I wasn't sure how best to setup the internal lighting, so I, well threw a selection of LEDs at it in three separate circuits/loops, These are on 12v circuits, and are isolated from & switched by the (5v) raspberry pi via a ULN2003AN transistor ic. I used all 7 base input channels, with the collector outputs switching the 12v LED loops through a selection of resistors as follows:
Loop 1) 4x 'Warm' LEDs: LOW (10k ohm) and HIGH (330 ohm)
Loop 2) 3x 'White' LEDs: LOW (10k ohm) and HIGH (330 ohm)
Loop 3) 36 IR LED array: LOW (10k ohm), 'MED' (5k ohm potentiometer) and ('HIGH' 330 ohm)
+ An opaque perspex 'windows' at either end for the natural light options..
Once the birdbox was in-situ, I wanted a simple way to fiddle about with the lighting, and came across Matt Richardson's excellent Flask tutorial, specifically his weblamp.py script example. This creates a webserver within python that allows me (and the kids...) to turn LEDs on, off up or down via a simple webpage:
The tutorial is an excerpt from his Getting Started with Raspberry Pi: An Introduction to the Fastest-Selling Computer in the World
book |
| Just for fun - someone's at home.... |
import RPi.GPIO as GPIO from flask import Flask, render_template, request app = Flask(__name__) #http://mattrichardson.com/Raspberry-Pi-Flask/ GPIO.setmode(GPIO.BCM) # Create a dictionary called pins to store the pin number, name, and pin state: pins = { 25 : {'name' : 'LED_IR_High', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 8 : {'name' : 'LED_IR_Med', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 7 : {'name' : 'LED_IR_Low', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 16 : {'name' : 'LED_Warm_High', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 12 : {'name' : 'LED_Warm_Low', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 21 : {'name' : 'LED_WHITE_High', 'state' : GPIO.LOW}, 20 : {'name' : 'LED_WHITE_Low', 'state' : GPIO.LOW} } # Set each pin as an output and make it low: for pin in pins: GPIO.setup(pin, GPIO.OUT) GPIO.output(pin, GPIO.LOW) @app.route("/") def main(): # For each pin, read the pin state and store it in the pins dictionary: for pin in pins: pins[pin]['state'] = GPIO.input(pin) # Put the pin dictionary into the template data dictionary: templateData = { 'pins' : pins } # Pass the template data into the template main.html and return it to the user return render_template('main.html', **templateData) # The function below is executed when someone requests a URL with the pin number and action in it: @app.route("/<changePin>/<action>") def action(changePin, action): # Convert the pin from the URL into an integer: changePin = int(changePin) # Get the device name for the pin being changed: deviceName = pins[changePin]['name'] # If the action part of the URL is "on," execute the code indented below: if action == "on": # Set the pin high: GPIO.output(changePin, GPIO.HIGH) # Save the status message to be passed into the template: message = "Turned " + deviceName + " on." if action == "off": GPIO.output(changePin, GPIO.LOW) message = "Turned " + deviceName + " off." if action == "toggle": # Read the pin and set it to whatever it isn't (that is, toggle it): GPIO.output(changePin, not GPIO.input(changePin)) message = "Toggled " + deviceName + "." # For each pin, read the pin state and store it in the pins dictionary: for pin in pins: pins[pin]['state'] = GPIO.input(pin) # Along with the pin dictionary, put the message into the template data dictionary: templateData = { 'message' : message, 'pins' : pins } return render_template('main.html', **templateData) if __name__ == "__main__": app.run(host='0.0.0.0', port=90, debug=True)
Make it executable as follows:
chmod 755 weblamp.py
Add the following toward the end of /etc/rc.local to make it run at boot:
python /home/pi/Documents/BirdCam2/flask/WebLamp/weblamp.py &
The IR sensitive camera is a v2 Raspberry pi Pi Noir (Camera 1). Unsurprisingly, the IR HIGH setting to just too bright, with the MED setting being the sweet spot. IR_Low (10k ohm) barely registers... At the moment I've got it set to IR_Medium.
I haven't made much use of the non IR LEDs yet, but the LifeCam Cinema webcam (Camera 2) does not see very well without them being on, which is bit of a shame. Maybe a ver 2018 box could have bigger natural light windows (Or I'll take a hacksaw to this one...).
We've seen a fair number of wasps taking an early interest and this Hornet (I think) taking a look... This is using the IR LED array and Pi Noir v2 camera
The LifeCam version looks like this.. the lesson is that I need a motion trigger on the non IR LEDs as there is only natural daylight illuminating this:
Some thoughts...
36 IR leds is excessive.
The raspberry v2 Pi Noir daylight light sensitivity is not good (with IR cut, so conceivably this is reducing the 'useful' daylight sensitivity).
I dont use the 'LOW' setting on the WARM or WHITE leds
LifeCame Cinema needs more natural light for unassisted daylight video (bigger windows)
Need an 'on-motion' event to turn on non-IR leds.
