ZCam
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ZCam is a brand of
time-of-flight camera A time-of-flight camera (ToF camera), also known as time-of-flight sensor (ToF sensor), is a range imaging camera system for measuring distances between the camera and the subject for each point of the image based on time-of-flight, the round ...
products for
video Video is an Electronics, electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving picture, moving image, visual Media (communication), media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, whi ...
applications by Israeli developer 3DV Systems. The ZCam supplements full-color
video camera A video camera is an optical instrument that captures videos, as opposed to a movie camera, which records images on film. Video cameras were initially developed for the television industry but have since become widely used for a variety of other ...
imaging with real-time
range imaging Range imaging is the name for a collection of techniques that are used to produce a 2D image showing the distance to points in a scene from a specific point, normally associated with some type of sensor device. The resulting range image has pix ...
information, allowing for the capture of video in 3D. The original ZCam, released in 2000, was an ENG video camera add-on used for digital video
compositing Compositing is the process or technique of combining visual elements from separate sources into single images, often to create the illusion that all those elements are parts of the same scene. Live action, Live-action shooting for compositing ...
. Before agreeing in March 2009 to sell its assets to
Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...
, 3DV had planned to release a
ranging Length measurement, distance measurement, or range measurement (ranging) all refer to the many ways in which length, distance, or range can be measured. The most commonly used approaches are the rulers, followed by transit-time methods and the ...
video
webcam A webcam is a video camera which is designed to record or stream to a computer or computer network. They are primarily used in Videotelephony, video telephony, live streaming and social media, and Closed-circuit television, security. Webcams can b ...
(previously called the Z-Sense), also under the name ZCam. The ZCam webcam was one of several competing real-time range imaging camera products in development that target home
game controller A game controller, gaming controller, or simply controller, is an input device or Input/Output Device, input/output device used with video games or entertainment systems to provide input to a video game. Input devices that have been classified as ...
applications.


