HALCON 8.0: Image Acquisition Interface for Sony XCI-SX1 and XCI-V3

This page provides the documentation of the HALCON image acquisition interface for the XCI-SX1 and XCI-V3 smart cameras from Sony. Registered customers can download the latest revision of this interface from the MVTec WWW server.

Revision: 3.1

System Requirements

• Sucessfully installed Windows XP Embedded operating system and camera driver on the Sony XCI-SX1/XCI-V3.
• At least SonyICamDrv DLL version 2.13 for XCI_SX1 or 1.0 for XCI_V3. These DLLs must be within your search path %PATH% (typically, it resides in the directory %WINDIR%\system32). If you do not have these DLLs, please contact Sony or the vendor from which you bought the camera.
• HALCON image acquisition interface hAcqSonyXCI.dll or parhAcqSonyXCI.dll, respectively. If you have properly installed the interface, both DLLs should reside in bin\%HALCONARCH% within the HALCON base directory %HALCONROOT% you have chosen during the installation of HALCON.

Features

• Synchronous and asynchronous grabbing.
• Software control of various parameters like shutter, trigger, and digital I/O.
• Software control of binning and partial scan.

Limitations

• grab_data and grab_data_async not supported.
• No support for grabbing color images with XCI-SX1/C and XCI-V3/C.
• No LUTs.

Description

Parameters for open_framegrabber():

	Name		'SonyXCI'		The name of the HALCON image acquisition interface.
	HorizontalResolution		---		Ignored.
	VerticalResolution		---		Ignored.
	ImageWidth		0		The width of the desired image part ('0' stands for the complete image). Default: 0.
	ImageHeight		0		The height of the desired image part ('0' stands for the complete image). Default: 0.
	StartRow		0		The row coordinate of the upper left pixel within the desired image part. Default: 0.
	StartColumn		0		The column coordinate of the upper left pixel within the desired image part. Default: 0.
	Field		---		Ignored.
	BitsPerChannel		8		Number of bits per image channel. Default: 8.
	ColorSpace		'gray'		Specify the desired color space and thus the number of image channels of the resulting HALCON image. Default: 'gray'.
	Generic		---		Ignored.
	ExternalTrigger		'true', 'false'		Enables or disables the external trigger mode.
	CameraType		'default', 'XCI_SX1', 'XCI_V3'		Set the type of the connected camera. Default: 'XCI_SX1'.
	Device		'0'		Select the current camera device. Default: 0.
	Port		---		Ignored.
	LineIn		---		Ignored.

Parameters for set_framegrabber_param():

