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OT: Computer controlled digital camera?

I have a situation where I want to take digital photos (snapshots - not video) of the contents of boxes as they move along on a conveyor. I'm thinking that a photo would be taken at the same time that I scan in a barcode that's on the side of the box. I'd then associate the barcode with the .jpg image file and store it on a computer's hard drive for later manual viewing.

Does anyone know of a camera that can be set up such that I can take the picture under computer control and that can then immediately send the resulting picture to the computer?

Any thoughts or suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Reply to
Martin
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Any webcam can do this, or you could use a frame grabber and any RS-170 video camera. You don't specify resolution, or if color is required, but you may want to look at

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for some reasonably priced USB

2.0 cameras.
Reply to
jeff

Jeff -

Thanks for the link.

I'm beginning to think that maybe going the "frame grabber" route might be a better way. Do you know of a particular camera and software that you could recommend?

Yes, the resulting photos need to be in color. I have no idea as to the resolution that's needed. The idea is for someone to be able to look at the picture and see what's in the box. I don't even know yet what exactly it is that they're looking for.

The software that's going to control all this (receive the barcode from the scanner, trigger the acquisition of the picture and process and store the picture) will be custom written using Visual basic 6. I've found an OCX that supposedly does frame grabbing (VideoCapX at

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Would you happen to know of any other software that I should look at?

Reply to
Martin

Our previous systems used a monochrome camera and I have used both National Instruments, and Data Translation frame grabbers. They work well. The new system I am working on will use the Electronic Imaging USB2.0 camera both for higher performance (resolution and speed) and for lower cost. It will also be programmed under VB6.0 due to some constraints on some legacy portions of our system. I will be using their device drivers.

Reply to
jeff

Is "Electronic Imaging" a brand name? I just googled that and didn't come up with a camera by that name.

Reply to
Martin

It is the

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site previously referenced.

Reply to
jeff

Jeff - Please check your e-mail. I just sent a note to you at the address in your newsgroup post (minus "INVALID").

Reply to
Martin

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