Technology

The ZCam's time-of-flight camera system features a near-
infrared Infrared (IR; sometimes called infrared light) is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than that of visible light but shorter than microwaves. The infrared spectral band begins with the waves that are just longer than those ...
(NIR) pulse illumination component, as well as an
image sensor An image sensor or imager is a sensor that detects and conveys information used to form an image. It does so by converting the variable attenuation of light waves (as they refraction, pass through or reflection (physics), reflect off objects) into s ...
with a fast gating mechanism. Based on the known
speed of light The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted , is a universal physical constant exactly equal to ). It is exact because, by international agreement, a metre is defined as the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time i ...
, ZCam coordinates the timing of NIR
pulse wave A pulse wave or pulse train or rectangular wave is a non-sinusoidal waveform that is the periodic version of the rectangular function. It is held high a percent each cycle ( period) called the duty cycle and for the remainder of each cycle is ...
emissions from the illuminator with the gating of the image sensor, so that the signal reflected from within a desired depth range is captured exclusively. The amount of pulse signal collected for each pixel corresponds to where within the depth range the pulse was reflected from, and can thus be used to calculate the distance to a corresponding point on the captured subject.Alt URL
Due to the fast timing required for light-based time-of-flight, the ZCam uses custom hardware for illumination and gating. The illuminator is a series of NIR
laser diodes The laser diode chip removed and placed on the eye of a needle for scale A laser diode (LD, also injection laser diode or ILD or semiconductor laser or diode laser) is a semiconductor device similar to a light-emitting diode in which a diode p ...
around the
lens A lens is a transmissive optical device that focuses or disperses a light beam by means of refraction. A simple lens consists of a single piece of transparent material, while a compound lens consists of several simple lenses (''elements'') ...
barrel, switched by special high-speed
driver circuit In electronics, a driver is a electrical circuit, circuit or electronic component, component used to control another circuit or component, such as a high-power transistor, liquid crystal display (LCD), stepper motors, Static random-access memor ...
s that produce pulses with a
rise time In electronics, when describing a voltage or current step function, rise time is the time taken by a signal to change from a specified low value to a specified high value. These values may be expressed as ratiosSee for example , and . or, equiva ...
and
fall time In electronics, fall time (pulse decay time) t_f is the time taken for the amplitude of a pulse to decrease (fall) from a specified value (usually 90% of the peak value exclusive of overshoot or undershoot) to another specified value (usually 10 ...
of less than one
nanosecond A nanosecond (ns) is a unit of time in the International System of Units (SI) equal to one billionth of a second, that is, of a second, or seconds. The term combines the SI prefix ''nano-'' indicating a 1 billionth submultiple of an SI unit (e ...
. Previously using an
image intensifier An image intensifier or image intensifier tube is a vacuum tube device for increasing the intensity of available light in an optical system to allow use under low-light conditions, such as at night, to facilitate visual imaging of low-light proce ...
for gating the image sensor, 3DV later developed a special solid-state image shutter, in the form of a
gallium arsenide Gallium arsenide (GaAs) is a III-V direct band gap semiconductor with a Zincblende (crystal structure), zinc blende crystal structure. Gallium arsenide is used in the manufacture of devices such as microwave frequency integrated circuits, monoli ...
-based
electro-optical Electro–optics is a branch of electrical engineering, electronic engineering, materials science, and material physics involving components, electronic devices such as lasers, laser diodes, LEDs, waveguides, etc. which operate by the propaga ...
chip Chip may refer to: Food * Chip (snack), thinly sliced and deep-fried gastro item ** Potato chips (US) or crisp (UK) * Chips (fried potato strips) (UK) or french fries (US) (common as a takeout side) * Game chips, thin chip/French fries * Choco ...
that is mounted atop the image sensor. The company was reportedly developing a gating solution based on less-expensive
CMOS Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS, pronounced "sea-moss ", , ) is a type of MOSFET, metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) semiconductor device fabrication, fabrication process that uses complementary an ...
-process fabrication. The time-of-flight camera is optically matched with a corresponding video camera, allowing the
RGB The RGB color model is an additive color model in which the red, green, and blue primary colors of light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three ...
video and range imaging to integrated together. 3DV refers to the combination as "RGBD" (or RGB-D), in which "D" refers to a "depth" or "distance"
channel Channel, channels, channeling, etc., may refer to: Geography * Channel (geography), a landform consisting of the outline (banks) of the path of a narrow body of water. Australia * Channel Country, region of outback Australia in Queensland and pa ...
.


