Camera with PIC chip

[The Master]

Hi, Is it remotely possible for a PIC chip to accept an input from a camera and process the image? I was thinking about a webcam because ive read somewhere that PIC have USB support but the type doesnt really matter. What i want to do is capture a frame from the camera and do a bit of maths on it to identify objects. I should be alright programming it to detect things but i dont know if its possible to get the image data into it in the first place. Normally i would use a PC for this kind of thing but i would like more than 1 camera running at a time.

The plan is to use the circuits to get the positions and colors of objects and send them to the PC. The PC should be able to process everything a lot quicker since its only dealing with co-ordinates and limited color information rather than an entire image from each camera.

Im not going too advanced with this. Im not after face recognition or anything but a full color image from even a webcam does have a lot of information. Im sure there is a chip with enough ram to handle all that data but im not sure about how to get it into the chip to start with

[mackrackit]

I do not think you can do it with the USB on the PIC.
But this might work for you
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~cmucam/

[The Master]

That looks really interesting. It looks like exactly what i was going to make except its already made! The price is a little higher than i was hoping for but it might be worth it. The functionality to send the image back to the PC will help too. I was going to add that later on so the PC can take single frames and save them or process them in more detail.

I should probably only get 1 because of the price and even still i wont be able to afford it for a while. I was origionally thinking about 3 cameras. I can get cheap webcams for about £15. The CMUcam3 looks good though and it appears that the camera can be detached from the circuit so that will help for fitting it into a small place. Ive gotta watch the cost a bit though because i need lots of other components too.

Thanx for the link

[mackrackit]

Yep, a little high on the price, but like you say, it is already made.

Here is one that is set up for the basic stamp. The code should be about the same for PBP.

I think spark fun has a few camera modules, but I do not know how to use them.

[mackrackit]

I forgot the link

http://www.parallax.com/Store/Microc...%2cProductName

[The Master]

I think i saw that one on one of the links i got from the other site. I dont think i would need it to connect to PIC chips if it can connect to the PC serial port. Then again if im having more than 1 (eventually) with PIC chips being used to control other things then it might be best to have a main PIC chip that connects to the PC and controls the others. That could take even more strain off the PC.

As long as this camera circuit outputs to serial then i should be able to connect a PIC to that and not have to have any special camera circuit.

That one does look cheaper but it looks like CMUcam2. If im going to spend all that money i think ill get the CMUcam3 because it looks so much more advanced