Pi-Noir IR light recommendations

[DazzF]

Hi,

First up, my apologies if this has been asked before, but I could not find a post.

Could you please let me know what IR lighting you are using with your Pi-Noir. I'm looking for a touch/light to eliminate my projects. I want to try a few things like videoing the foxes in the garden at night, building a senor for an alarm system, etc...

Many thanks in advance....

[poing]

something like this? http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid= ... &_from=R40

[MattHawkinsUK]

Take a look at my post :

http://www.raspberrypi-spy.co.uk/2013/1 ... umination/

The 48 LED type devices would probably suit your purposes. I would buy a cheap one and experiment.

[skyemoor]

What is the IR wavelength sensitivity of the IR camera? That makes a big difference on the IR illuminator one wants to purchase.

So many of the IR LEDs out there today shine predominantly at 850nm. Is this the right wavelength for the PI NOIR?

[jbeale]

I do not think any spectral sensitivity graphs have been published for the Pi NoIR device. I think it would be very helpful if someone did! I can publish an image looking into a spectroscope, but only if someone gives me a camera All the US suppliers are currently sold out.

In general, for a CMOS imager, a 850 nm illuminator will show up more brightly than 940 nm where silicon imager sensitivity is dropping off. However Adafruit is suggesting their 940 nm IR LEDs alongside the Pi-NoIR camera: http://www.adafruit.com/products/1567#Technical_Details so presumably, 940 nm works at least to some extent.

Just for reference, with the IR filter in place, you don't see much image below about 680 nm. Here is the original R-Pi camera (including its stock IR filter) looking into spectroscope, with compact-fluorescent light:


Original R-Pi camera, spectroscope, with tungsten-filament lamp:


Original R-Pi camera looking at near-IR LED on Sony Digital8 camera (I did not measure the wavelength)


What that IR illuminator on the above Sony Digital8 camera looks like, using a different IR-sensitive CCD camera:

[aeckard87]

I've been doing some research on IR illuminators lately to use mine for security purposes at night. I purchased a 42 IR LED dome at 850nm (says it has a 50 ft illumination range but I'll find out tonight as I just got them in today) But I can verify that the pi noIR can pick up wave lengths between 850-940nm so far. 1 IR LED at 940nm illuminated about 1 foot out.

Hope this helps.

[DazzF]

Take a look at my post :

http://www.raspberrypi-spy.co.uk/2013/1 ... umination/

The 48 LED type devices would probably suit your purposes. I would buy a cheap one and experiment.

Thanks Matt, that's very helpful

[jbeale]

It will be interesting to hear how it works. Those claims about LED illuminators with 50 foot range are probably assuming you have a security-type 0.01 lux camera and a f/1.4 lens. The R-Pi camera is not like that.

[caerandir]

Here are my 50 cent: I today installed 30 IR-LEDs @ 880 nm and get a decent illumination up to 2-3 meters, then the image gets noisy. With exposure mode "night" 5 meters are still OK. The LEDs are arranged to fill the full FOV of the camera, so better results might be possible when one narrows the beam. And the LEDs are not pushed to their limits, I want them to live long.

[jarrah31]

Hello,

I'm after an off-the-shelf IR light module to help power a baby-cam, but I'm not too clear on what strength I need.

Basically I'd like something that doesn't emit a red glow light from the LEDs and something that isn't considered blinding for a baby's eyes please...

As part of this would someone mind explaining what the different strengths mean as well, e.g. 650nm vs 880nm?

Thanks.

[poing]

I'd be a bit cautious with IR light and babies. Basically you need the same illumination level as for a normal camera, only you can't see the light so your pupils will not react.

[jbeale]

All the baby monitors I know of have a dimly visible red glow, so I presume they use LEDs somewhere around 850 nm wavelength. These have been in widespread use for a long time, and I haven't heard about babies getting hurt by them.

[poing]

OK, didn't know that. Still, I'm all for DIY solutions around the house but this is one thing I'd shy away from. Your baby has one pair of eyes only. Why not make something with sound?

[jbeale]

By all means, don't do it if you are concerned about it.

