Sony previews the company's first IEEE1394b machine vision camera module, XCD-V50.

Sony previews the company's first IEEE1394b machine vision camera module.

Sony's IEEE-1394b XCD-V50 Firewire Camera

VISION 2004, Stuttgart, 19. - 21. October 2004 - Sony Europe's Image Sensing Solutions division held the company's first public preview of its forthcoming IEEE1394b cameras. The Sony on-stand demonstration included a pre-release sample version of the forthcoming XCD-V50 camera linked by an IEEE1394b 800mbps link to a VAIO PC equipped with a 1394b interface board. The camera was monitoring a moving AIBO (Sony robotic dog) to demonstrate the capturing of live images in full resolution (VGA), and full speed (60fps).

Sony expects that the adoption of the new revision of the standard is likely to ensure that IEEE1394 will remain the solution of choice for industrial vision applications. It will allow Sony, which pioneered the use of IEEE1394 in industrial image sensing products, to bring new levels of functionality and performance to its customers.

Sony is expected to lead the way as it did with IEEE1394 version 'a' cameras for the machine vision market. The company's first IEEE1394b camera, the XCD-V50, is planned to be a VGA monochrome model based on a 1/3-type CCD, support 60fps and 800Mbit/s throughput, and include added functionality with extremely low power and small size. Other expected features consist of full IIDC compatibility including hard and soft trigger, shutter control and gamma correction. The XCD-V50CR, a raw colour model, is expected to follow soon after.