External triggering D435 camera

[jasonb]

Hi everyone, I'm curious if there's any update on official support for hardware sync of the D435. I'd like to trigger the D435 with a pulse from an autopilot (pixracer) so that I can get synchronized pose data for the camera. I've looked through the Multiple Cameras setup white paper and here: https://forums.intel.com/s/question/0D50P0000490XgeSAE/how-to-properly-setup-external-triggering-on-d415-and-d435?language=en_US

Couple issues I see is that the D435 needs to be 1.8V level signal and autopilot outputs a 3.3V pulse. It looks like on the external sensor sync connector there is only a 3.3V voltage reference so I would need to make a simple voltage divider to get the reference I need. There aren't any details on how much current can be sourced from the 3.3V VDD so I'm not sure what value of resistors to use for the voltage divider, but this is what I'm thinking:

Will that work? Are there any EMI or other effects to consider? Cable lengths will be pretty short (<12 inches)

Thanks,

Jason

[Eliza_D_Intel · Accepted solution]

Hello jasonb, Thank you for your interest in the Intel RealSense D435 camera. I believe this thread might be very helpful to your project: https://github.com/IntelRealSense/librealsense/issues/2637 Before applying the external trigger, could you please confirm that the multi-camera configuration works? Are you looking to synchronize both Depth and RGB streams? Thank you and best regards, Eliza

[jasonb]

Hi Eliza,

Thanks for responding--I have a couple of D415's but only one D435 so I can't test the multi-camera setup with it. I am looking to synchronize both streams--from the link you sent I may have to change my approach slightly since it seems the color camera always wants to be master. There is a change in progress on the pixracer that will allow it ingest a trigger pulse and publish IMU data on that pulse. I will see if I can help push that along.

Thanks,

Jason