Looking for cheap ILCs to embed

I'm looking for as-small-as-possible, cheap, interchangeable-lens cameras to embed in a device I'm making.

There are two key features I'm looking for:

1. Easy to remote-trigger capture of a photo using an Arduino.
2. Provides some trivial way to get a remote live view (without disabling the trigger mechanism accessible to an Arduino).

A wired HDMI live view output (with camera status markings) would be OK, but a live view via WiFi could be better. Best would be if the camera can act as a WWW server to provide a live view visible via WiFi without an app -- just using a WWW browser to access the live video address.

How cheap am I looking for? Ideally less than $300 -- used body only is fine.

I don't care much about the sensor size and resolution as long as it is MFT or larger, and DSLRs with live view modes would be OK. Camera body size needs to be no bigger than a Sony A7 and preferably smaller than that.

Any suggestions?

The best fit to that which I have on hand is an EOS M, but it requires NIR triggering, which is awkward.

Thanks.

Look at Samsung NX-1000 and other NX bodies. We use them twinned for 3D cameras. I think you can do remote finder via wifi, though I've never even tried it. No other viewfinder option other than back screen. APS-C, cheap.

Have you looked into the Olympus Air A01? The SDK was only published for Apple and Android, but iirc it's all www and cgi scripting so an Arduino might have enough power to handle it.

Best wishes,

Sterling

SterlingBjorndahl wrote:

Have you looked into the Olympus Air A01? The SDK was only published for Apple and Android, but iirc it's all www and cgi scripting so an Arduino might have enough power to handle it.

They'd be very appropriate if they weren't so darn expensive. As is, I can literally get a Sony A7 for less than one of the A01! Incidentally, the Sony DSC-QX1 is better than the A01 in every way... except for being even harder to get and hence pricier: I see just one for sale, and it's $1,616.58 from Japan! Originally the QX1 sold for around $400 new, which was pretty good for a 20MP APS-C sensor.

ProfHankD wrote:

SterlingBjorndahl wrote:

Have you looked into the Olympus Air A01? The SDK was only published for Apple and Android, but iirc it's all www and cgi scripting so an Arduino might have enough power to handle it.

They'd be very appropriate if they weren't so darn expensive. As is, I can literally get a Sony A7 for less than one of the A01! Incidentally, the Sony DSC-QX1 is better than the A01 in every way... except for being even harder to get and hence pricier: I see just one for sale, and it's $1,616.58 from Japan! Originally the QX1 sold for around $400 new, which was pretty good for a 20MP APS-C sensor.

Yeah, and sadly, the QX family were crippled by:

1)  No wired tethering control

2)  A severely crippled wifi control API - on the QX100, you could not delete images remotely.  When designing the camera, it appears Sony just lopped all of the controls off of one of the RX100 devices without bothering to think about what local capabilities needed to be implemented in the remote API that were missing.

Blackmagic Micro is probably the best match to your technical needs, but not your cost goals.

I wish someone would put an MFT or APS-C sensor that had a CSI-2 interface on a host board that could talk to a Raspi or Jetson...  Sadly in dedicated ILCs, SLVS-EC dominates over CSI-2.

Could a Z CAM E1 work?

Small MFT camera. Pretty much defunct nowadays, but apparently still available new (but expensive - $700) from some places. I see it on the usual auction sites pretty regularly. There is a used one up for sale on ebay right now, item #175372853907.

It can be controlled over HTTP (WiFi or IP-over-USB) or through its I/O port. I don't think you can get the video stream through its WWW server, but it has a dedicated TCP server that serves the H264 frames.

https://github.com/imaginevision/Z-Camera-Doc/tree/master/E1

My own experiments with a Teensy (not an Arduino but close enough.)
https://github.com/RagnarJensen/Z-CAM-E1-IO

Ragnar Jensen wrote:

Could a Z CAM E1 work?

Small MFT camera. Pretty much defunct nowadays, but apparently still available new (but expensive - $700) from some places. I see it on the usual auction sites pretty regularly. There is a used one up for sale on ebay right now, item #175372853907.

$700 is two used Sony A7... and the A7 has no trouble being controlled via WiFi, including image transfer and live view (even from an ESP32), and it only takes an NIR LED and a resistor for any Arduino-compatible to fire the shutter via NIR remote.

PS: I've recently realized that FE bodies may be a problem due to mount vignetting, but it's not that hard to simply crop-out the vignetted area.

It can be controlled over HTTP (WiFi or IP-over-USB) or through its I/O port. I don't think you can get the video stream through its WWW server, but it has a dedicated TCP server that serves the H264 frames.

https://github.com/imaginevision/Z-Camera-Doc/tree/master/E1

My own experiments with a Teensy (not an Arduino but close enough.)
https://github.com/RagnarJensen/Z-CAM-E1-IO

Cool, but not cool/cheap enough...