Views
Contents |
HOW TO SETUP BUMBLEBEE STEREO CAMERA UNDER LINUX
This article introduces the general steps to make BumbleBee Stereo Camera (Figure 1) work under linux.
Preconditions
The BumbleBee Stereo camera has excellent reputation for its performance on the stereo vision. However, it is very "picky" on its running platform: it only works under 32-bit Linux system due to the 32-bit static library provided by Point Grey Research, Inc[3].
The preconditions are listed below:
| Items | Notes |
| 32-bit Linux System | Here we use Debian-2.6.26-2-686 |
| PC or Laptop with ieee1394 interface | I use Firewire (1394) PCI card |
| Kernel Module Installed | ieee1394, ohci1394, raw1394 |
| Library Installed | libdc1394 (>=2.0.2), libraw1394 (>=1.2.0) |
Technical Notes:
- <1> Configure the 1394 device kernel module for Redhat/Fedora Linux
- Article [2] introduces how to setup the kernel modules of 1394 devices with Redhat 9.0 and Fedora Core 1 & 3
- For Redhat EL5 or Fedora 10 or aboved versions linux, the 1394-kmdl-<version>-<arch>.rpm is available in ATrpms
- For other Redhat or Fedora versions of linux, if there is no 1394 device module installed in the kernel, you have to build a kernel with 1394 device support. The [5] lists detailed instruction
- <2> Configure the 1394 device kernel module for Debian/Ubuntu Linux
- To automatically load the kernel modules at booting time, we can add following lines into file "/etc/rc.local"
# create the 1394 devices
mknod /dev/raw1394 c 171 0
chmod a+rw /dev/raw1394
mkdir /dev/video1394
mknod /dev/video1394/0 c 171 16
mknod /dev/video1394/1 c 171 17
mknod /dev/video1394/2 c 171 18
mknod /dev/video1394/3 c 171 19
chmod a+rw /dev/video1394/0
chmod a+rw /dev/video1394/1
chmod a+rw /dev/video1394/2
chmod a+rw /dev/video1394/3
# install the modules
modprobe raw1394
modprobe video1394
- Also you can choose to manually load the kernel modules into the kernel by run commands in the terminal (root permission is needed)
modprobe ieee1394
modprobe ohci1394
modprobe raw1394
modprobe video1394
- <3> For libdc1394: you should have a directory called dc1394 in which some headers are contained in path of /usr/include or else.
Install Library
Point Grey Research, Inc. provides the Triclops SDK, which is an area based correlation with SAD (Sum of Absolute Differences), to perform the image rectification and stereo processing.
The algorithm is fairly robust and it has a number of validation steps that reduce the level of noise. The method requires texture and contrast to work correctly. For more detail, please refer [6].
To install the library, first please download the pacakge: Triclops3.2.0.8-FC3.tgz, by registering on Point Grey Research, Inc's website or directly download from here.
Second, you also need to download the package pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2.tar.gz here. It contains some example programs and a static library libpgrlibdcstereo.a.
1). Uncompress the file Triclops3.2.0.8-FC3.tgz to the directory /usr/local/include first:
~$ sudo tar zxvf Triclops3.2.0.8-FC3.tgz -C /usr/local/include
2). The uncompressed folder name is "Triclops3.2.0.8", rename it as "triclops":
~$ sudo mv /usr/local/include/Triclops3.2.0.8 /usr/local/include/triclops
3). Uncompress the file pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2.tar.gz to some place, (I prefer /opt)
~$ sudo tar zxvf pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2.tar.gz -C /opt
4). Now the uncompressed files under /opt should be:
|--- /opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2
|--- Makefile
|--- pgrlibdcstereo
|--- simplegrab
|--- simplestereo
|--- x3bstereo
go to the subdirectory pgrlibdcstereo:
~$ cd /opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/pgrlibdcstereo
Modify its Makefile with your favorate editor as below:
ROOT_INCLUDE = /usr/local/include
USER_INCLUDE = /usr/include
# compilation flags
CPPFLAGS += -I.
