invisible light camera modification for everyone!

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Wed Mar 15, 2023 5:14 am

Here's mine.
Attachments
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test.png
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johnnyM1984
Posts: 55
Joined: Mon Jan 09, 2017 12:00 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by johnnyM1984 » Wed Mar 15, 2023 5:33 am

Great work!

Did you use 12v led lamp? do you feed it from the same 5v usb ?

Maximum current onuisb is 0,5A and camera uses about half of it. 12v led lamp needs at least 12v 0,3A. That means with camera and 12v led lamp running simultaneously, you will drain more than 0,5A from your usb port. This will be a problem for most of notebooks and PCs with cheap power supplies.

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Wed Mar 15, 2023 5:49 am

I used a very rare and hard to find 5V infrared LED ring. It's not as bright as the 12V, but it still plays fine. I actually measured the brightness of both lamps and the 5V infrared ring is half as bright as the 12V infrared ring, but I don't see any difference playing indoors.

I've tested this on a few different machines. All of them Dell, but none of them complained about the power draw. You are allowed to draw 500mA on USB2. The camera draws around 200mA and the LED ring is 250mA only when it's cold. As it heats up, the current drops to 200mA.

The major problem is that you are not allowed to draw more than 100mA on usb until after you negotiate and ask for full power. There is nothing keeping the 5V IRED ring off at startup, but for some reason computers don't complain. I should and may look at the timing on a scope.

Btw your model being STL I couldn't modify. I had to recreate the model and I noticed that some of your holes (for the PS3 camera) were off by a little bit. That's why you need to drill out the holes on the pcb, but I didn't need to because I fixed it. I forget the details now, but if you want to update your model I can find out again.

Also the bosses used to support the PS3 eye interfered with some components on the board. In my model I created some steps in the bosses so that they wouldn't interfere with the components.
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And before I forget, thanks very much for putting the first camera together and then sharing the files. The IR camera is a game changer. The LED room lighting that normally makes it hard for me to find a place to play here at home are no longer an issue!

johnnyM1984
Posts: 55
Joined: Mon Jan 09, 2017 12:00 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by johnnyM1984 » Wed Mar 15, 2023 2:07 pm

That's great, thank you for sharing this piece of information. I did not share the source of stl model because it was made in Freecad and rather old version that glitched and crashed a lot. It was my 1st project)))

Most of people use Autocad products for modelling anyway, so someone had to redraw it for modern soft.

I also used 5v led ring but it seems it is no longer available on Ali, 12v leds are more common.

I drilled PCB not because of supporting stuff. The M12 lens holder from Ali had wider holes than original PS3 lens holder. Stl has slight correction that are adopted for my model of 3d printer. Obvious other printers dont need it.

I am glad that you liked it. Will hou share your stl files and links to buy 5v led ring?

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Wed Mar 15, 2023 4:25 pm

Stl files (surfaces) are not easy to work with in CAD. Step files (solids) are better. STL files for printers, STP files for CAD.

The actual source files in CAD are not interchangeable and that is a sad fact. I'm using an ancient 2006 version of Solidworks in a Windows XP virtual machine and FreeCAD still can't match it's ease of use. So my source files aren't useful either. But I will make a step file available at some point. I'm not done yet. I'm going to add a usb port to the bottom pointing down. I don't like how it sticks out on the back while on the stand.

The slots for the stand are challenging to print. Especially if you don't have your first layer dialled in. On my resin printer I've had lots of issues, but I'm going to have my case printed in MJF (Multi Jet Fusion) when I finish prototyping.

Correct the 5V LED ring is not available on Aliexpress. It seems to come from one vendor. Anyone who wants one has to wait for it to become available again or order the minimum quantity (approx $600 for 200 pcs). Maybe if enough people are interested that cost can be split a few ways...

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Thu Mar 16, 2023 8:44 am

Today I was able to hook up the 'red led' on the ps3eye to the IRED ring. This means the IREDs are only on when the camera is actively streaming. This is nice because it doesn't violate the usb specs and the infrared light isn't warming up my retinas until I have Aerodrums running.

I didn't cut the LEDs off. Instead I desoldered them and reinstalled them on the other side of the PS3eye pcb. This way I still have indicators.