This document http://www.axis.com/products/cam_irillu ... 011107.pdf contains the statement:

The ACGIH publish the TLV (Threshold Limit Values) for various physical agents; they recommend a TLV of 10 mW/cm2 for the irradiance of near Infra-Red radiation under
conditions of viewing for longer than 16 mins.

According to http://www.gizmology.net/LEDs.htm : A fairly typical "bright" IR LED will put out about 27 mW/sr. Now there are 4*pi steradians in a sphere. At a distance of 1 cm from that LED, you get 27 mW/cm^2 but it falls off as 1/r^2 so at 2 cm away, you have only 27/4 or 6.75 mW/cm^2, and at 4 cm you have 27/16 or 1.69 mW/cm^2. So if you have an illuminator with 40 such LEDs, you do want to stay at least 10 cm away from it to be within the TLV value for long-term exposure. In other words, don't clamp such an illuminator source to the rail of the crib, but mounting it somewhere out of reach should be fine. But of course, such a thing should always be mounted out of reach, for several other reasons! such as the strangulation hazard from the power cord getting around the neck.

FWIW, the commercial baby video monitor we used had only six LEDs. The illumination level at night was OK for that camera, which had a slow update rate of maybe 4 fps (if that) so consider it similar to the R-Pi camera in "-ex night" mode. I mounted the babycam against the ceiling, not for radiation hazards but due to the narrow field of view of the camera. I think the 40 LED device of my example (intended for medium or longer-range outdoor security application) would be way more than needed for a 2 meter distance into a crib (for example).

[batfastad]

I'm hoping to do exactly the same thing to replace a D-Link DCS-932L which we've been using as a baby monitor for about a year. This D-Link works well but having to use a nasty browser plugin (ActiveX or Java) is annoying, and connecting to the MJPEG stream directly with VLC or something is extremely unreliable. I want something that I can hook up to with XBMC or any streaming media player, so presumably an RTSP stream of some sort. I've seen a few bits about this in the forums.

The DCS-932L (http://www.dlink.com/uk/en/home-solutio ... oud-camera) produces enough illumination but only appears to have 4 iR LEDs, glowing a dim red colour.
Does anyone have any info on whether it's possible to obtain and then power similar iR LEDs directly from the Pi?

Presumably there's a maximum amount of power that would be available for these? I was hoping to be using a USB wifi adaptor and possibly a small microphone and temperature sensor as well.

It would be great to have this powered by a single cable but I don't have much practical electronics knowledge. I'm not afraid of learning a bit if someone can point in the direction of parts needed and the best way to power from the Pi.

Cheers, B

[Bikeman]

Hi!

I am doing some indoor IR experiments with the NoIR cam board, and instead of trying to build some DIY IR illumination solution from individual LEDs, I am for now using a "retrofit" IR LED light bulb that can be used in standard lamps meant for halogen bulbs (available for both the "GU10" high voltage sockets and the low voltage variant). The one I have consumes 4W, emits light at 850 nm and is more than sufficient to illuminate (say) a 3m x 3m area from 2 m away.

I am sure the respective manufacturer can answer questions on safety wrt. emission levels, minimum distance etc.


Cheers
HBE

[keithj69]

I'm hoping to do exactly the same thing to replace a D-Link DCS-932L which we've been using as a baby monitor for about a year. This D-Link works well but having to use a nasty browser plugin (ActiveX or Java) is annoying, and connecting to the MJPEG stream directly with VLC or something is extremely unreliable. I want something that I can hook up to with XBMC or any streaming media player, so presumably an RTSP stream of some sort. I've seen a few bits about this in the forums.

The DCS-932L (http://www.dlink.com/uk/en/home-solutio ... oud-camera) produces enough illumination but only appears to have 4 iR LEDs, glowing a dim red colour.
Does anyone have any info on whether it's possible to obtain and then power similar iR LEDs directly from the Pi?

Presumably there's a maximum amount of power that would be available for these? I was hoping to be using a USB wifi adaptor and possibly a small microphone and temperature sensor as well.

