This is about using the pan-tilt-zoom features of the Sony camera, models EVI-D30 and EVI-D31.
Those cameras are controlled using VISCA, a protocol invented by Sony, on a serial line.
The code here is developped with Linux, and may work with any Unix out-of-the-box. Windows users will have to adjust the code that sets up the serial port. Alternatively, they can use Cygwin which allows compiling and running Unix-targeted programs with windows.
This is not about using the video flow coming from the camera. No video, framegrabbing, etc... issues here.
Though the camera connector uses minidin-8 plugs, it is not exactly the same as the Apple Macintosh serial port.
The Sony technical document, include a pin layout and wiring diagram (PNG,
88kb).
They are wrong somehow. At the bottom half of the page, instead of "Windows"
you should read "RS-232" in the table titles.
The base for this software was a driver by Thomas Moeslund,
that was sufficient for his purpose.
It assumes one camera (i.e. no daisy chain feature), and transactions are
synchronous (i.e. the program is blocked until the camera movement is
done).
The fact that I could not query the camera while it was moving was a problem for my purpose.
I did the following modifications to the code:
| technical modifications |
|
| feature added |
|
The author of the original code, Thomas Moeslund says in its
documentation:
If some errors are located in the code or in the documentation then
please report this to the author personally or by E-mail. Comments and
questions should also be reported to the author and if someone decides to
expand the code/documentation then please report this so this report can be
updated.
Both the documentation and code can freely be used if a reference to this tech
report is clearly stated.
