- If you're anything like me, you saw the new high-quality camera from the Pi foundation and thought, well, the Pi foundation
comes out with some versatile and affordable hardware,
like the Raspberry Pi. Surely with a name like
that it must be two things; a camera and high quality. But what do words mean? This is clearly not a
camera until you build it. And by quality, do they
mean it never breaks down? Or do they mean it takes good pictures? Can this really be better than
the other options out there? Can our sponsor Ridge Wallet, really redefine the wallet, with his compact frame
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free worldwide shipping. (upbeat music) The high-quality cameras, the Pi foundation's third
generation camera module. It's compatible with every Raspi, except the early Pi zeros, and like the v1 and v2, it connects to your Raspberry
Pi with a ribbon cable via its Mipi CSI two serial interface. Now as you'd expect from a Pi product, the module has surprisingly
competent specs, at least on paper, including Sony's ImX 477 sensor, which is similar to what you'd find in a GoPro or DJI Mavic, a tripod mount and a
built-in metal lens mount that feels, well, high quality. As you'd also expect, it's reasonably priced at just $50. Although by the time you factor in everything else you're gonna need, a Raspi, SD card and lens, it's more like 100 to $200. It's not strictly necessary by the way, but for bonus marks, we also 3D-printed a housing for ours that both protects it from
incidental static discharge and from bumps. And, allows us to use it,
like a point and shoot camera. So, our config came in at about $185. Now, you obviously won't
get the water resistance or image stabilization
that you'd find on a GoPro, but for the price, it actually still looks pretty good. This sensor captures
12.33-megapixel stills in JPEG, PNG and even RAW, and we can even shoot video
at up to 1080p 50fps H.264. It supports changing
the ISO, shutter speed, and white balance. You know all the usual camera controls and thanks to its C-mount lens flange. Pretty much any lens from
very cheap to very expensive, can be made to fit with the right adapter. You can even do, "in-camera"
image processing, like balancing colors or adding filters, like an oil paint or watercolor
effect to your image. If you're feeling adventurous, you can add some AI and get notified, when you're neighbor
takes your parking spot with basic image recognition. You can make your own smart
door with Alexa integration or you can have a highly
customizable security camera with features that match or even exceed some of the
high-end systems out there. Maybe the coolest part, is that it also happens
to be a whole computer, with a built-in browser, for you to check out LTTSTORE.com. But, there is, a gotcha. To explain, let's talk semantics. The Raspberry Pi foundation
calls this a camera module in their documentation, but some other Mipi camera
makers try distinction, between a sensor module,
which contains no ISP or Image Signal Processor onboard, meaning that the attached
computer has to do all the work of denoising and debayering
the raw sensor data, and a camera module
which does contain an ISP and outputs a pre-processed
image to the host computer, which in many cases would
also be a Raspi or similar. Now a camera module costs more, but that extra hardware can
perform more advanced processing compared to the Raspberry
Pi's built-in ISP, or, it can free up processing resources that can instead be
dedicated to things like, scene detection, and facial recognition. It can also act as a
kind of translation layer simplifying upgrades, by allowing the host system, which remember, might not
necessarily be a Raspberry Pi, to reuse existing drivers and software, rather than requiring
new ones to be written every time you want to
plug in a new sensor. So, the gotcha. By some definitions, this is a sensor module, which hasn't gotten much
software support yet. Meaning that there are only a
few graphical user interfaces that work with it at all, and even those have their limits. Pi Camera app for example, gives you an easy-ish to use interface, and support for both photo and video, but it hasn't been updated
in nearly five years, other than a bug fix back in January, and might never be updated to
fully support the new modules, full resolution and features. That means, to unlock its full potential, you'll need to have the
know-how and patience to adjust parameters in command-line. Now it isn't all that difficult and the provided guide has
all the commands listed for easy reference with a
short summary of each function, but, it's very clear
that if your goal is to, quickly capture the moment, this ain't it chief. Which isn't to say that we didn't try. Armed with our 3D-printed
high-quality camera, and a 3D-printed tripod, Brandon went on a photography expedition and he's back to tell
you about his findings. - Let me start by saying this
camera is such a cool idea. It's small, it's cheap
and like all Pi products, your imagination is the limit to its use. Now I took the camera
out for about an hour and while it was a fun, new experience, I am overall disappointed with the result. In my testing, I took the Raspi camera out into the world with a pixel 4 for comparison. I did my best to match the composition of the Raspi camera on the pixel 4, since they were vastly
different fields of view. Our Raspi camera setup was a
very rough experience to use, and we had to use command-line for all the actual camera functions. So I definitely would have preferred to have a dedicated shutter button. Usability aside, how does it compare to
something like the pixel 4? Well, that is where things get
worse for the Raspi camera. Let's start with the positives. When it comes to the stills, the Raspi camera does
an above average job, with overall sharpness and detail. Thanks to the Sony ImX 477 sensor. Unfortunately, compared
to the pixel 4 stills, which I even zoomed in on, to better match the field of
views between the cameras, the Raspi has some
rough processing issues. In all the photos I took, there is a clear magenta
cast in the photos. It does a good job of isolating subjects with a shallow depth of field, but especially since these C-mount lenses aren't anything special
in terms of optics, the pixel 4 portrait mode
produces just as if not, a more pleasing bokeh. Video-wise unfortunately,
the story is similar. The video is soft, lacks
overall dynamic range. The detail can be improved
a reasonable amount with higher quality lenses, but the sensor with
this current processing feels like a phone video
from about four years ago. It really goes to show that all the years of R&D Google and Apple have put into image processing, make all the difference in a great result when you're working with limited hardware. I am sure what the right engineers
working on the processing this sensor module could be
used for content creation, but for now, it is best to use it for
the many other applications you would use a camera for in general. - Well, that's a bummer. But, realistically, I wasn't
expecting a $50 module to replace a purpose-built camera anyway. So, let's talk about what
it's actually good for. In practical terms, if I wanted a solution for
monitoring my farm of 3D printers or my lab experiment, the usability deficiencies
here are less important, and, it does live up to
its name pretty well, offering high quality,
especially for the cost. The Raspberry Pi Foundation
has also committed to producing these things
until at least 2026. So, unlike some other sensor modules, I can count on future
availability if I need more. So, the reason it exists
falls in line perfectly, with the Raspberry Pi
Foundation's overall goal of putting the power of
computing and digital making into the hands of people
all over the world. It might not be the best camera in an Apples to Apples comparison,
with a phone for example, but, it is a great camera
for experiments, education, and just cool projects that
can benefit from high quality, but don't need the best quality. In conclusion then, it's not dumb to build your own camera, but, if you have a somewhat recent phone, you're probably gonna
want to stick with that. Thanks to iFixit for
sponsoring today's video. iFixit wants to make sure you
have the right bit for the job and with iFixit you can take apart almost all your electronics
depending on which kit you pick. The Mako has its small 64 Bits. The Mahi has larger bits and 48 of them. The Manta has all the
bits at a whopping 112 and each kit includes
one of iFixit's famous, swivel knurled screwdrivers. iFixit kits are contained
in magnetic enclosed case and all the tools are held
together with laser cut foam for your convenience. Check it out at iFixit.com/Linus. We're gonna have that linked below. If you guys enjoyed this video, you might also enjoy our cheap
home security camera video that we did a little while ago when I was super mad
about subscription fees on the, you know,
affordable consumer cameras. It was also Raspberry Pi-based. We'll have a look.
