Interworkz Security and Surveillance

Color Camera

Cuisinart CSB-76 SmartStick 200-Watt Immersion Hand Blender $55.00 Cuisinart Smart Stick Hand Blender – 200W Blend ingredients right inside pots, pitchers, bowls, or the clear plastic beaker that is included with the Cuisinart Smart Stick Hand Blender, which is available in your choice of color. A powerful 200-watt motor operates with an easy one-touch control. Blend drinks, puree soup, and mix crêpe batters in seconds! The blender features a ergonomic grip that…

Pyrex 6022369 Storage 14-Piece Round Set, Clear with Blue Lids $19.50 Eliminate the guesswork about what’s lurking in your fridge with these convenient glass storage units by Pyrex. It’s a scientific fact that leftovers are far less likely to be eaten if they languish hidden. By the time someone decides to take a peek, well, let’s just say it can be unnerving. Glass gives you the advantage of being able to store and reheat in the same container, and it doesn’t disco…

KitchenAid Artisan 5-Quart Stand Mixers $319.99 The legendary KitchenAid® Artisan Series® Stand Mixer is incredibly versatile. With all the available attachments, you can use it to make homemade pasta, stuff fresh sausage, whip up ice cream and give fruit a squeeze. No wonder generations of cooks have cherished theirs.Accessories Include:Pouring ShieldDough HookFlat BeaterWire WhipFeatures:10-speed slide control ranges from a very fast whip t…

Looney Tunes – Golden Collection $29.99 LOONEY TUNES:GOLDEN COLLECTION VOL 1 – DVD Movie…

Antennas Direct DB8 Multidirectional HDTV Antenna $64.59 Antennas Direct DB8 Multidirectional HD Antenna DB8 Television Accessories…

Wonder Boys $5.49 Wonder Boys is one of those movies in which more twists and turns disrupt the life of the hero in one weekend than would bother most of us our whole lives. Professor Grady Tripp (Michael Douglas) is an aging one-novel wunderkind at a small Pittsburgh college who’s laboring on his seven-years-in-the-making, 2000-plus page second opus with no end in sight. The morning of the college’s literary lolla…

The Wiggles – Whoo Hoo Wiggly Gremlins [VHS] $4.49 Australia’s hottest children’s band presents another full-length video that’s bursting with great music, amusing antics, and a fanciful story. Two mischievous “Wiggly Gremlins” have singled out the Wiggles and their own “Network Wiggles” television studio for some serious mischief in Whoo Hoo! Wiggly Gremlins. When the big red car breaks down on the way to the studio, Jeff, Murray, Greg, and An…

Nova – The Miracle of Life [VHS] $13.50 Still startlingly beautiful after several years, Nova’s The Miracle of Life records human conception for the first time on film, and much more. Living, functioning reproductive systems are laid bare to the camera, and there is so much to explore and absorb that Nova’s expert guidance is much needed and appreciated. The viewer follows an egg from its follicular development in an ovary, through the…

Gun Camera Footage: The Desert Storm Air War [VHS] $19.95 …

Wireless IP Pan/Tilt/ Night Vision Internet Surveillance Camera Built-in Microphone with Phone remote monitoring support – Black $51.79 Specs: Image Compression Format: M-JPEG standard Image Resolution: VGA(640×480) / QVGA(320×240) Sensor: 1/4 inch CMOS, 300,000 Pixels Light frequency: 50Hz, 60Hz or Outdoor Audio compression: ADPCM Data rate: 802.11b: 11Mbps (Max.), 802.11g: 54Mbps (Max.) Ethernet: One 10/100Mbps RJ-45 Viewing angle: 67? Horizontal Rotating Angle: 0~270? Vertical Rotating Angle: 0~120? Alarm Mode: motion detection…

Choosing a Camera for Inspection: Color or Monochrome?

Choosing a camera for inspection: Color or monochrome?

