Panoramic pictures w/ PTZs?

Tolting Colt Acres

Tolting Colt Acres

Pulling my weight
Jun 7, 2016
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Anyone aware of a piece of linux command-line software, or method, by which a Hikvision PTZ camera could be used to create a panoramic photograph?

I'm assuming I can set, via a script (perl, php, etc.) the camera's x/y axis through the api using and then capture an image, traversing the x or y axis, capturing photos as I go along, which I can then pipe into another application to created a stitched image.

I'd like to automate this process to create a panoramic picture for weatherstation purposes.
 
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I've done it before, not with a linux app/script though. I generate 60-80 or so images and feed them into Microsoft ICE to get outputs like this (obviously you can get much higher resolution outputs than this).

aGpk2vI.jpg
 
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Took me some time, but, I culled together a workable script. The panotools link was useful, but I had to install quite a bit of software -- much of it I had to download the source and compile manually, as RPMs were not available for my distro (CentOS 7.5) though various yum repositories.

Hugin was the worst. I had to download and compile a dozen different support libraries and utilities (newer version of cmake and boost, exiv, hdf5, lwxwidgets, fftw, openexr, exiftool, vigra, glew, ilmbase, hugin and enblend). Probably not for the faint of heart :)

I snap 7 pictures 46 degrees apart, with the cameras field of view it yields a near 360 degree image. Elevation is 18 degrees as to not capture the top of the enclosure. The camera expects values multiplied by 10 as the parameters for elevation and azimuth are expressed in 10ths of a degree.

This photo is taken on my camera mounted at the very top of my TX-455 tower (currently cranked down) so is about 40' above ground level. You can see bits and pieces of my A6270-13S, A3WS and A3S on the mast below.

oi5cj.jpg
 
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#!/bin/sh
move_camera () {
COUNTDOWN=0 ;
echo "<PTZData><AbsoluteHigh><elevation>$1</elevation><azimuth>$2</azimuth><absoluteZoom>00</absoluteZoom></AbsoluteHigh></PTZData>" | \
curl -X PUT -s -d @- http://user:pass@ip.address.of.camera/ISAPI/PTZCtrl/channels/1/absolute > /dev/null
echo -n Moving camera to $1 $2
until [ $COUNTDOWN -gt 59 ] ; do
curl -X GET http://user:pass@ip.address.of.camera/ISAPI/PTZCtrl/channels/1/status > /tmp/pano/status.txt 2>&1
E=`grep elevation /tmp/pano/status.txt | tr '>' ' ' | tr '<' ' ' | awk '{print $2}'`
A=`grep azimuth /tmp/pano/status.txt | tr '>' ' ' | tr '<' ' ' | awk '{print $2}'`
sleep 1;
if [ $E -eq $1 -a $A -eq $2 ] ; then
return 0;
fi
let COUNTDOWN+=1
done
return 1;
}

rm -f /tmp/pano/*
COUNTER=0

until [ $COUNTER -gt 6 ]; do
str="abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"
fname="${str:$COUNTER:1}"
let AZIMUTH="$((0 + $COUNTER * 460))"
move_camera 180 $AZIMUTH
if [ $? -eq 1 ] ; then
echo Error encountered. aborting...
exit
fi
curl -s -X GET http://user:pass@ip.address.of.camera/ISAPI/Streaming/channels/1/picture > /tmp/pano/${fname}.jpg
echo ... CLICK!
let COUNTER+=1
done

echo Creating panoramic photo
cd /tmp/pano
pto_gen -o project.pto *.jpg
cpfind -o project.pto --multirow --celeste project.pto
cpclean -o project.pto project.pto
linefind -o project.pto project.pto
autooptimiser -a -m -l -s -o project.pto project.pto
pano_modify --canvas=AUTO --crop=AUTO -o project.pto project.pto
hugin_executor --stitching --prefix=project project.pto
convert project.tif project.jpg
cp -f project.jpg /var/www/html/pano.jpg
echo Finis!
 