It would be great to have this powered by a single cable but I don't have much practical electronics knowledge. I'm not afraid of learning a bit if someone can point in the direction of parts needed and the best way to power from the Pi.

Cheers, B

can you point me in the direction of the retrofit bulb you are using please?

[Bikeman]

can you point me in the direction of the retrofit bulb you are using please?

I use this one (web page in German language, can be switched to Spanish tho)

http://www.synergy21.de/shop/onlineshop ... arot-ir-1/

Cheers
HB

[skyemoor]

Do you have anything to share at this time? I'm curious about objects at a distance (over 10-15') and the level of IR illumination needed in a dark area (e.g., not passively lit by nearby streetlights, neighbor's porchlights, etc).

[kyuzumaki]

The last post on this topic was some time ago. Has anyone since pointed a pinoir camera at a spectroscope to see which wavelength it is most sensitive to?

[jbeale]

I haven't done this, but I'd be willing to bet the peak sensitivity is somewhere around 700 nm, because that's usually the case for any CMOS sensor. It will be lower as you go to 900 nm and goes to zero between 1000 to 1100 nm which is the practical limit for silicon sensors. Do an image search for "CMOS spectral response" for some example graphs.

[KevinA]

I haven't done this, but I'd be willing to bet the peak sensitivity is somewhere around 700 nm, because that's usually the case for any CMOS sensor. It will be lower as you go to 900 nm and goes to zero between 1000 to 1100 nm which is the practical limit for silicon sensors. Do an image search for "CMOS spectral response" for some example graphs.

But why can't the Raspberry organization post the designed frequency response of their product? Is this too much to ask that they provide this information?

[jbeale]

For the new Sony sensor (v2.1) we actually do have a graph, at least for the visible light region.
See also: viewtopic.php?f=43&t=145815&start=375#p1031885

AFAIK the RPi group relies on the sensor manufacturer to provide that level of detail, and for the v1 camera (OV5647 from Omnivision), such data was never published, apparently because the market did not require it. I think until recently, mobile phone cameras don't normally go into science / industrial application where people actually care about spectral sensitivity, or even know what those words mean.

[lupa]

Hi,
talinkg about reccomandations for IR lights...

I have a 2017 Raspberry PI Zero W to which I connected a Pi Camera Noir V2.1 (the black one).

All works well meaning that I can stream the video and if I use an external IR light I can see in the dark...

Now I'm trying to minimize size to fit birds cage and so, instead of the external IR light, I'd like to use the IR leds you tighten with screws on the camera module.

As far as I know the Pi Noir V2.1 should be able to transfer through the screws the power (3V if I remember well) to the leds but... nothing happens: the lights do not go on.

I'm wondering if anyone has tried a similar setup (pi zero w+pi noir+ lateral led lights) succesfully.
If yes, any specific setup or any specific brand I should buy?

Next step from me will try to feed the led lights with an external 3V source to check if they work but knowing someone was succesfull would be very useful

Thanks

[6by9]

Hi,
talinkg about reccomandations for IR lights...

I have a 2017 Raspberry PI Zero W to which I connected a Pi Camera Noir V2.1 (the black one).

All works well meaning that I can stream the video and if I use an external IR light I can see in the dark...

Now I'm trying to minimize size to fit birds cage and so, instead of the external IR light, I'd like to use the IR leds you tighten with screws on the camera module.

As far as I know the Pi Noir V2.1 should be able to transfer through the screws the power (3V if I remember well) to the leds but... nothing happens: the lights do not go on.

I'm wondering if anyone has tried a similar setup (pi zero w+pi noir+ lateral led lights) succesfully.
If yes, any specific setup or any specific brand I should buy?

Next step from me will try to feed the led lights with an external 3V source to check if they work but knowing someone was succesfull would be very useful

The version of the Pi V1.3 camera which has the relevant pads for these IR LEDs is NOT a Raspberry Pi product - it is made by Waveshare
The official Pi V2.1 camera module does NOT support providing power to external LEDs via the screw holes.

TBH Drawing 1.2A off the 3.3V rail for two of those IR LEDs is not a sensible thing to do anyway - provide an alternative power source/regulator, or find some to run directly off the 5V rail.