ArduCam launched a crowdfunding campaign to produce a 16MP autofocus camera for Raspberry Pi boards. The new camera offers 40% higher resolution than the 12MP Raspberry Pi HQ camera, managing to keep the compact size of the 2MP Raspberry Pi Camera V8 camera.
The new product will reach the general public at a cost of $ 25.
The new camera for Raspberry Pi. Features and performance
The camera will feature a 519MP Sony IMX16 sensor and will work with any Raspberry Pi board that has a MIPI CSI interface. The manufacturers contend that with the camera tuning algorithms provided by the Raspberry Pi Foundation, the camera module outperforms the Raspberry Pi HQ camera. in all aspects including sharpness, saturation, exposure and more. On the other hand, it does not have supports for interchangeable lenses.
The specifications
- Sensor: Sony IMX519 sensor with 4656 x 3496 pixel resolution.
- Fixed resolution: 16 MP.
- Video modes: 1080p30, 720p60.
- Optical size - Type 1 / 2.53 ″
- Focal ratio - 1,75.
- Focal length - 4,28 mm.
- Autofocus: With a range of 10 cm to infinity.
- FoV: 80 ° angle of view
- Exposure time up to 200 seconds.
For reference, the official Raspberry Pi Camera V2 has fixed focus, while the HQ camera has manually adjustable focus.
Although the 16MP ArduCam autofocus camera ships with a plastic housing, it can also be used with other Raspberry Pi camera housings. Regarding the drivers, it is compatible with the V4L2 drivers and the libcamera library (both open source) lor that means that its behavior will be similar to that of the official Raspberry Pi cameras
The price
As I said above, the price of $ 25 will be the retail price. To compare with other options, it is the same as the Raspberry Pi Camera v9 and half the price of the HQ camera. However, if you decide to participate in Campaign of crowdfunding, you can get a 40% discount by getting the 16MP autofocus camera, the cabinet and a 15cm flex cable for a total of $ 16. For $ 31 you will have access to an HDMI adapter and, if you need two cameras, you can get them for a total of $ 31.
Other offers include the camera and a stand for pan and tilt at $ 43,
Volume discounts are as follows
- For 4 cameras you pay $ 61.
- For 8 cameras you pay $ 120.
- For 12 cameras you pay $ 150.
The campaign has so far exceeded its first goal of $ 5000.. He's $ 3000 and 29 days away from his next goal, which is to release a version for the Nvidia Jetson Nano / NX single board computers.
If they reach 15000 they will add an extension kit to 15 meters and as soon as they reach 20000 a NoIR version (Here I request the help of the readers because I have no idea what that is and Google does not collaborate).
The maximum goal ($ 30000) is to produce a camera that combines 4 lenses.
What are Raspberry Pi?
The Raspberry Pi are part of a series of low-cost single board computers developed in the UK by the Raspberry Pi Foundation. This entity has among its objectives:
Put the power of computing and digital creation in the hands of people around the world. We do this so more people can harness the power of computing and digital technologies to work, to solve problems that matter to them, and to express themselves creatively.
Because of their affordable cost, the Raspberry Pi became the preferred choice for the realization of open source hardware projects both by hobbyists and for educational and research purposes. It must be said that this is one of the most successful open source hardware initiatives.
Hopefully this campaign can exceed any of its goals and, if you buy one of these cameras we would like to hear about your experience with it.
NoIR stands for No Infrared, which means that the camera does not have an infrared filter, making it ideal for capturing light in this range of the spectrum.
So you can see that what you write interests us and we read it in depth :)
Thanks for the answer and for reading me