	'camera_gain'		camera_gain (long)		Specifies the gain of the camera.
	'cds_gain'		cds_gain (long)		Specifies the CDS gain of the camera.
	'continuous_grabbing'		'enable', 'disable'		Sets grabbing mode from single frame capture to continuous mode. If the continuous mode is enabled, the camera will grab all the time. Default: 'enable'.
	'gpio_iso_output'		0, 1 (long)		Status of the isolated output channel. Default: 0.
	'gpio_ttl_output'		0, 1 (long)		Status of the ttl output channel. Default: 0.
	'grab_timeout'		100 ... 327680		Specifies the desired timeout (milliseconds passed as an integer) for aborting a pending grab. Default: 5000.
	'horizontal_binning'		0, 1 (long)		Specifies the horizontal binning mode. 0 disables the binning. Setting it to 1 enables binning.
	'image_full'		'enable', 'disable'		Enables the grabbing of images with the size of the full sensor. The original chosen values for partial grabbing ('image_part') are stored internal and used if partial grabbing is chosen again. If 'image_full' is enabled, with the next 'image_part' 'image_full' is automatically disabled. Default: 'enable'.
	'image_height'		height (long)		Specifies the height of the grabbed image. Please note the step width of the height parameter. If a non valid value is set it is expanded to the next valid value.
	'image_part'		[row1 (long), col1 (long), row2 (long), col2 (long)]		Specifies the upper left (row1, col1) and lower right (row2, col2) corner of the desired rectangular image part which will be actually acquired by the camera. Please note that col1 and col2-col1+1 must be multiple of 32 (for SX1) or 30 (for V3), while row1 and row2-row1+1 must be multiple of 128 (for SX1) or 64 (for V3). Otherwise the image part is expanded to the next valid values.
	'image_width'		width (long)		Specifies the width of the grabbed image. Please note the step width of the width parameter. If a non valid value is set it is expanded to the next valid value.
	'offset'		offset (long)		Specifies the offset (clamp level) of the camera.
	'start_column'		start_column (long)		Specifies the start column of the grabbed image. Please note the step width of the start column parameter. If a non valid value is set it is expanded to the next valid value.
	'start_row'		start_row (long)		Specifies the start row of the grabbed image. Please note the step width of the width parameter. If a non valid value is set it is expanded to the next valid value.
	'shutter_delay'		delay (long)		Specify the delay of the shutter in milliseconds. The camera waits the specified time after the trigger pulse before starting the exposure.
	'shutter_speed'		shutter_speed (long)		Specifies the shutter speed. In continuous mode 0 means shutter speed is off, while in trigger mode it means 1/15 s.
	'trigger_signal'		'falling', 'rising'		Specifies the trigger signal. Note that setting 'trigger_signal' to 'rising' may deactivate your software trigger.
	'vertical_binning'		0, 1 (long)		Specifies the vertical binning mode. 0 disables the binning, while 1 means binning is on.

Parameters for get_framegrabber_param():

Additional parameters supported by get_framegrabber_param only. Note that all parameters supported by set_framegrabber_param can also be accessed by get_framegrabber_param. Furthermore, corresponding to the parameters supported by set_framegrabber_param, there may exist additional read-only parameters with the following postfixes:

• '_description': These parameters provide the tooltip of the corresponding parameter as a string.
• '_range': These parameters provide the minimum, maximum, stepwidth, and default values for the corresponding integer or float parameter as a tuple with 4 elements, e.g., get_framegrabber_param(..,'exposure_range',..) will return the output tuple [min,max,step,default]. Optionally, this tuple can also contain additional valid string values like 'auto' or 'manual'.
• '_values': These parameters provide the valid value list for the corresponding parameter as a tuple, e.g., get_framegrabber_param(..,'volatile_values',..) will return the output tuple ['enable','disable'].

	'gpio_iso_input'		0, 1 (long)		Status of the isolated input channel.
	'gpio_ttl_input'		0, 1 (long)		Status of the ttl input channel.
	'image_available'		0, 1		Returns the status of the last asynchronous grab command. The value 1 means that the image is already acquired and thus can be fetched by grab_image_async without delay. Note that this parameter is especially useful in combination with external triggering.
	'revision'		revision		The revision number of the HALCON SonyXCI interface.

Release Notes

• Revision 3.1 (Apr 22, 2008):
  • Added read-only parameters with postfix '_description', '_range', and '_values' to enable the easy parameterization via a generic graphical user interface.
• Revision 3.0 (May 15, 2007):
  • HALCON 8.0 version of the interface (included in HALCON 8.0 DVD).
• Revision 2.3 (Oct 13, 2006):
  • Adaptation to Sony SDK 1.0
  • Added support of Sony XCI-V3 camera.
  • Activated parameter 'camera_type' in open_framegrabber.
  • Added low level error message, which shows if driver version is too old.
  • Fixed bugs relating to the SDK conversion.
• Revision 2.2 (Jun 12, 2006):
  • Adaptation to Sony SDK 2.11
  • Added support of external triggering.
  • Added parameter 'trigger_signal'.
  • Fixed bugs in 'grab_timeout' and setting of image size and position.
  • Enhanced stability.
• Revision 2.1 (Mar 31, 2006):
  • Adaptation to Sony driver version 1.0.
• Revision 2.0 (Jan 12, 2006):
  • First official release.