How to calculate minimum mounting height for cameras purchased elsewhere

Ah! Now I get it. I thought maybe it was for youtubers and such so I wondered why you wouldn’t just strap on a gopro but now I understand the functionality. Thank you.

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I just did a search with “lightburn camera” and my own name, and got 50+ hits. This topic has been up many times and for me it is a clear sign that we can/should improve the knowledge of using a camera together with LightBurn.
On the other hand, we already have many good resources here and on YT that deal with this topic.
As an example, this one is from the first days with my new LB camera.

There is another post that shows with a drawing and calculation how important it is that your camera is absolutely stable and reproducible in its position. I just can’t find it right now, I’m on vacation traveling through the EU…

The discussion about the usability of a working camera solution is, in my opinion, comparable to whether you need a computer for CAD or not, I need both and LB :wink:

My workflow and machine setup definitely benefits from having a good camera for precise positioning. Yes, I could work around it should it break but I would also immediately order another if it did. My custom machine enclosure is accessible (only) from the front for inserting materials but is otherwise a bit of a pain for viewing exact material placement or for monitoring work in progress. The positioning camera is above and centered for best performance, but that placement also means the laser head and gantry mostly obscures what is happening from that camera view while it’s working. For that reason I have a second camera providing an angled view from the front of the enclosure. Setting a camera up correctly is no more difficult than any other job, just be methodical and accurate and it’s easy. I’ve tried several lightburn-clone type cameras in the past but the (main) issue with them was they defaulted to a lower resolution than their spec implied, and with no way of controling resolution from within Lightburn I got 640x480 instead of the 2K or 4K resolution. That was the main difference that distinguished genuine Lightburn cameras as they defaulted to their highest resolution with via modified firmware. Another was autofocus - definitely something to avoid, you want manual focus only. Once set there is no need to change it again, the DoF (depth of field) is ample to work with. Things may be different with newer clone offerings now. The genuine cameras are over-priced (IMHO) when you compare them to cheap clones because the component costs look to be similar, but at least you know it will work as expected. Another feature is the angle of view, it’s best to avoid fisheye lenses if at all possible, instead use a camera lens with narrower field of view and mount the camera higher. The distortion correction algorithm has less work to do with the narrow FOV and personally I use an 8MP camera with 90 degree lens and get great results for material positioning. Distortion doesn’t matter for a camera only used for monitoring laser activity and just about any camera will do for that.

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