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wher to buy a camera chip with integrated dsp

is there a camera like the wiimote camera (pixart) that can be buaght « on: February 11, 2009, 02:23:00 AM »

Hi all, I hope I am in the correct forum. I am thinking of taking apart the wiimote camera and connecting it to a micro controller. The wiimote camera is made by pixart and integrated dsp that is able to track upto 4 points and relays the information through i2c protocol. The thing is that pixart doesn't sell this chip separatly (even on the wiimote there are no markings on the chip) and they don't provide any datasheets. It is amazing how people managed to reverse engineer it it understand how it works.

I though that before I go through the hassle of desoldering the chip and connected it I would try to find out anyone knows of camera's that can be baught (like the pixart camera), that have a built in dsp that can track a number of points of light and can relay the information to a microcontroller (i doesn't matter how it relays the information). I know of cmu board (and other such boards but am looking for something that is less expensive (I am only looking to track a monochrome ir led light). The wiimote is only $40 compared to the cmu board that is around $170 (alot better but beyond my needs). I hope someone can help me because I am pretty new to cameras and don't even know what the technical name is.

I need this for a robot that tracks a ball which emits ir light.

Thanks Gil

Reply to
bobster23
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ty

The reason the Wiimote is $40 is because Nintendo makes a million of them a day at a factory somewhere in China where the workers are paid $0.10 in a good week, and are executed and rendered down for saleable internal organs if they complain. The CMUcam is assembled by far more expensive workers and in volumes that are at least five orders of magnitude smaller.

Tracking bright spots in a camera's FOV is not a difficult task. If the cost difference ($170 to $40 =3D $130) is worth more than your time writing an algorithm, then I suggest you google "machine vision bright dot sourcecode" or a similar query. The problem being that it's really not easy to find a cheap camera module that's simple to talk to.

Reply to
larwe

Well, there's this one. Only $50 and communicates over a serial link. Does JPEG but can be commanded to emit uncompressed grayscale, which would probably work okay for the target app *if* the update rate is acceptable.

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Rich Webb     Norfolk, VA
Reply to
Rich Webb

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