How to: Change flash position in Smart Eye Pro

Open Smart Eye Pro (SEP) navigate to settings > Hardware settings and choose the “Flash Setup” tab. In SEP you can also just press Alt+F6 to go in to the hardware settings.

In the Flash Setup tab you define for the system where the different flashes (illuminators, LEDs) are places in relations to the cameras.

Usually our flashes are mounted to the cameras with a flash bracket (or beam). If you are using these brackets it is quite easy to just measure the distance from the center of the camera base to the center of the flash base and add that distance (in meter) in the field describing the X value of the placement (This per design 0.1m). This is particularly handy due to the fact that the brackets rotate in relations to the camera in such a way that you only need to add the X value when you have the flash relate to the camera you are rotation.

The coordinate system for the camera(s) has the positive y-direction upwards, the positive z-direction straight out of the camera and the positive x-direction to the left (seeing from the camera).

After adding a new flash or editing the position of an existing one its new position can be viewed in the "3D World View" (Window > New 3D World View).

The flashes are visualized by a yellow dot and the camera(s) by a small coordinate system with red, blue and green axes. The colored lines symbolize the x-, y- and z-axes (Red, green and blue) respectively on the camera coordinate system.

In this example we have the first flash, called “1” in this 3D view, fixed on the first camera with a flash beam. In this case I measured the distance from camera base center to flash base center to 10cm, so I add the number 0.1 (m) as the X value. And for the second flash, fixed to the third camera, I add the number -0.1 (m) as it is facing the opposite side from the camera native coordinate system. Therefore, it gets a negative value.

There is also the option to place the flashes freely in the WCS but you then have to measure the correct distances with the Laser Chessboard Tool (LCT). If you would be keen of trying this, contact Smart Eye Support.