Hadron ov64b snapshots have a vertical image artifact

restore

We have our VOXL2 with Hadron connected on J8. We have everything setup and can capture images successfully. After taking a bunch of images we noticed a vertical artifact in the hires_snapshot that consistently appears in the same column of pixels (~340).

Is this a data processing flaw? If so is there a way to diagnose / troubleshoot it? Here is my voxl-camera-server.conf and an example crop of the artifact.

{
        "version":      0.1,
        "fsync_en":     false,
        "fsync_gpio":   109,
        "cameras":      [{
                        "type": "boson",
                        "name": "boson",
                        "enabled":      true,
                        "camera_id":    0,
                        "fps":  30,
                        "en_preview":   true,
                        "en_misp":      false,
                        "preview_width":        640,
                        "preview_height":       512,
                        "en_raw_preview":       true,
                        "en_small_video":       false,
                        "en_large_video":       false,
                        "ae_mode":      "off",
                        "en_rotate":    false,
                        "small_video_width":    640,
                        "small_video_height":   480,
                        "small_venc_mode":      "h264",
                        "small_venc_br_ctrl":   "cqp",
                        "small_venc_Qfixed":    30,
                        "small_venc_Qmin":      15,
                        "small_venc_Qmax":      40,
                        "small_venc_nPframes":  9,
                        "small_venc_mbps":      2,
                        "small_venc_osd":       false,
                        "large_video_width":    -1,
                        "large_video_height":   -1,
                        "large_venc_mode":      "h264",
                        "large_venc_br_ctrl":   "cqp",
                        "large_venc_Qfixed":    40,
                        "large_venc_Qmin":      15,
                        "large_venc_Qmax":      50,
                        "large_venc_nPframes":  29,
                        "large_venc_mbps":      40,
                        "large_venc_osd":       false,
                        "misp_width":   -1,
                        "misp_height":  -1,
                        "misp_venc_enable":     true,
                        "misp_venc_mode":       "h264",
                        "misp_venc_br_ctrl":    "cqp",
                        "misp_venc_Qfixed":     30,
                        "misp_venc_Qmin":       15,
                        "misp_venc_Qmax":       50,
                        "misp_venc_nPframes":   29,
                        "misp_venc_mbps":       2,
                        "misp_venc_osd":        false,
                        "misp_awb":     "auto",
                        "misp_gamma":   1,
                        "gain_min":     54,
                        "gain_max":     8000
                }, {
                        "type": "ov64b",
                        "name": "hires",
                        "enabled":      true,
                        "camera_id":    1,
                        "fps":  15,
                        "en_preview":   true,
                        "en_misp":      false,
                        "preview_width":        1920,
                        "preview_height":       1080,
                        "en_raw_preview":       false,
                        "en_small_video":       false,
                        "en_large_video":       false,
                        "en_snapshot":  true,
                        "ae_mode":      "isp",
                        "gain_min":     100,
                        "gain_max":     32000,
                        "small_video_width":    1024,
                        "small_video_height":   768,
                        "small_venc_mode":      "h264",
                        "small_venc_br_ctrl":   "cqp",
                        "small_venc_Qfixed":    30,
                        "small_venc_Qmin":      15,
                        "small_venc_Qmax":      40,
                        "small_venc_nPframes":  9,
                        "small_venc_mbps":      2,
                        "small_venc_osd":       false,
                        "large_video_width":    3840,
                        "large_video_height":   2160,
                        "large_venc_mode":      "h264",
                        "large_venc_br_ctrl":   "cqp",
                        "large_venc_Qfixed":    40,
                        "large_venc_Qmin":      15,
                        "large_venc_Qmax":      50,
                        "large_venc_nPframes":  29,
                        "large_venc_mbps":      40,
                        "large_venc_osd":       false,
                        "en_snapshot_width":    9248,
                        "en_snapshot_height":   6944,
                        "exif_focal_length":    3.0999999046325684,
                        "exif_focal_length_in_35mm_format":     17,
                        "exif_fnumber": 1.2400000095367432,
                        "snapshot_jpeg_quality":        75,
                        "misp_width":   -1,
                        "misp_height":  -1,
                        "misp_venc_enable":     true,
                        "misp_venc_mode":       "h265",
                        "misp_venc_br_ctrl":    "cqp",
                        "misp_venc_Qfixed":     38,
                        "misp_venc_Qmin":       15,
                        "misp_venc_Qmax":       50,
                        "misp_venc_nPframes":   29,
                        "misp_venc_mbps":       30,
                        "misp_venc_osd":        false,
                        "misp_awb":     "auto",
                        "misp_gamma":   1.6
                }]
}

Additionally - we are noticing a soft focus on every image. Are there any camera-server parameters for the Hadron that could lead to this sort of effect? Image EXIF shows:

9248 x 6944
72 dpi
24 bit
3.1 mm
f/1.24
1/2500
ISO 54
EXP 0

Lastly - are we able to capture RAW images from the hadron at full resolution?

Thanks!

Alex Kushleyev

@restore, that is strange. Does this effect appear in the jpeg snapshot only? (as opposed to the preview stream).

Yes, we do support saving raw bayer10 for this camera. For 9248 x 6944, each image would be something like 80MB (10-bit bayer)

In order to test it,

set your preview width and height to 9248 x 6944
en_raw_preview : true
en_snapshot : false (for now)
en_misp : true
set misp width and height to something reasonable (1920x1080)

When you run it, assuming there are no errors, you should see hires_bayer pipe and you can dump individual images using voxl-record-raw-image tool.

I have not tested this in a while, but it should work. Let me know if you run into any issues.

Also, please use an SDK that is not older than few months, as we recently enabled the full raw resolution support for this camera.

Regarding the jpeg smoothing, the parameters are baked into the chromatix tuning file and we have not tuned that for any particular application. However, you should first check whether the jpeg encode quality is sufficiently high. snapshot_jpeg_quality param in your voxl-camera-server.conf is set to 75.

Alex

restore

@Alex-Kushleyev thanks for your response!

I will try these suggestions and let you know how it goes.

I tested jpeg quality at 75 and 95 and did not notice much of a difference in sharpness.

Alex Kushleyev

@restore , a few more things:

you should set the auto exposure to lme_msv, which is the non-isp option, since we would not be using isp in this case
before saving the raw bayer, start the misp output stream, so that AE can actually process, otherwise the exposure will be stuck in default value -- the bayer stream does not trigger AE to process.

Alex