Laser is a great technological invention. One of it’s use case is to make markings on an solid object – aluminum enclosure in my case. Sandblasted and black anodized coating reveals gray material underneath. This marking is fast to apply, durable and looks awesome. First product I will be marking is Kurokesu C1 USB camera. […]
Read MoreDo you want to see the unseen?
I have always been fascinated by Infrared photography. But it was associated with big cameras and complicated rework process. Never considered using small cameras for this task until yesterday. After taking videos for new experiment (count bypassing vehicles) I switched to modified camera and captured short video of surroundings. Was surprised that camera worked flawlessly […]
Read MoreMeasuring minimal and maximal microscope magnification and zoom ratio
Magnification ratio is one of many parameters to describe optical instrument – microscope in this case. Magnification ratio usually comes along with zoom range. These terms are often being misused. In this post I will measure zoom range and magnification ratio of monocular video microscope lens and stereo inspection microscope (Konus #5424) head. Despite being […]
Read MoreLong range license plate recognition
Automatic license/number plate recognition (ALPR / ANPR) is a specialized kind of optical character (OCR). Target applications might include automatic car parking control, electronic toll collection, neighborhood watch, vehicle tracking and such. Concerns about these systems have centered on privacy fears of government tracking citizens’ movements. Critics have described it as a form of mass […]
Read MoreKurokesu C1 camera firmware upgrade
Good news everyone! Friends from Sonix made custom firmware for Kurokesu C1 camera. Now camera has wider manual white balance adjustment range (9300K instead of 6500K). Also frame rate is now flexible and camera can adapt to lower light automatically. Unfortunately camera firmware can’t be upgraded remotely, if you have purchased camera before this date […]
Read MoreUnusual tasks with video files – reading bar-codes and qr-codes
A barcode is an optical, machine-readable, representation of data; the data usually describes something about the object that carries the barcode – wikipedia. While first barcode was patented on 1952, it took quite a while until these codes were used in first grocery store on 1974. And now they are being used everywhere. While using […]
Read MoreUnusual tasks with images – stacking pictures
Stacking images always has been a favorite topic for astro or timelapse photographers. In most cases computational photography opens complete new dimension to taking pictures and acquiring awesome results. There are countless commercial software packages with some advantages or limitations. My mind about simple tasks has always been on DIY side – I think it […]
Read MoreAny CS-mount camera deserves autofocus!
I have been working on open-sourced motorized zoom lens for a while. Probably there is no need to mention benefits of having motorized zoom/focus lens on a regular CS type camera. Even greater value comes by having auto-focus capability. This feature is being calculated on host computer and does not consume lot of resources. Many […]
Read MoreExploring and displaying USB video with GraphEdit
GraphEdit is a little known tool distributed with Microsoft Windows Software Development Kit (SDK) and allows exploring camera settings and video rendering filters. A copy of old version (which worked just fine without installing whole SDK) can be found wildly on the internet. Besides ability of tinkering with options it is much more advanced tool […]
Read MoreDIY PCB inspection microscope
Despite how good microscope you have, stand is still very important part of final assembly. And while there are many commercial ones made of cast iron, they might cost more than a microscope head itself. I decided to make stand from wildly available material laying around – it’s MDF (Medium Density Fiberboard). Advantages – stable […]
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