The existing availability of multispectral cameras is heavily tilted towards robust and very sophisticated multispectral cameras and also to sophisticated laboratory versions that are not so robust. Many of these are from Defense suppliers of very sophisticated equipment and therefore do not have any interest in offering cut-price versions of their wares for applications that can be carried out with less sophisticated equipment. Our customized instrumentation group has identified a niche for a low-cost multispecral camera with limited capability from the UV to the IR bands on just 40-50 channels and made with standard off-the-shelf components and our image fusion and image processing software, which has been refined in multiple colorimetry, spectroscopy, microscopy and velocimetry applications for customers such as Alstom Power, Technicolor, and Hitachi Global Storage. The camera under development includes a 12.3 Million pixels sensor with a sampling rate of 2.5 frames/second, able to record images in the 350-1,000 nm range, i.e. from the UV to the near-infrared, a NIKON AF 28-80mm lens, with a minimum resolution of 4nm, coupled to a transmission grating iBTF filter, and controlled through a USB 2.0 connection by a dedicated FPGA chip. Although this is a limited spectral range, it does allow to discriminate targets such as water, vegetation, sand, cement, snow, humidity, different types of soil, environmental characteristics such as exhaust fumes, metal and some geological terrain characteristics. Applications envisaged for this device include prospecting, forestry, surveillance, archeometry, tracking, tactical awareness; as a unmanned vehicle payload.
Features
- Compatible with our Raphael ground control station
- No US export license required.
- High-resolution sensor
- Whole-field imaging
- UV to Near-IR allows investigation of a wide range of targets
- Minimum channel width of only 4nm
Technical specifications
Resolution: 4,256x2,848 pixels
Existing lens options: NIKON AF 28-80mm lens
Non-uniformity correction: Splines
Frames per second: 2.5 frames per second
Operating waveband: UV to near infrared, 350-1,000 nm
Minimum channel width: 4nm
Weight: < 2 kg (camera)
<5 kg (mounted and fitted with a macro lens)
Dimensions: 36x36x42 (LxWxH) cm
Camera Power supply: 7.2VDC
Power consumption: <35 watts operating
User control: USB 2.0/IEEE 1394
Operating temperature: -10oC to +50 oC