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For more than 10 years, National Instruments has been a leader in machine vision with a wide range of hardware products, including the NI Compact Vision System for embedded image processing and PCI Express and PXI frame grabbers for acquiring images from thousands of different cameras. 
National Instruments is expanding its vision hardware product offering with the NI Smart Camera. The NI 1722 and NI 1742 Smart Cameras are the first in a family of Smart Cameras from NI that feature image processing directly on the camera sensor to create an all-in-one embedded device ideal for automated inspection applications. A smart camera is a combination of an image sensor and a high-performance processor that returns inspection results instead of images. While a typical industrial camera acquires and transmits images through a standard camera bus, such as Camera Link or IEEE 1394, to a host PC or vision system that processes the images, a smart camera performs all of these operations directly on the camera. NI Smart Cameras are ideally suited for industrial vision applications including packaging inspection, assembly verification, 1D and 2D code reading, and motion guidance. NI Smart Cameras reduce cost and time of inspection by processing images on the camera with a PowerPC processor capable of running NI Vision Builder for Automated Inspection (AI) software, which is included with the NI Smart Cameras, or the NI LabVIEW Real-Time module and the entire suite of NI vision algorithms. With the combination of a high-performance PowerPC processor, a high-quality charge-coupled device (CCD) image sensor, and LabVIEW, users can easily create distributed machine vision systems that transmit inspection results instead of raw images. NI Smart Cameras are designed to tightly integrate with the NI family of programmable automation controllers and human machine interfaces. Now a single LabVIEW Project can contain NI Smart Camera inspection VIs along with code for motion control, data acquisition, and operator interfaces. In smart cameras, shared variables simplify the task of transferring data among the different components of an industrial automation system. Features of the NI 1722 and NI 1742 Smart Cameras include the following: -
Monochrome CCD image sensor with VGA resolution (640x480) at 60 fps -
400 MHz (NI 1722) and 533 MHz (NI 1742) PowerPC processors -
Built-in isolated digital I/O -
Dual Gigabit Ethernet ports -
Vision Builder AI software
Additional features of the NI 1742 Smart Camera include the following: |
