Camera advice

[Magnus Eide-Fredriksen]

Hello, we are planning on using a camera together with a bandpass filter (or longpass) to detect 940nm NIR light. What cameras do you recommend for this? Ideally we are able to fit a M12 lens together with the filter on the camera.

[Alex Kushleyev]

@Magnus-Eide-Fredriksen

Please take a look at the following spectral sensitivity plots for the cameras we support:

IMX412: https://www.framos.com/wp-content/uploads/FSM-IMX412_V1B_Datasheet_v1.1c_Brief.pdf
IMX678: https://www.framos.com/wp-content/uploads/FSM-IMX678_V1A_Datasheet_v1.0d_Brief.pdf

It seems IMX678 is more sensitive at the 940nm (relative sensitivity at 940nm to normal color range). Also, IMX678 by itself has higher sensitivity / lower noise compared to IMX412.

We currently sell the following camera, which integrates the Framos module. It is not recommended for new designs, as quantities may be limited. https://www.modalai.com/collections/image-sensors/products/mdk-m0061-2

We are also working on a new version of IMX678 , similar to this IMX412 module : https://www.modalai.com/collections/image-sensors/products/msu-m0161 , but i don't have the ETA.

If you wanted to try something that we have now, the best option may be M0061 camera module, but please review the information I linked above.

Additionally, you can review the following page for comparison ; https://www.sony-semicon.com/en/products/is/security/security.html -- check the SNR1s (lx) *2 column for the two cameras, which is the "index used to quantitatively evaluate picture quality at low illumination" - basically the lower the number, the less pixel noise in low light conditions and IMX678 has about 4x lower quanity (which may or may not translate to 4x less noise, but something along those lines).

Please note the IMX678 has less pixels than IMX412 (8.3 vs 12.3 Mpix) and aspect ratios are different (16:9 vs 4:3).

Both IMX412 and IMX678 are supported by our SDK and we can help with testing if needed.

Alex