The mod isn't easy, but I'll try to explain it. The red led on the ps3eye is driven by an NPN transistor. It's too bad it's not an n-channel mosfet or I could have used it. There is a resistor that drives the base of that transistor and I soldered a wire to the other side of the resistor. On one side of the resistor there will be 0 to 0.7V (due to the base emitter junction) on the other side there will be 0 to 3.3V (from the cpu). The 0 to 3.3V side is the one to use so one red wire soldered to the resistor and one black wire soldered to a nearby ground. These wires will connect to the IRED board. I didn't take any pictures, but next time I have it apart I will try to remember.

For the IRED ring, the LDR that is removed (you cut it off, I desoldered it) leaves 2 pads. One of those pads, pad 1, is connected directly to 5V, the other pad, pad 2, connects to ground through a 2M resistor. The first thing is to solder a 499k resistor between pad 1 and 2. This is the pullup for the mosfet we add next. When the mosfet is off, pad 2 will be pulled up to almost 5V and this will turn off the IREDs. When the mosfet is on, pad 2 will be pulled down to ground and this will turn on the IREDs.

The next step is to solder down a 2n7002 (sot23 package). The drain is soldered to pad 2. The source is soldered to the ground side of that 2M resistor because it's close by. A 499k resistor is soldered between the gate and the source - this is necessary to keep the gate from floating because the cpu doesn't seem to assert low (it may go hi-z). Finally solder the red wire to the gate and the black wire to the source(ground).

It's definitely not pretty. Since we're not using the red led, I may be able to replace that npn transistor with a mosfet and with some other mods to the ps3eye board simply have a pair of wires soldered in the red led holes that then solder directly to the two holes on the IRED board.

I didn't get a chance to play anything on aerodrums tonight. The camera looked like it worked. I may have to write a post saying this was all a failure after I put some time actually playing drums with the camera's new mods.

With these new mods, I plugged the camera into my android tablet. The blue LED came on, but from what I can tell the PS3eye does not enumerate as a UVC so android can't use it. I don't need to use it on my tablet, but I was testing that it could work from a usb-c to usb-c cable. That means I could conceivably use any new windows laptop or tablet that had only a single usb-c port.

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Wed Mar 29, 2023 4:29 pm

Has anyone who has printed an enclosure bought the acrylic cover?

I've been trying to find this IR transparent acrylic. None of the local laser cutters have it and most online laser cutters don't offer it either. I did find a place that could do it, but it was going to cost USD$200 for 6 covers. Which is rather pricey.

Anyone have any leads where can I find this stuff for a reasonable price?

InTheWorks
Posts: 80
Joined: Sat May 28, 2022 11:59 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by InTheWorks » Fri Mar 31, 2023 5:31 am

I bought two 12"x12" squares of IR transparent acrylic from eplastics.com. I'm going to get them cut locally at a maker lab. Seems to be only way to do it. If anyone wants an acrylic cover for their camera, I can cut more. I don't have exact pricing on the cutting yet, but if anyone wants one it will probably come out to USD$12 each plus shipping.

I figured I would share some pictures of my MJF enclosure and the latest modifications to my design.
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The acrylic is not IR transparent. I had that cut from regular acrylic to test the fit. As you can see the usb cable exits from the bottom which is *much* nicer.
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The above picture shows a second usb-c port. It's connected in parallel with the bottom usb-c and allows flexible cable exit. They can't be used at the same time though. For example, you couldn't power the camera from one port and use the other one for a data connection. You can also see the texture of the MJF. It has a very matte finish and the texture is almost uniformly rough. It's not perfect though and there are some printing artefacts. Still it looks quite nice.
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This last pic shows the tripod adapter. I don't care for plastic threads for anything meant to be screwed into more than once.

jpb2nd
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Apr 27, 2023 9:09 pm

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by jpb2nd » Thu Apr 27, 2023 9:15 pm

Sounds like the new Aerodrums 2 is using your ideas. Or is their approach different?

Zankoman13
Posts: 3
Joined: Sun May 21, 2023 12:24 am

Re: invisible light camera modification for everyone!

Post by Zankoman13 » Sun May 21, 2023 12:29 am

Does anyone have one they'd be interested in selling? I've tried making one but no success. I'm willing to pay of course.

Please let me know, I'd really appreciate it.

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