# libdc1394 installed in /usr/include location
CPPFLAGS += -I$(USER_INCLUDE)/dc1394
CPPFLAGS += -I$(ROOT_INCLUDE)/triclops/include
CPPFLAGS += -Wall -g
CPPFLAGS += -DLINUX
# library that will be generated
LIBRARY_NAME = pgrlibdcstereo
LIBRARY = libpgrlibdcstereo.a
LIBRARY_SRC = pgr_conversions.cpp \
pgr_stereocam.cpp \
pgr_registers.cpp
all: $(LIBRARY)
$(LIBRARY): $(LIBRARY_SRC:%.cpp=%.o)
$(AR) $(ARFLAGS) $@ $^
%.o:%.cpp
g++ -c $(CXXFLAGS) $(CPPFLAGS) $*.cpp -o $*.o
clean:
rm -f *~ *.o *.d $(EXECS)
Then compile the source codes:
/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/pgrlibdcstereo$ sudo make
Copy the generated library to:
/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/pgrlibdcstereo$ sudo cp libpgrlibdcstereo.a /usr/local/include/triclops/lib
/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/pgrlibdcstereo$ sudo cp *.h /usr/local/include/triclops/include
Now we get our libraries for BumbleBee camera ready!
Run Test Program
The other three folders under /opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2 are sample codes, to run them we need to compile the source codes to executable files first. For example:
~$ cd /opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/simplestereo
Modify the Makefile here:
~/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/simplestereo$ vim Makefile
Define ROOT_INCLUDE as the parent directory of triclops; USER_INCLUDE as parent directory of dc1394; USER_LIB as path of triclops/lib; The modified Makefile looks like:
ROOT_INCLUDE = /usr/local/include
USER_INCLUDE = /usr/include
ROOT_LIB = /usr/local/lib
USER_LIB = /usr/local/include/triclops/lib
LOCALLIB = ../pgrlibdcstereo
# compilation flags
CPPFLAGS += -I.
# libdc1394 installed in /usr/local/include location
CPPFLAGS += -I$(ROOT_INCLUDE)/dc1394
CPPFLAGS += -I$(LOCALLIB)
CPPFLAGS += -I$(ROOT_INCLUDE)/triclops/include
CPPFLAGS += -Wall -g
CPPFLAGS += -DLINUX
# libraries flags
LDFLAGS += -L. -L$(ROOT_LIB)/triclops
LDFLAGS += -L$(LOCALLIB)
LDFLAGS += -L$(ROOT_LIB)
LDFLAGS += -L$(USER_LIB)
LIBS += -ldc1394 -lraw1394 -pthread
LIBS += -lpgrlibdcstereo -ltriclops -lpnmutils
# executable name and contents
EXEC1 = simplestereo
EXEC1SRC = $(EXEC1).cpp
EXEC2 = simplestereo-profile
EXEC2SRC = $(EXEC2).cpp
EXECS = $(EXEC1) $(EXEC2)
# compile
all: bin
bin: $(EXECS)
$(EXEC1): $(EXEC1SRC:%.cpp=%.o)
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o $@ $^ $(LIBS)
$(EXEC2): $(EXEC2SRC:%.cpp=%.o)
$(CXX) $(LDFLAGS) -o $@ $^ $(LIBS)
%.o:%.cpp
g++ -c $(CXXFLAGS) $(CPPFLAGS) $*.cpp -o $*.o
clean:
rm -f *~ *.o *.d $(EXECS) *.pgm *.ppm
Run make to commile:
~/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/simplestereo$ sudo make
Now we can use the sample program to test the BumbleBee stereo camera:
~/opt/pgr-stereo-examples-libdc-2.0.2/simplestereo$ ./simplestereo
The captured figures are listed below:
 |  |  |  |
References
- [1] Point Grey Research, Inc. Using Point Grey Stereo Vision Products under Linux
- [2] Point Grey Research, Inc. Setting up 1394 devices using the Linux "udev" device manager
- [3] Point Grey Research, Inc. 64-bit Linux support for Digiclops and Triclops libraries
- [4] Point Grey Research, Inc. Source code examples of grabbing images under Linux
- [5] www.FedoraProject.org Building a custom kernel
- [6] Point Grey Research, Inc. Triclops™ SDK
- [7] The Image Group at the Department of Computer Science, University of Copenhagen, How to work with the Bumblebee2 Stereo Camera on Linux
- [8] Point Grey Research, Inc. Technical Application Note (TAN2008005): Stereo Vision Introduction and Applications (pdf)
Author
Yang Song