boards that can be found with dedicated ISPs that can handle dual 4k. Cost-wise, if you don't need 4k, perhaps a RPi Zero is a win with compatible cameras?

Something to remember RPI high quality camera with the 25 dollar lens is going to be like 100mm deep at least yes the Logitech Brio is only 30mm deep so completely different class to webcam or camera in phone that extra physical distance in lens is what allows all the extra zoom and focus stuff. So it not a compact device once setup to function.

I am mostly interested in the sensor support tbh. RPi adopting it as an official product is generally a good thing, in time should hopefully see an upstream driver arrive in the kernel and the sensor become available in other modules with competing products.

Lens wise, you could ditch the C/CS mounts for m12 if you want something not as deep? Although those appear to have same disadvantage at lowering effective resolution of the images, and cheap ones may not have glass optics afaik. T

he resolution quality seems to be defined as lines per millimetre (lp/mm), you can find the sensors value to match by taking it's pixel pitch/size value, such as the pi HQ cam 1.55 um, and multiply by 2, and divide that against 1000... or 500 / 1.55 == 322 lp/mm. Then I believe the lens will have it's lp/mm value rated for some specific sensor pixel pitch(some only mention a megapixels rating or lp/mm without additional details..), this Blaser lens for example is 230 lp/mm for 2.2 micron pixel pitch, which ends up being 5MP resolution, I think this math works 230/322 == 70%, 12MP * 70% == ~8MP, so you'd get 8MP instead of 5MP as good quality resolution/crop?

https://machinevisionstore.com/catalog/details/1463

When it comes to optics RPi high quality camera with the lens mount is not taking a compromise in this department this is why comparing it to webcams and phone cameras will never work out right because they are simply in a different class due to the restricted depth requirement on webcams and phone cameras.

I think if my understanding of these lenses are correct, a lot of people that aren't informed are going to be upset with expectations as these lenses aren't going to produce bigger images with similar area coverage. They'd need to get a lens inbetween, but unlikely to get the 12MP still, that Basler lens is fairly high lp/mm value for low pixel pitch, most others seem to be much less at a similar price range and not even that would manage the 10MP that the 16mm pi lens is offering(they don't have much specs regarding the lens, so lp/mm is presumably 270, and I could not find those readily available), so should be interesting to see.

That not a sensor in that link that is a fairly limited lens. Welcome to china horrible listing they list the sensor the lens is for before the lens details. You to scroll down to the Product name bit "F1.8 4.4mm 100 degree m12 lens for 8k surveillance camera" sorry no sensor in that listing. Sensor costs more so does a decent quality lens.

Whoops, right you are sorry about that!

$10-30 bare sensor: https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...855590419.html

Doesn't look like any modules are being sold atm, some claim to in their titles but then change the sensor in the details section..

There is the older IMX 214 mentioned earlier in this response for $12 in bulk:

https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/OEM-camera-module-Sony-IMX214-sensor_60784679018.html

Bare sensor for IMX219 (8MP Pi v2 cam) $1.25-2.80: https://www.alibaba.com/product-deta...764947112.html

Not that I see those being particularly useful to anyone here, doubt any potential savings is worth the effort(I assume at that low of a component level, it'd need to go through some factory run anyhow).

13MP with fixed focus with processing on the RPi 3 have been done in the past for photogrammetry. This new camera would allow doing this stuff better due to being able to focus and zoom.

Link? I don't know of anyone doing photogrammetry and processing that on the Pi... makes little sense vs doing processing on the desktop. Unless you're referring to SLAM for real-time stuff.

Will be good to see how third-party lenses pan out

[oiaohm]

Does anyone with knowledge have any idea is the lense/optics good enough to use/build microscope for smd soldering example?

Trinocular microscope is normally used for this work. Being able to use both eyes to get depth on what you are doing can be important for performing some smd work. The digital capture for compare and computer based filters can also be important.

Now can I recommend a Trinocular microscope not off the top of head and not really at all once you read this issues.

https://store.rossmanngroup.com/index.php/rossmann-microscope.html

Its a pity this one disappeared due to USA tariff. As stated here you run into some problems. The trinocular port(where the camera connects) in different microscopes have many things wrong.
1) unstable rotation mount so any bump and you have you camera spinning/moving that really bad if you suffer from any form of motion sickness..
2) unstable focus mount so you are constantly fighting to keep the camera in focus.
3) Out of focus no matter what you do.

The Binocular part(where your eyes go) can have its own set problems with the eye pieces.
1) insanely expensive eye pieces or not replaceable at all eye pieces.
2) unstable eyepieces.

The unstable eyepieces mounts can be cause by revision or in cheap made ones cause by bad quality control on machining.

So far all the faults listed happen in the most expensive and the cheapest so price does not help to sort around these problems.

3) miss aligned eyepieces something you normally only find on the really cheap.

Please note I could recommend a model number of a microscope that does not have any of these problems and you get a different revision of the same microscope and the one you have has one if not all of the above faults on the version you get.

Like if you can go to a brick and mortar store so you can inspect before purchase this is the best. Yes before you got there you learn what you should be inspecting to make sure correct function.

If you cannot you will have to go by current reviews and pray they did not change it between the review you read and the shops stock you are buying from and that the person knew how to review all the parts properly.

The basics of course it has to be a Trinocular microscope that can be arm mounted and used with a front ring light so you can move around over PCB and of course light will not come though the PCB effectively.

As you can see getting a microscope for this work can be at times playing the loto. It really should not be but its the reality. Even those getting Trinocular for research work have the same problems and its why when you get a good one you will be like I will only loss this over my dead body.

[caligula]

Well maybe he was thinking about webcams for streaming and videoconferencing. Most webcams are very poor and seem to have technology from the 90s. It is like 0.3 megapixel sensors and 720p at only 24 or 30 fps.

FWIW, 720p video requires a 0,92 MP sensor. 720p isn't that bad considering they're designed for video conferences. You can also easily find good quality 1080p webcams for $69 or less. The situation has improved quite a lot in 15 years. Webcams used to shoot 320x240 back then. Most webcams also shoot stills at much higher quality. For example the $25 entry level Logitech C170 can do 5 MP.

[caligula]

Still you have to ask what is the actual results those 108 megapixel cameras can deliver, especially under varying photographic conditions. It is really the end result that counts.

These are also coming soonish https://petapixel.com/2020/04/21/sam...the-human-eye/

[caligula]

There are many options, for many years now. Most DSLR manufacturers offer an SDK where you can attach to a regular PC via USB cable, and then control the camera via software. My company writes software that utilizes this functionality and we've been doing it since 2007. I have a dozen different Canon DSLR's at work that I can stick on a tripod and control with my keyboard and mouse. Nothing new about it.

You can also remote control most cameras with gphoto2. The API allows configuring some settings. No need for any special software.

[caligula]

It is high quality compared to the cheap camera modules they have. It obviously doesn't compare well against a high-end smartphone camera, but I hope nobody seriously expects it to at this price point.

Phone camera modules aren't that expensive, e.g. $34.95 for the SGS9 main camera: https://www.eetasia.com/18032605-gal...-bom-revealed/