Webcam

Targeted primarily at the
video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...
market, the ZCam webcam was designed to be used as a game controller like the
EyeToy The EyeToy is a color webcam for use with the PlayStation 2. Supported games use computer vision and gesture recognition to process images taken by the EyeToy. This allows players to interact with the games using motion, color detection, and als ...
, using
gesture recognition Gesture recognition is an area of research and development in computer science and language technology concerned with the recognition and interpretation of human gestures. A subdiscipline of computer vision, it employs mathematical algorithms to ...
to interpret hand and body gestures for controlling the interface, but without many of the complications of a purely 2D-based
computer vision Computer vision tasks include methods for image sensor, acquiring, Image processing, processing, Image analysis, analyzing, and understanding digital images, and extraction of high-dimensional data from the real world in order to produce numerical ...
approach. Developing the device since 2005, 3DV completed the initial prototype in late 2006, and officially announced the product in late 2007. The ZCam webcam had a 60- degree
field of view The field of view (FOV) is the angle, angular extent of the observable world that is visual perception, seen at any given moment. In the case of optical instruments or sensors, it is a solid angle through which a detector is sensitive to elec ...
, a
frame rate Frame rate, most commonly expressed in frame/s, or FPS, is typically the frequency (rate) at which consecutive images (Film frame, frames) are captured or displayed. This definition applies to film and video cameras, computer animation, and moti ...
of 60 Hz, a 1.3
megapixel In digital imaging, a pixel (abbreviated px), pel, or picture element is the smallest addressable element in a Raster graphics, raster image, or the smallest addressable element in a dot matrix display device. In most digital display devices, p ...
full color The RGB color model is an additive color model in which the red, green, and blue primary colors of light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three add ...
video resolution, and an
8-bit In computer architecture, 8-bit integers or other data units are those that are 8 bits wide (1 octet). Also, 8-bit central processing unit (CPU) and arithmetic logic unit (ALU) architectures are those that are based on registers or data bu ...
Quarter VGA ranging resolution (320x240 pixels with 256 depth levels per pixel). Precision was fine as 1-2 centimeters, with a practical ranging limit of 0.5–2.5 meters distance. The webcam connected via a
USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard, developed by USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), for digital data transmission and power delivery between many types of electronics. It specifies the architecture, in particular the physical ...
2.0 interface. Demonstrations included a boxing game,Alt URL
/ref> an airplane demo,
Windows Media Center Windows Media Center (WMC) is a discontinued digital video recorder and media player created by Microsoft. Media Center was first introduced to Windows in 2002 on Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE). It was included in Home Premium and U ...
hand-gesture control, and a body-gesture
Second Life ''Second Life'' is a multiplayer virtual world that allows people to create an Avatar (computing), avatar for themselves and then interact with other users and user-created content within a multi-user online environment. Developed for person ...
interface. 3DV stated that the webcam would be priced comparably to other peripherals in the gaming market such as the
PlayStation Eye The PlayStation Eye (trademarked PLAYSTATION Eye) is a digital camera device, similar to a webcam, for the PlayStation 3. The technology uses computer vision and gesture recognition to process images taken by the camera. This allows players to i ...
: less than
US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...
100, with a bundled US$69.99 price mentioned as a possibility. The webcam was to include
software development kit A software development kit (SDK) is a collection of software development tools in one installable package. They facilitate the creation of applications by having a compiler, debugger and sometimes a software framework. They are normally specific t ...
s for camera control and gesture recognition. 3DV originally projected the ZCam to be released before the end of 2008, then later revised the projection to 2009. In March 2009, the company agreed to sell its assets including the ZCam to a third party, later confirmed to be
Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...
.Alt URL
Following these reports, it was speculated that Microsoft would use the ZCam technology for a motion-sensing controller system for the
Xbox 360 The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the Xbox (console), original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox#Consoles, Xbox series. It was officially unveiled on MTV on May 12, 2005, with detail ...
video game console or its successor. This speculation increased in the month leading up to Microsoft's announcement of the
Kinect Kinect is a discontinued line of motion sensing input devices produced by Microsoft and first released in 2010. The devices generally contain RGB color model, RGB cameras, and Thermographic camera, infrared projectors and detectors that map dep ...
3D depth-sensing device at the 2009 Electronic Entertainment Expo, during which leaked information about that device prompted frequent comparisons with the ZCam.


See also

*
Time-of-flight camera A time-of-flight camera (ToF camera), also known as time-of-flight sensor (ToF sensor), is a range imaging camera system for measuring distances between the camera and the subject for each point of the image based on time-of-flight, the round ...
* Canesta *
Kinect Kinect is a discontinued line of motion sensing input devices produced by Microsoft and first released in 2010. The devices generally contain RGB color model, RGB cameras, and Thermographic camera, infrared projectors and detectors that map dep ...
* Omek Interactive *
PrimeSense PrimeSense was an Israeli 3D sensing company based in Tel Aviv. PrimeSense had offices in Israel, North America, Japan, Singapore, Korea, China and Taiwan. PrimeSense was bought by Apple Inc. for $360 million on November 24, 2013. History Pri ...
* Softkinetic


Footnotes


References


External links

*
Profile
of the original ZCam at
JVC JVC (short for Japan Victor Company) is a Japanese brand owned by JVCKenwood. Founded in 1927 as the Victor Talking Machine Company of Japan and later as , the company was best known for introducing Japan's first televisions and for developin ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zcam Webcams Gesture recognition