Good news!
The beauty of this community is on the collaboration. This new firmware proves it.
I have the pleasure of announcing that "ArduCAM OSD" and "MinimOSD-Extra" teams are now working together to make MinimOSD better and better.
I've been planning this fusion with Gábor Zóltan and Pedro Santos and we've started a nice friendship.
We spend the latest days merging and retouching everything to improve your experience with the new firmware. The Wiki was also updated for matching the new resources.
What's up?
You'll se all those awesome improvements from MinimOSD-Extra as well as improvements we made together.
The latest one is the new auto detection and updating of the EEPROM mapping .
From now on both OSD Firmware and ArduCAM OSD Config Tool will share the same internal signature.
So, both will detect the need for an EEPROM remapping preventing from loading or saving truncated data.
After a firmware upgrading the OSD Config Tool will detect an outdated mapping updating it automatically.
If you update your firmware by other way, the new firmware will alert you on screen and the Config Tool will repair automatically before you load anything from the EEPROM.
Update your MinimOSD right now. The most important: Have fun!
Important NOTES:
- After install the new "ArduCAM OSD Config Tool" remember that you need to update the Character Set. A new one is available on the install folder. From now on it will be always there as "OSD_Charset.mcm".
- Both sides of the MinimOSD need to be powered during a Character Set updating. Max7456's internal memory is really picky about voltage level during a charset update.
Download it from here:
Comments
@Medeiros: Good to now that it's working fine! Yes, feeding the board like that is the best option.
@Andrew: Yeah... I saw the blinking behavior. Didn't seems to be fast enough and without a buffer... no way. Even with Max7456 you cannot clean and write an entire screen on each vsync interrupt without some flickering. That's why I chose overwriting the panels instead.
Wow... that one for Mikrocopter is really impressive!
@Mohammed: I didn't give up yet, but it's being frustrating.
The USB/PTP works fine. However, its available only for older PowerShot cameras. It's a shame, but Canon isn't including "PTP Remote Control" on newest PowerShot's firmwares anymore. And it's even worse because USB and video-out ports are now merged on a proprietary connector. How to invest on such expensive and complicated hacking?
now ok!!!! I used the MinimOSD_20.hex and the Config_OSD_20.zip and all works great! And I upgraded the char with feeding the MinimOSD with lipo 12V at same time with the FTDI cable. Thanks!!!!!!!!!!!
@Sandro: You mention "Personally, I have some plans on a new board with more resources. I'm still studying how to make this happen. Maybe even a fully graphic OSD. I need more free time for starting a new code adventure. ;)"
I would be very interested in a fully graphical OSD for Ardupilot. I find that the symbology of the 7456 based designs doesn't match up to that of the systems like EagleTree, and SmartOSD for Mikrocopter. Differences are both in the range of character sizes and the ability to draw lines. I have used a BOB4 module, which does allow this, but is limited because it is only single buffered so I have to erase lines before I redraw and then end up with flashing (video here). Not too objectionable with just a horizon line, but pretty annoying when I draw a moving map display.
I have considered using the SmartOSD by emulating the Mikrocopter debug bus output, but the only ICD data I have found is from the Mikrocopter source code, which does not have an open source license, It does have nice symbology though.
Really cool man! What is the status on the USB Host + OSD board?? I'm really interested in it because I plan to use a Canon PowerShot in the belly of a Bixler for terrain photography. USB Host/PTP would really help.
Thanks,
Kabir
@James: you've described the OSD of my dreams. Probably we have no such precision on the sensors to make it work so fine. But it would be really nice even to have just more resolution and freedom to design better panels. Yesterday, Pedro did show me a nice project that does it. Let's try to understand how it works and see what hardware is needed to integrate it with MAVLink, etc.
@Medeiros and James: Even after tying the two power stages (soldering the power jumpers) attaching only the FTDI uses to not work well. That depends on the USB bus of your computer. Sometimes it has less than 5V and the result is a lot of fuzzy and malformed characters on screen. So, even with a tied board, may be necessary feeding the second stage to ensure it has the required power.
If you solder the jumper to power both sides from APM, the FTDI will also power them (when plugged in) so updating charsets becomes simple.
"Both sides of the MinimOSD need to be powered during a Character Set updating": I feed with 12V (camera, tx video and MinimOSD). I need to plug de battery when the FTDI cable is conected to update the charset? thanks
Nice work. The Minim-extra stuff is great. It provides a huge level of functionality and the best part is it is still open source, so I can still make mods in the unlikely event there is another piece of functionality that I need.
A graphical OSD would be amazing. Imagine being able to see your waypoints virtually superimposed over the real ground surface that you see on the camera and moving as the plane moves, or the location of other offscreen objects (eg. other APM equipped planes) on a small map as in most FPS computer games, or advanced visual camera targeting with distance to target etc. showing up onscreen.
Cheers
James
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