FLIR Arduino code is not working

[Andrew]

I have connected breakout as illustrated on the image here http://www.pureengineering.com/projects/lepton, however arduino code from https://github.com/PureEngineering/LeptonModule gets stuck on first read_reg().

I have concern about power as pureengineering mentions that "Power can be fed in through AREF. " not sure how to do it. I also tried connecting 3.3V and ground to the separate pins on back without success. Do I do something wrong or I got defective camera?

Thanks!

[sa...@pureengineering.com]

What arduino are you using. As it stands now the spi code for the avr Arduino is not fast enough to grab video/images from the lepton. The current crop of Arduino brand arm based boards have a modified pinout for the SPI pinout and require an cables similar to what you would use on the raspberry pi. 

If you are using an arduino pinout compatible board such as the stm32 nucleo series then it should plug straight in. 

With the UNO arduino you should be able to read the registers of the device over i2c to verify that it is working.  

[Andrew]

Thanks for reply. I use arduino uno, wanted just verify if it works at all.

It looks that my camera is defected then. But I still not sure how AREF provides power in this case. AREF is input voltage and by default it has zero volt there. I think it does not work because camera is not powered. Could you provide any insights on how arduino's AREF pin is used in this case? Thanks.

[sa...@pureengineering.com]

In the case of the UNO, AREF is just an input(as you said). so you have to solder down a wire to the 3.3V rail or something like that to get power to the unit. Top of C3 to pin 8 on the header. 

http://arduino.cc/en/uploads/Main/arduino-uno-schematic.pdf

If you are not wiring up the AREF line, then the board must be sucking enough power from the IO lines to read the registers. 

In other boards such as the stm32nucleo the AREF line is wired already to a 3.3V rail. 

http://www.st.com/st-web-ui/static/active/en/resource/technical/document/user_manual/DM00105823.pdf

I would look into getting a M/F kit jumper set

https://www.sparkfun.com/products/9385

as this allows you to to prototype quickly to different pin-outs. and you can mount the camera in any way you want. 

[Andrew]

Got it working, thanks!

I removed camera from breakout, cleaned socket, inserted camera back and connected via jumpers. With Vin pin to 3.3V it started to show up. It seems there were no contact somewhere. Leaving Vin on AREF also works but it prints "busy" in the loop. With proper connection to 3.3V it works as expected.

Thanks again, I'm happy it is not broken.

[Noah Graham]

I had this same problem with an Arduino UNO.  I did the following, and it seems to work:

1) I connect the camera board directly to the Arduino.  The pins all match except AREF is connected to Vin on the camera.
2) I use the connector on the back of the camera to connect Vin to the Arduino 5V supply.
3) Because this means AREF now has an external voltage, I call analogReference(EXTERNAL); in the setup() function of the Arduino program.  This is to safeguard the Arduino from an internal short on an AnalogRead call, since otherwise the external voltage is shorted to the internal reference.  (Actually I think these are both 5V on the UNO, but it doesn't hurt to be on the safe side.)

[George Erhart]

I was also having issues with the FLIR breakout board + camera. on the raspberrypi_video example, I got the dread red square. When I tried the Arduino example, it got stuck reading the serial number. After connecting the 3.3v pin on the back of the breakout to the Arduino 3.3v, I get all of the expected output. I am going to re-try the Raspberry PI code with the 3.3v/GND connected on the back of the breakout board.

Thanks for the hints ...

[Noah Graham]

Does the raspberrypi_capture example work?  I had a much easier time with that one than the video.

If you've already connected the power/ground pins on the bottom of the camera board to the corresponding pins on the Pi, you don't need to connect the pins in the back.  The issue with the Arduino is when you connect the board directly to the Arduino as shown in the photo at the PureEngineering page, the pins all match up with what they're supposed to connect to except for the Vin pin.  So you need to make up for that by using the alternate connection on the back.

[Galih Prakoso]

Hi Andrew,

I just new in arduino project. I buy flir lepton 2.5 with V2 breakout board. Could you please share the circuit diagram and code for Arduino UNO? thanks