Time lapse photography over month while connected to Linux PC

[encore2097]

Hi,

I'd like to use the Xiaomi Yi Camera to take outdoor time lapse photography over an extended period of time. By long time I mean over a month or so.

The camera would be connected to a dedicated power source and also a small linux PC with lots of storage. I'd like to take photos every 5 seconds for more than a month and then stitch the photos later together.

Its important the focus doesn't change and it would be nice if the RAW photos can be obtained for post processing later.

Is this possible with the Xiaomi Yi camera?

 

[Andy_S]

a) external power source: sure.
b) no need to connect to ANY computer, just grab large enough storage card. Camera can't operate & be connected via usb as mass storage.
c) focus can't change, its fix-focus.
d) RAW is possible.

 

[encore2097]

a) external power source: sure.
b) no need to connect to ANY computer, just grab large enough storage card. Camera can't operate & be connected via usb as mass storage.
c) focus can't change, its fix-focus.
d) RAW is possible.

Thanks Andy_S!

a, c, d : awesome!

b: I see a post about control via PC (https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threa...-control-configure-from-pc-win-lin-mac.11206/) , is it possible to save to small SD card and then pull image inbetween shots or something?

A RAW shot every 5 seconds for 30 days is about 1.5 TB so I need a hard drive, I'm not aware of any SD card THAT large

 

[Andy_S]

you could download them images via C&C, sure, but there is no automated script to do so. Yes, it is possible to loop search the dir & download newly added files, but it will take much longer than 5s. RAW photos are much larger and it takes already ~3-5s to download standard JPEG.

Oh and it works over wifi ONLY.

 

[Andy_S]

HMMMMmmmmmmmmmmm... what if the camera mounted nfs / smb ? Gotta try (in the evening)

 

[reverend]

HMMMMmmmmmmmmmmm... what if the camera mounted nfs / smb ? Gotta try (in the evening)

Maybe a tftp client might work for this as well as it's very lightweight and a simple protocol and would just need a tftp server installing on the Linux laptop?

 

[Andy_S]

it is still limited by camera's max transfer rate which we got up to 1.2MB/s.

 

[encore2097]

it is still limited by camera's max transfer rate which we got up to 1.2MB/s.

Is that the limitation of the USB port, Wi-Fi, or SDcard reader/writer interface?

I ended up getting a PS3 eye-toy.. its only 640x480 but it was only $5.. I'll play with that for a bit and then see if I get something stable and will upgrade to a multi megapixel RAW camera

 

[Andy_S]

wifi.

 

[encore2097]

wifi.

Did you have any success with the nfs / smb mount? Was this over Wi-Fi or USB?

Since, I'm using USB for power, is it possible to use USB for data as well? It sounds like the the Yi Cam runs linux, if thats the case, mounting the camera as a disk drive on a host PC might be fast enough to pull pictures from the device while sending commands via the web interface. Alternatively, the camera could act as the USB host and the linux PC mounted as a destination to save files... any interesting possibilities!

Is there a dumb of the firmware somewhere or a WiKi on how it works, what it runs, etc??

Two things I'm lacking at the moment: time and a Yi camera. The latter will be solved when mine arrives from China!

 

[Andy_S]

i totally forgot about it Sorry... been busy lately, new job, weekends with daughter... Sorry

 

[encore2097]

Haha.. life

I'll do some research and update!