Sony adds performance, flexibility and colour to its smart camera line-up

The camera modules in the new product family are available for VGA (XCI-V100) and SXGA (XCI-SX100) monitoring, with colour and black and white modules created for each.

The camera’s FPGA provides pre processing for real time raw image data without any load placed on its 1GHz CPU, reducing the camera’s power consumption. To add flexibility, the function of the module’s four inputs and eight outputs can be specified using the FPGA. Furthermore, the FPGA’s open platform enables a user to specify and design niche functions, giving a strong competitive advantage to Sony customers. The XCI-V100 records at 90fps, whereas the XCI-SX100 records at 30fps.

The addition of colour analysis in two of the four new camera modules enables the smart cameras to be used in a diverse range of markets where hue is vital to data analysis with initial beta tests including airport security, animal welfare in agriculture, traffic surveillance, forest fire prevention and machine vision applications.

All cameras in the range are sized 94x70x139.5mm, support C and CS mounting, come with 512Mb of SDRAM, eight memory buffers and a 1Gb memory card accessory with Windows XPe is also available. To ensure system cabling is as simple as possible, the XCI series utilises a share trigger line.

Commenting on the launch, Arnaud Destruels of Sony’s ISS division stated: “This generation [of smart camera] uses the best possible hardware to maximise the number of applications and give more freedom to developers. The feedback from the beta testing is very strong indeed and, just as the first generation of smart cameras did, the launch should help to redefine the smart camera concept.”

The XCI series further features auto gain control, auto iris control and auto white balance as well as USB2.0 and Ethernet transmission at 10, 100 and 1000 Mbps.