When purchasing a new suveillance system you must decide between color and monochrome cameras. Many times businesses decide on a system without understanding how the choice affects the performance. Most surveillance systems include color cameras because users feel more comfortable with color images. They are more into the aesthetics rather than performance of the system. On the other hand, some owners may want monochrome cameras because they assume they would cost less, which is not always the case. The best decision an owner can make is they must consider the strengths and weaknesses of each system so they can get the best value for their money.

High Resolution

A single pixel can yield only intensity information. Most color cameras determine pixel color with a combination of filters and interpolation from the intensity values of adjacent pixels. This interpolation reduces resolution. For example, the arrangement of blue and red pixel sites in a Bayer filter makes a single-imager color camera more prone to horizontal and vertical interference, particularly on objects with straight edges that follow a row or column. Therefore, designers often favor monochrome cameras when resolution is most important such as in banks and stores.

Owners who want their systems in both color and the highest possible resolution need another alternative, a color-imaging system that does not interpolate. In this case, three separate sensors gather three color channels of information. A separating prism placed in front of the three sensors directs the red, green, and blue light to the proper detector. While the three chip color camera present resolution that matches that of a monochrome camera, the prism and additional sensors make this system more expensive. Also, these cameras use more power than their counterpart. Finally, although the sensors in these color cameras may equal the resolution of the monochrome sensors, they are not always easily available. Many times, you can get the required resolution on a large-format single-chip color camera by choosing the lenses with an appropriately adjusted magnification.

Inspection Example

An inspection system that must decide whether fuses are correctly placed in an electrical harness often needs a computer to make color differentiation evaluations. Because fuses are color coded, you might be inclined to use a color camera. If the purpose requires human visual inspection on an analog monitor, a color camera would be a good choice. If the components were in color, inspectors would find it easier for them to do their job.

But if a computer performs the inspection where they must distinguish few colors, a monochrome camera may provide a more cost effective solution. Most image-processing algorithms process pictures to a pixel depth of 8 bits. A color camera would take the color planes from each image and analyze it in three separate color channels. A final pass-fail decision would have to compare each analysis against the others. The ensuing processing time of the images could slow down the inspection step, limiting system throughput. In this case, image-processing speed and higher resolution requirements favor a monochrome camera.

However, a monochrome camera cannot distinguish colors well. Significant color variations within batches of similar filters can manufacture incorrect results. To improve contrast, adding a color filter usually works. So, a filtered monochrome camera works fast and can provide sufficient contrast for two-color applications.

If the application involves additional colors, a monochrome camera might not be enough. Instead, inspection parameters would define each fuse as a ratio between mean pixel values in the three different color planes. Consequently, applications that do not allow cooperation on either resolution or color require a three-chip color camera; the greater processing time becomes unavoidable.

The obvious choice of monochrome vs color cameras for machine-vision applications is not always clear. System designers must look at the different tradeoffs such as processing time, resolution, pass/fail-decision accuracy, power consumption, and, of course, cost—to make the best decision for each situation.

About the Author

Mark Allen is a frequent writer security systems, fiber cabling and network cabling. www.losangelescctv.com

800-203-9841

Email: myoung@sctproducts.com

SCT Product Sales is a structured wiring & cabling communications solutions provider servicing commercial and clients throughout Southern California. Our services include but are not limited to:

Cabling Infrastructure Design, Installation & Certification

Data Cabling, Voice Wiring, Audio/Video Cable, Fiber Optic Cabling

Audio/Video

Audio Distribution, Video Distribution & Conference Table Data Systems

Is oxygen required to expose color film in a camera?

A friend informed me that oxygen is req’d to expose color film in a camera. Is this true. I thought film exposer is a chemical process and not organic. He said living organism on the film expose the film and they need oxygen. I don’t know about this. Do you?

Your buddy is pulling your leg! There are no living organisms on the film. It doesn’t need oxygen to be exposed, however YOU do – can’t push the shutter button if ya can’t breathe!

Wire Color Camera & Satellite Link