Hi folks, Merry Christmas!
OpenMV IDE 2.1.0 and Firmware 3.2.0 are now available! Nothing much important has changed in OpenMV IDE (just bug fixes), however, one of our users Dr. Chris Rogers wrote a LabVIEW Plugin for the OpenMV Cam. This new plugin is now distributed with OpenMV IDE under the:
<install_dir>/share/qtcreator/labview
folder. Here are some screen shots!
Thank you Chris!
As for the firmware we fixed ALOT of various bugs encountered on the forums for Firmware 3.2.0 and we added MLX90640 and AMG8833 thermal vision sensor support to all OpenMV Cam modules. We already blogged about the thermal vision feature before but now it's actually available! So, if you have an OpenMV Cam M7 and want to start playing around with thermal images and color images combined you can now! We've got quite a few examples per sensor type making it a snap to get started now.
Moving on, we'd like to apologize for sitting on the firmware release for so long. Running the store and the Kickstarter have been taking up all the development time. OpenMV has gotten popular enough now with over 10K units sold that answering forum questions and dealing with customer service is now quite a bit of work. That said, we'd managed to keep on top of all the important stuff like the OpenMV Cam H7 Kickstarter!
OpenMV Cam H7 Kickstarter
Everything has been going smoothly for the OpenMV Cam H7 Kickstarter! We've gotten production samples back and have tested them all and they appear to be working without issues. If you are interested in a production sample let me know. I have about 20 at my house right now available for sale if you want one now. Note that I will be charging for the production samples and shipping via FedEx if you want one.
EtonTech, our contract manufacturer, tells us that the STM32H743VIT6 chips arrive in January and that we'll start production on-time allowing us to begin delivery by about the Chinese New Year (hopefully before things shutdown in China for the holidays).
New Shields
Next, we got some new shields for the OpenMV Cam coming soon:
Pan and Tilt Shield
We just got samples back for a new Pan and Tilt Shield that will be available soon on the webstore.
This new shield breaks out the three servo pins (P7/P8/P9), provides a terminal block connector for powering the OpenMV Cam and servos from an un-regulated battery, and provides another battery servo connector power powering the OpenMV Cam and servos from an ESC.
Wireless Video Shield
Our friends at SingTown recently developed a wireless video transfer shield for the OpenMV Cam:
The new wireless video shield attaches to the OpenMV Cam via the SPI bus where the OpenMV Cam then sends image data to a SPI to NTSC video generator chip. The video generator chip is then connected to a 5 GHz wireless transmitter chip that broadcasts the video on the same frequencies used by drone FPV receivers.
We'll be getting these in stock once they are available. With the OpenMV Cam M7/H7 and the wireless video shield you'll be able to add thermal video to your drone! Note that the transmitter draws a lot of power however.
Can Shield
We haven't actually started developing a CAN shield yet. However, we've gotten a lot of requests from folks for CAN support. In particular, for FIRST robotics support. So, we're going to get a CAN interface shield done ASAP for folks to use the OpenMV Cam in CAN networking based applications.
Moving to Amazon FBA
Last but not least. You may have noticed the new UPC barcodes on our products now. We've been adding these so that we can move our products to Amazon FBA for better and faster shipping to everyone. I'll be setting up the Amazon FBA system over the holidays and hope to have all our inventory fully moved over before the OpenMV Cam H7 ships in March.
Anyway, That's all folks! (Kwabena and Massimo Banzi of Arduino below)
Happy New Year!
