Transitioning from Ladybug3 to Ladybug5

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Questions about Upgrading from Ladybug3 to Ladybug5

Is Ladybug3 being discontinued?
No, there are no plans to discontinue Ladybug3 at this time. The new Ladybug5 provides the advantages of USB 3.1 and next-generation functionality.

What other hardware is needed to use Ladybug5?

Interface Card—The Ladybug5 requires a USB 3.1 PCIe host controller card compliant with the SuperSpeed USB Specification and the xHCI Specification. A host controller card is provided with the camera.

Cable—The Ladybug5 requires a USB 3.1 Type-A to Micro-B cable with locking screws. A 5 m cable is provided with the camera.

Power supply—Power must be provided through the 12-pin GPIO interface. The required input voltage is 12-24 V. A power supply and wiring harness is provided with the camera.

Mounting—Both a desktop and a tripod mount are provided with the camera.

Can I run Ladybug5 with my existing application?
The Ladybug SDK version 1.7 is required to run Ladybug5. This version of the SDK contains the following new features and enhancements:

• Added support for USB3 drivers
• Added ladybugGetGrabTimeout() call to API
• Added PNG quick save option to toolbar in LadybugCapPro
• Added support for Auto Shutter Range control
• Added support for three Auto Exposure preset modes
• Added keyboard shortcuts for zoom/pan functionality in LadybugCapPro
• Added memory channel save/restore to API
• Added environmental sensor support for Ladybug5
• User interface modifications to new features

Additionally, the Ladybug SDK contains several new example programs to support new the features of Ladybug5, including:

• ladybugEnvironmentalSensors
• ladybugPostProcessing
• ladybugTranslate2dTo3d

How easy is it to migrate from FireWire to USB 3.1?
The Ladybug3 is a FireWire (IIDC-1394) camera while the Ladybug5 is a USB 3.1 camera. However, the IIDC-based control and status registers in the camera firmware, which are accessed by Point Grey’s Ladybug API, remain mostly the same between the cameras. As a result, upgrading an application from the Ladybug3 FireWire to the Ladybug5 USB 3.1 should be fairly straightforward.

Among the factors to consider are supported pixels formats and modes. The Ladybug5 offers a raw image format that has no on-camera image processing; all image processing is performed on the PC. This allows users to fine tune their output settings as a separate step after image acquisition.

How does the performance compare?
Data throughput on the IIDC-1394b bus is 800 Mb/s while on the USB 3.1 network it is 5 Gbit/s.

Ladybug5 Image Processing Pipeline

Image Processing

For both Ladybug3 and Ladybug5, when using Raw8 or JPEG8 pixel formats, some image processing is done on the camera during capture before being output to the PC. Additional post processing is then performed on the PC.

For Ladybug5 when using Raw12, RAW16, or JPEG12 pixel formats, most of the image processing is done on the PC. This processing is done as part of ladybugConvertImage(). This allows users to fine tune the output settings independently from image capture.

User access to adjusting the parameters for image processing is available in LadybugCapPro or via CSRs.

Data Format

Formats, Frame Rates, Image Sizes

Shutter Range

Both Ladybug3 and Ladybug5 offer three preset shutter range modes to set the maximum shutter value:

• Motion—maximum shutter is set to as short as possible to prevent motion blur. Best used outdoors or images may be too dark. This is the default.
• Indoor—maximum shutter is slightly longer than the motion mode, for use in indoor applications.
• Low Noise—maximum shutter is not restricted.

Auto Exposure Modes

Ladybug5 offers three preset modes for the auto exposure algorithm:

• Bottom 50%—uses only the bottom 50% of the five side cameras and excludes the top camera from its calculations.
• Top 50%—uses only top 50% of the five side cameras and includes the top camera in its calculations. This is the upside down version of the first mode, used when the camera is mounted upside down (for example, on a helicopter).
• Full Image—uses the entire image of all six cameras for its calculations. This is the default.

For 8-bit pixel formats, the auto exposure modes are set for image capture. For 12- and 16-bit pixel formats, the auto exposure modes are set both for image capture and post processing on the PC.

Software Workflow

Image Acquisition

The Ladybug5 can be started and controlled in the same way as Ladybug3.

Stream Recording

The Ladybug5 has a much greater maximum bandwidth and the amount of data written to disk per second is substantially greater than Ladybug3. It is possible to greatly reduce the amount of data sent in JPEG modes by reducing the compression quality.

Image Processing and Stitching

The workflow for data formats with on-camera image processing remains the same. See the LadybugPanoStitch example for an example.

For data formats that do not perform image processing on-camera, see ladybugImageAdjustment.h in the \include directory for image processing parameters as well as usage instructions. In addition, the LadybugCapPro application provides a graphical interface to these parameters.

In both cases, ladybugConvertImage() prepares the image for output purposes, including JPEG decompression, Bayer demosaicing as well as image post processing.

Image Output

The image output functionality remains the same as LadybugCapPro 1.6. If a full resolution panoramic image is desired, it is recommended that an output size of 10000 x 5000 is used.

Image Size

For Ladybug3, the size of a single camera image after image conversion is 1616 x 1232.

For Ladybug5, the size of a single camera image after image conversion is 2448 x 2048.

If your software allocates its own memory for image conversion and texture updating, the amount of memory to be allocated should be 6 x W x H x (bytes per channel), where bytes per channel is 1 for 8-bit modes, 1.5 for 12-bit modes, and 2 for 16-bit modes.

For example, the memory size required to contain a JPEG8 image after conversion is:
Ladybug3 = 6 x 1616 x 1232 x 1 = 11945472 bytes
Ladybug5 = 6 x 2448 x 2048 x 1 = 30081024 bytes

Detailed Comparison between the Ladybug3 and Ladybug5

Mechanical Properties

GPIO Properties

Hardware/Electronics

Firmware

Software, Driver, and System Support

Dimensions

Ladybug3 Dimensional Diagram

Ladybug5 Dimensional Diagram