HALCON 8.0 Image Acquisition Interface for SICK IVP Ranger D/E 3D Cameras

This page provides the documentation of the HALCON RangerE image acquisition interface for SICK IVP Ranger D and Ranger E cameras. Registered customers can download the latest revision of this interface from the MVTec WWW server.

Revision: 3.4

System Requirements

• Intel compatible PC with Windows XP.
• Intel PRO/1000 network interface card.
• Successfully installed eBUS high performance driver.
• Successfully installed SICK IVP Ranger Studio version 4.0. Please make sure that the the icon_c_40.dll is available via the %PATH% environment variable. Note that for using the HALCON RangerE interface you need a valid .prm file (e.g., Ranger E55 Default.prm) for your specific camera configuration, which must be created using Ranger Studio.
• HALCON image acquisition interface hAcqRangerE.dll or parhAcqRangerE.dll, respectively. If you have installed the interface properly, both DLLs should reside in bin\%HALCONARCH% within the HALCON base directory %HALCONROOT% you have chosen during the installation of HALCON.

Features

• Synchronous and asynchronous grabbing.
• Image or measurement configuration available.
• Access to multiple measurement components either via multi-channel images (with grab_image_[async]) or via image tuples (with grab_data_[async]).
• Access to mark data via grab_data_[async].
• Software control of all camera parameters.

Limitations

• No LUTs.
• No support for Ruler E cameras.
• No support of 3D calibration and rectification yet.

Reading Mark Data

The Ranger 3D cameras allow to read the optional mark data (either a counter or the actual encoder values). To query these data together with the grabbed image data, you have to use the operators grab_data or grab_data_async. If the mark data is enabled in the used camera configuration file, the output parameter Data of grab_data[_async] contains for every mark sub-component the value and the status. The order of these integer values corresponds to the order of the images in the parameter Image.

Description

Parameters for open_framegrabber():

	Name		'RangerE'		The name of the HALCON image acquisition interface.
	HorizontalResolution		---		Ignored.
	VerticalResolution		---		Ignored.
	ImageWidth		0, 256 ... 1536		The width of the desired image part. Please note that the image width must be divisible by 8. If set to 0 the value in the prm-file (or the current setting of the camera) is used. Default: 0.
	ImageHeight		0, height		The height of the desired image part (in image mode) or the number of scans (in measurement mode). If set to 0 the value in the prm-file (or the current setting of the camera) is used. Default: 0.
	StartRow		---		Ignored.
	StartColumn		0, 1 ... 1280		The column coordinate of the upper left pixel within the desired image part. Note that the sum of StartColumn and ImageWidth must not exceed 1536. If set to 0 the value in the prm-file (or the current setting of the camera) is used.
	Field		---		Ignored.
	BitsPerChannel		---		Ignored (the number of bits per channel is determined automatically by reading the parameter file).
	ColorSpace		'image', 'measurement'		The desired camera configuration. If set to 'image', every call of grab_image and grab_image_async will result in a gray value image. If set to 'measurement', a multi-channel image containing the measurement components as defined in the prm-file will be returned. Default: 'measurement'.
	Generic		buffer size, -1		Buffer size in MB. Default: 50.
	ExternalTrigger		'true', 'false'		Activate/deactivate external triggering. If activated, pulse triggering is used.
	CameraType		prm-file, 'default'		Name of the camera parameter file. In case of 'default', the current camera settings are used. Default: 'default'.
	Device		ip_address		IP address of the camera.
	Port		---		Ignored.
	LineIn		---		Ignored.

Parameters for set_framegrabber_param():

Note that most of the following parameters (and also the valid parameter values!) depend on the capabilities of the used camera. Furthermore, the default values may depend on the current camera settings.

	'active_channel'		value		Sets the number of the active channel if measurement configuration is chosen.
	'configuration'		'image', 'measurement'		Sets the configuration of the camera. If set to 'image', every call of grab_image and grab_image_async will result in a gray value image. If set to 'measurement', a multi-channel image containing the measurement components as defined in the prm-file will be returned. Default: 'measurement'.
	'continuous_grabbing'		'enable', 'disable'		If 'continuous_grabbing' is enabled, data is continuously acquired by the camera. Otherwise data is only acquired when calling grab_image or grab_image_async.
	'do_save_parameters'		prm-file		Save the parameter settings to the specified filename.
	'grab_timeout'		value		Specify the desired timeout (milliseconds passed as an integer) for aborting a pending grab. The value -1 sets the timeout to 65535. Default: 5000.
	'module_name'		name		The name of the parameter to be changed, e.g., 'number of rows'.
	'module_path'		path		The path to a component in the XML structure.
	'module_value'		value		The new value for the parameter specified by the parameters 'module_name' and 'module_path'.
	'trigger_mode'		'0', '2'		If 'trigger_mode' is set to '0' the camera is free running; if set to '2' pulse triggering is activated.

Parameters for get_framegrabber_param():

Additional parameters supported by get_framegrabber_param only. Note that all parameters supported by set_framegrabber_param except the ones with prefix 'do_' can also be accessed by get_framegrabber_param. Furthermore, corresponding to the parameters supported by set_framegrabber_param, there may exist additional read-only parameters with the following postfixes:

• '_description': These parameters provide the tooltip of the corresponding parameter as a string.
• '_range': These parameters provide the minimum, maximum, stepwidth, and default values for the corresponding integer or float parameter as a tuple with 4 elements, e.g., get_framegrabber_param(..,'exposure_range',..) will return the output tuple [min,max,step,default]. Optionally, this tuple can also contain additional valid string values like 'auto' or 'manual'.
• '_values': These parameters provide the valid value list for the corresponding parameter as a tuple, e.g., get_framegrabber_param(..,'volatile_values',..) will return the output tuple ['enable','disable'].

	'channel_names'		channel_names (string)		The component names of the accessible channels are returned as a tuple of strings.
	'image_available'		image_available (int)		Returns the status of the last asynchronous grab command. The value 1 means that the image is already acquired and thus can be fetched by grab_image_async without delay.
	'revision'		revision (string)		The revision number of the HALCON interface.

Release Notes

• Revision 3.4 (May 26, 2009):
  • Adapted to icon_API version 4.0.
  • Added reading of mark data (counter or encoder values) via grab_data_[async].
• Revision 3.3 (Feb 9, 2009):
  • Adapted to icon_API version 3.3.2.
  • Added auto-detect functionality for the HDevelop Image Acquisition Assistant.
  • Added implementations of grab_data and grab_data_async to return a tuple of images in measurement mode instead of multi-channel images.
  • Enabled button for the parameter 'do_save_parameters' in the HDevelop Image Acquisition Assistant.
  • The parameter 'grab_timeout' now supports the value -1 which internally sets the timeout to 65535.
• Revision 3.2 (Apr 23, 2008):
  • Bugfix in info_framegrabber(...,'device',...) to prevent accessing uninitialized memory.
  • Added read-only parameters with postfix '_description', '_range', and '_values' to enable the easy parameterization via a generic graphical user interface.
• Revision 3.1 (Feb 27, 2008):
  • Adapted to icon_API version 3.3.
  • In open_framegrabber, the trigger was not disabled when ExternalTrigger was set to 'false'. This bug has been fixed.
  • In case of grab timeouts, empty images were delivered. This bug has been fixed.
  • Improved image buffer handling.
• Revision 3.0 (Oct 16, 2007):
  • First official release.