Gigapan works like this. It is theoretical a PT mount, just like a PT(Z) IP camera. It can create real big panorama's.

If you could program a PTZ camera (i bet it could be done with HTTP API) , to take pictures at specified presets, left, right, up or down, and stitch them with Photoshop, Microsoft ICE, etc etc.

s-l640.jpg
 
Tolting Colt Acres said:
Not sure I'd want to put my Sony Alpha 99 on top of my tower though :D
Click to expand...

Nah, me neither :D

But with the http api it would be possible to code a program that does the same as the gigapan. + waterproof also haha. Just without the MP a DSLR has :D
 
Here's a slightly different version which traverses both the x and y axis. Takes a loooong time to run, though, matching up all the control points. Would go faster if I could find a way to pre-define the stitching order of the images, since I know what sequence they're taken in. Might help eliminate the stitching errors as well.

Code: 
#!/bin/sh

move_camera () {
   COUNTDOWN=0 ;
   echo "<PTZData><AbsoluteHigh><elevation>$1</elevation><azimuth>$2</azimuth><absoluteZoom>00</absoluteZoom></AbsoluteHigh></PTZData>" | \
      curl -X PUT -s -d @- http://user:pass@w.x.y.z:p/ISAPI/PTZCtrl/channels/1/absolute > /dev/null
   echo -n Moving camera to $1 $2
   until [ $COUNTDOWN -gt 59 ] ; do
      curl -X GET http://user:pass@w.x.y.z:p/ISAPI/PTZCtrl/channels/1/status > /tmp/reh/status.txt 2>&1
      E=`grep elevation /tmp/pano/status.txt | tr '>' ' ' | tr '<' ' ' | awk '{print $2}'`
      A=`grep azimuth   /tmp/pano/status.txt | tr '>' ' ' | tr '<' ' ' | awk '{print $2}'`
      sleep 1;
      if [ $E -eq $1 -a $A -eq $2 ] ; then
         return 0;
      fi
      let COUNTDOWN+=1
   done
   return 1;
}

rm -f /tmp/pano/*
ELEVATION=180
until [ $ELEVATION -gt 900 ] ; do
   AZIMUTH=000
   until [ $AZIMUTH -gt 3150 ]; do
       printf -v fname "%03d%04d" $ELEVATION $AZIMUTH
       move_camera $ELEVATION $AZIMUTH
       if [ $? -eq 1 ] ; then
          echo Error encountered. aborting...
          exit
       fi
       curl -s -X GET http://user:pass@w.x.y.z:p/ISAPI/Streaming/channels/1/picture > /tmp/pano/${fname}.jpg
       echo ... CLICK! $fname
       let AZIMUTH+=450
   done
   let ELEVATION+=120
done

echo Creating panoramic photo
cd /tmp/pano
pto_gen -o project.pto *.jpg
cpfind -o project.pto --multirow --celeste project.pto
cpclean -o project.pto project.pto
linefind -o project.pto project.pto
autooptimiser -a -m -l -s -o project.pto project.pto
pano_modify --canvas=AUTO --crop=AUTO -o project.pto project.pto
hugin_executor --stitching --prefix=project project.pto
convert project.tif project.jpg
cp -f project.jpg /var/www/html/pano.jpg
echo Finis!

2ngez9u.jpg
 
Tolting Colt Acres said:
Anyone aware of a piece of linux command-line software, or method, by which a Hikvision PTZ camera could be used to create a panoramic photograph?

I'm assuming I can set, via a script (perl, php, etc.) the camera's x/y axis through the api using and then capture an image, traversing the x or y axis, capturing photos as I go along, which I can then pipe into another application to created a stitched image.

I'd like to automate this process to create a panoramic picture for weatherstation purposes.
Click to expand...
I was uising ImageMagick for our webcam for years and now use Montage. Linux. We are uising an Axis PTZ and run it through an array of images and then uise Montage to stitch them up.

 
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