How to build an infrared camera at home for less than $100 (Part 1)
We all probably have seen in the movies the special forces use a device that allows you to see through the walls and detect objects by their temperature.
Is it cool? I think it’s awesome. I really started to want to get something like this, for further consideration.
After some investigation, I found out that the simplest infrared camera with color LSD screen in average costs around $300 and the price can be up to $30k. That’s why I decided to design and build my own infrared camera at home and with the minimal cost. Okay, let’s start…
It was decided to make a device that could be remotely managed from a smartphone or computer via the application. For the hardware part, was taken the cheapest from Arduino family microcontrollers — Arduino Nano, while Windows Forms was used to create the desktop application.
How you can see in the table below I spent about $50 on my infrared camera, all of this details were bought on aliexpress.com, nothing special, but I want to make short comments about each item from the table.
- Arduino Nano — I think this controller is the best solution for our situation: cheap, small with 22 digital I/O pins and operating voltage 5V, it’s more than enough for us.
- Servo mount kit MG995 — also the cheapest kit that I found and with a very simple construction, which takes about 5 minutes to assemble all the details together.
- Servo Futaba S3003 — since our infrared camera will consist only of the sensor and the camera and the laser pointer, then we won’t have a large load on the construction, which allows us to use rather weak servos.
Just two things:
The fact that we use 5V for Arduino power supply then torque will be 3.2kg/cm (4.8V), instead of 4.1kg/cm (6V).
You can use another type of servo, but choose according with this dimensions 40x20x36 mm. Otherwise you will have problem with Servo mount kit MG995.
4. Laser pointer SYD1230 (Red) — it’s not an obligatory element, but I decided that it would be convenient to see where exactly our camera is directed while scanning, following the laser pointer. In addition, either device looks better with laser :)
It’s best to buy a laser pointers without the case since they are cheaper and easier to install in the construction.
5. Thermosensor MLX90614ESF-DCI — is an infrared thermometer for non-contact temperature measurements and is the most important part of the infrared camera, so you need to pay a lot of attention in terms of sensor quality when buying it. There is a lot of version of these sensors in MLX90614ESF family (DCI, BCI, BAA, etc…) some of them are cheaper than BCI and DCI model, but very important that last letter should be “I”, which means that FOV = 5°.
FOV — field of view of our sensor, and the more it will be, the less accurate will be the temperature it will give, because it will be not only a point of temperature measurement in a focus, but also some area around it.
Also, we need a couple resistors 4k7 to build our electric scheme, a couple of contacts and wires and sheet of plexiglass, for making the basis to an infrared camera.
Before proceeding directly with the build an explanation of the electric schemes and connections, I would like to highlight the main pluses and minuses of this device.
Among the advantages is the cheapness of this device, the ability to remotely control the device and changing color gamma of term picture, as well as the ability to compare the resulting thermal photo with real photos.
The main disadvantages of this device are the operating time (1.5–3 minutes, depending on the quality of the photo), which in turn prevents its use on moving objects and the absence of its own screen, which makes connecting it to the PC.
All these features will be described in the following parts where the process of building the electrical circuit and the main aspects of software development for the device will be described in detail.
