Tau Camera Corner

If you run into issues, how to report a software bugs, or give feedback

Lazar Demin — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 01:42:16 GMT

If you run into Issues with the Tau Camera

Take a look at the Resources & Useful Links post, it has a ton of helpful information.

If you still can't resolve your issue, post here on the Community. The team will be around and will do their best to help you out. And best of all, the entire community will benefit from the conversation!

When posting, try to include as much helpful information as possible:

What type of host computer you're using
Installed Python version
Version of installed Tau LiDAR Camera libraries
A brief description of the issue you're experiencing vs what you expect to happen
Steps to reproduce the issue
Any other info, photos, or screen grabs that you think might be helpful

Reporting Software Bugs

If you've found a software bug, post a Bug Report issue on GitHub.

Issues relating to the Tau Studio web app: https://github.com/OnionIoT/tau-lidar-server/issues
Issues relating to the TauLidarCamera Python module: https://github.com/OnionIoT/tau-lidar-camera/issues

We also welcome all suggestions and Pull Requests!

Giving Feedback

We would love to hear all of your feedback and suggestions!

If it's something general, please make a new thread right here on the Onion Community.

If it's related to the Tau Camera software, get in touch by posting an issue on GitHub:

Tau Studio web app: https://github.com/OnionIoT/tau-lidar-server/issues
TauLidarCamera Python module: https://github.com/OnionIoT/tau-lidar-camera/issues

Tau Camera Resources & Useful Links

Lazar Demin — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 16:56:27 GMT

@sriharsha-phd Take a look at the 3D Topics in the FAQ Post for more details. If you have a specific question, feel free to make a new post!

FAQs for the Tau Camera

Lazar Demin — Thu, 22 Jul 2021 19:43:22 GMT

I've run into issues when using the Tau Camera, where can I get help? Start by going over our Troubleshooting Guide. It covers common errors and issues. If you can't find a solution for your problem there, post on the Onion Community Forum and we'll do our best to help out. To make it easier to get help, try running the checkCamera.py Example Python Program and posting the command line output and screenshots of the output if you think it will be helpful.

Onion Tau Camera now Available!

JeffZhou — Tue, 01 Dec 2020 01:26:58 GMT

Great ！

Cant Start the Camera in Sudden

Lazar Demin — Fri, 15 Mar 2024 18:12:34 GMT

@cyberai pls try running the checkCamera.py Example Python Program and posting the command line output and screenshots of the output. This will give us a better idea of what's going on.

TAU camera is showing black screen( not giving the data)

Lazar Demin — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 17:13:17 GMT

@abdullahjhatial And does the same behaviour happen on a different computer? Please also try this suggestion from the thread I previously linked @Indighost said in Onion Tau not working anymore: Use ctrl+c to kill the program and try running it again Unplug the Tau Camera from the computer for 10 seconds, reconnect, and try running the program again Try switching to a high-quality cable! If possible, try using a not-super-long USB-C to USB-C cable from a reputable brand. Then try running the program again.

Onion Tau stopped sending data...

abdullahjhatial — Tue, 21 Nov 2023 03:25:34 GMT

@abdullahjhatial said in Onion Tau stopped sending data...: did you resolve this issue ? i am also facing same issue ,

Understanding the return value of getUint16LittleEndian(array, index)

Lazar Demin — Mon, 30 Jan 2023 22:27:19 GMT

@Electro the getUint16LittleEndian method is used for reading 16-bit integers from the Camera. It's used for reading the camera's configuration/settings. See this search for the getUint16LittleEndian method on the tau camera github repo for details of when it's used. For your purposes of finding the closest point in the frame, you should look at the readFrame method. It will return a Frame object with distance/depth. See the related documentation entry for more info. You can see the readFrame method in action, as well as how OpenCV is used to render pictures using the data in the example programs. Enjoy!

How to Get Point Datas

frosa9x — Mon, 11 Jul 2022 06:33:48 GMT

How can I get point datas to plot or process point datas in Python? Moreover, I also need to know how you arrange data in an array such as x, y, z datas to use the point datas correctly. Could you explain to me, such as how I can modify your example (such as distance.py) to meet what I want.

How to retrieve normal RGB image using Onion Tau Lidar camera?

Lazar Demin — Thu, 07 Apr 2022 15:08:21 GMT

@sriharsha-phd You can't retrieve an RGB image, but you can get a grayscale image. See the distancePlusGrayscale.py example program for more details: Info on the example program The example program source code And the Tau Camera API Reference & Documentation

Onion Tau not working anymore

Indighost — Mon, 28 Mar 2022 07:13:03 GMT

Use ctrl+c to kill the program and try running it again Unplug the Tau Camera from the computer for 10 seconds, reconnect, and try running the program again Try switching to a high-quality cable! If possible, try using a not-super-long USB-C to USB-C cable from a reputable brand. Then try running the program again.

Curious about the Hardware and sensors used in the TaU Camera

Lazar Demin — Thu, 10 Mar 2022 22:03:48 GMT

Hi @abbas_barwani You should talk to our hardware design partner VSemi if you're interested in the hardware details.

