Synchronized StartAcquisition of multiple cameras using ActionCommands

[hirschenberger]

Describe what you want to implement and what the issue & the steps to reproduce it are:

Hey, I have a 8 Racer 2 r2L4096-84g5m 5GigE Linescan cameras that I want to start at the same time.

I want to use ActionCommands to do this.

I realized that there's no possibility to select AcquisitionStart as TriggerSelector for Action1.

I can only select FrameStart as selector. This works but unfortunately only grabs one frame.

How can I start synchronized continuous acquisition with action commands?

Is your camera operational in Basler pylon viewer on your platform

Yes

Hardware setup used

Debian 13

Camera(s) used

8 x r2L4096-84g5m

Runtime information:

Pylon 8.0.2 64bit Debian Linux

[SMA2016a]

The Action Command is designed for scenarios where the application sends an action command for each frame.
More information: Action Commands – Basler Documentation

However, you might be looking for a Periodic Trigger instead.
See: Periodic Signal – Basler Documentation

[hirschenberger]

@SMA2016a Thanks for your quick reply. Unfortunately my camera is not running with a fixed framerate, it's using an external linetrigger.

Do you see any other software solution to start acquisition synchroniously?

[SMA2016a]

I do not understand your use case. Do you want to use Line trigger and acquisition ? do you use the same line trigger signal to all cameras?

[hirschenberger]

I have 8 cameras looking at an endless material belt. Left and right side, dark- and brightfield, upper and lower side.

All camera's coordinate systems are mapped to a common coordinate system where error locations are found.

The cameras are attached to a common pulsetrain as line-trigger.

For the coordinate-system transformations which are predetermined and later applied online, it is necessary that all cameras start acquisition deterministically, so that the images align the same at each restart.

I try to avoid using a hardware IO-Signal when it would be possible to do it in software.

If I remember correctly, on older Basler Linescan cameras it was possible to select AcquisitionStart as TriggerSelector for actions, right?

[thiesmoeller]

Yep. That's true.

Have to check with the racer team for a workaround.

Will be e.g. FrameActive Trigger and keep it active from a timer or a counter as a side effect of your action command.

[hirschenberger]

Thank you. Really appreciate your help.

Disclosure: I'm not using pypylon but pylon-cxx with Rust. But it doesn't matter in that case.

[thiesmoeller]

please try:

FrameBurstTriggerStart -> Source -> Action1
FrameBurstTriggerStart -> TriggerMode -> On
FrameBurstTriggerEnd -> Source -> SoftwareSignal1
FrameBurstTriggerEnd -> TriggerMode-> On

Of course you could also use a second Action signal to stop frame generation...

Disclaimer, i haven't validated this but to give you a fast indication for a possible fix ... you get the workaround idea hot out of the press.