Depth (Z) Resolution of TaU Camera

abbas_barwani — Thu, 24 Feb 2022 07:24:02 GMT

Thank you for your reply

Dimensional Weight

Lazar Demin — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 20:53:19 GMT

Hi @Garth-Tuck We don't have any examples measuring dimensions. But all of the Tau Camera software is open source and well documented if you want to build an application that does this. Check out the Tau Camera Useful Links listing for links to the github repos and documentation.

Acces point cloud

Lazar Demin — Tue, 01 Feb 2022 20:51:26 GMT

Hi @JackHulspas Have you tried comparing your open3d point cloud visualizations to the point cloud in the Tau Studio web app? (See step 1 in the Tau Camera Getting Started Guide for more info on the Tau Studio web app) It's possible the open3d library is expecting the data to be ordered differently. I would suggest taking a look at the Tau Camera Python API reference: https://taulidarcamera.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

3D point cloud and Depth Map generation-regarding

sriharsha.phd — Fri, 28 Jan 2022 11:37:23 GMT

Dear Technical Team,
We are having a few questions regarding Onion Tau LIDAR Camera.

Is the device capable of producing 3D point cloud and depth map for a particular object (say human face) ?

provided that the face is aligned with camera and is at a distance ( say 50cms) from the camera

Our applications include face detection and recognition. We are interested with 3D point cloud and depth map retrieval of particular human face ( covered with hard cover material). In that aspect is your onion Tau lidar camera is capable of producing the 3D point cloud and Depth Map
Pls let me know regarding
with regards
Dr K V Sriharsha
AI/CV Engineer
Matdun Labs India Pvt Ltd

Tau Lidar points_3D

JackHulspas — Thu, 23 Sep 2021 08:42:03 GMT

@Lazar-Demin Thank you for replying! I shall see if i can use the data_depth method to do what I need. But wouldn't the points_3D be more useful? Since I am trying to find two points on the screen to measure the distance. The 2 points most likely won't be on the same axis, so in order to get the distance between points wouldn't it be better to use the points_3D fuction, as it returns 3D coordinates in meters? Because as as far as I can tell the data_depth method returns how far the point is away from the camera (correct me if I'm wrong). I shall also let you know if I make any progress using data_depth to get the distance, thanks!

ROS Support

david — Thu, 16 Sep 2021 01:20:35 GMT

Is this tau camera supported in ROS? If not, is there any plan for ROS package support.

TAU stuck on "Looking for connected Tau LiDAR Camera hardware ..."

Lazar Demin — Wed, 01 Sep 2021 21:33:50 GMT

@Missa Happy you resolved the issue! We've updated the Troubleshooting Guide to cover this scenario as well! Let us know what you end up doing with your Tau Camera!

[RESOLVED] Connected but no image

Lazar Demin — Fri, 06 Aug 2021 20:32:22 GMT

@Rastus Awesome, happy to hear you resolved your issue! I'll add your Jetson setup steps to the FAQ. I don't foresee any issue with using the Jetson to analyze the data - should be a fun project. Do you have any specific libraries in mind? Make sure to keep us in the loop as your project progresses, we love robots - especially those that use the Tau Camera

SOLVED : Tau USB Cable Suggestions

kevin lefrank — Mon, 02 Aug 2021 13:03:31 GMT

Just wanted to follow up and say this issue was solved with the tau v0.0.4 update. I no longer have dropped frames or bad data packets. If you have these issues. I would update to the latest GitHub and update your computer make sure there are no updates waiting for your bios

Convert Frames to STL

Weimann — Fri, 16 Jul 2021 06:21:55 GMT

I'm not sure if this belongs here, but I don't know where else to ask. (If not, please redirect me to a more relevant subreddit) I needed to make something on a 3D printer that the engineering shop has at my school, so I decided to try my hand at TurboCAD. I found an old v12 Deluxe edition in my house, so I figured that was all I would need to print the part. After a few hours of working on it (it's not terribly complex, but I had to feel my way through as I had never done anything CAD related before), I had a finished product.

Improving camera performance

Lazar Demin — Mon, 28 Jun 2021 19:32:35 GMT

@JohnW said in Improving camera performance: what is the theoretical maximum frame rate for the Tau camera? Is the virtual serial port not a bottleneck? The theoretical maximum frame rate is 50fps. And the USB serial port shouldn't be a bottleneck because the bandwidth required is low. Having said that, the realistic frame rate that can be achieved depends on lots of factors, such as the sensor configuration (integration time, operation mode etc.) and available resources in the host machine (CPU, cache, RAM etc.). The practical frame rate is usually between 20 and 30 fps. On the noise filter: There is no filter running on the Tau Camera hardware or in the driver. If this is a requirement, you'll need to add it in your software.

points_3d

kevin lefrank — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 15:29:42 GMT

@Lazar-Demin thanks for all your hard work onion team!

Can't install TauLidarServer

kevin lefrank — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 15:28:59 GMT

@Justtraps I downloaded from the python website . Not through the command line. If you are on Linux, some Linux distros don't have an up to date python package. But you can always download it for Linux from the python.org website. The link for it is in the starter guide link that Lazaar posted

Excited to start!

ModusPraxis — Fri, 07 May 2021 05:03:11 GMT

@kevin-lefrank Aha! Just found this - looking forward to hearing about the STL files