Hello everyone! In this article I will tell how started the company FPV3DCAM , how came the idea of creating the stereo cameras BlackBird and why 3D?
Historical information
About 5 years ago my wife Anna gave me for my birthday a radio-controlled (rc) car HSP Gladiator 1:10. After a few days of its management I was bored, so as to watch from the sidelines was not interesting, I wanted more, I wanted to be inside this small car and drive around the yard like a guy in one of the parts of the movie "Home Alone", fixing to the camera on the car.
Then I got the idea to install on the machine a camera and connect it to the monitor. From that day I began to sit on forums dedicated to rc and read various articles from which I learned about FPV (first person view). After examining the range of equipment for FPV, I learned that there were video glasses, receivers and transmitters, and various small video cameras. But I still could not decide what appropriates to me, as most people used the FPV on planes, and I had to put FPV on the machine.
I began to study the equipment for receiving the transmission, I needed to know what would the best for me, what the equipment I had to buy– 5.8 GHz, 2.4 GHz, 1.2 GHz or 900 MHz. When I learned all about the video transfer, I chose the 900 MHz as in this range the length of radio waves is the biggest, and hence the overcoming obstacles the radio wave would be better. And soon, I ordered at the hobbyking kit FPV: receiver, transmitter, camera. FPV kit from hobbyking. I got it in a couple of weeks. So I decided to install FPV on rc model. When everything was ready, I went outside, started the car, turned on the equipment, put on video goggles and saw the picture from the car. It was what I dreamed of...
But having driven a little time I was disappointed, as the machine all the time crashed somewhere – into curb, pole, it constantly crashed into something! Running machine I did not feel the distance and the speed, I didn't understand where certain objects.... At that moment I realized that I needed 3D.
Help – Many types of animals have eyes looking forward rather ahead, than sideways, because their way of life requires good estimation of the distance to the object,. So, mountain sheep, leopards, monkeys, tigers have stereoscopic vision, which is better, which helps to estimate the distance before jumping. People also have good stereoscopic vision, which allows to feel the volume, distance and speed, which allows to navigate better in the space. .
At the same time my friend Alexander, who is now a very important part of our team, engaged in the development of various electrical appliances and he, as me, was fond of rc modeling... At one meeting I told him about my problem. Alexander replied that he had the same problem, but he already solved it. So I saw a sample of his first stereo camera, which was very large and worked from 5 volts. This 3D camera was absolutely unsuitable for me as I needed a miniature camera, which will occupy little space on my rc model. Then Alexander invented the FPV camera 3D Transformer.
Camera FPV 3D Transformer – it was a great 3D FPV camera, she was petite and could be divided into two modules that allowed you to change the stereo base and to obtain high-quality stereo image at any distance. The transformer can be placed on any rc model: a machine, glider or quadrocopter... So we had the idea to tell other people about our products and to solve such problems.
The site FPV3DCAM.RU was created for this and online store RCENERGY.RU. So a new company FPV3DCAM was born... Immediately we had first sales in Russia and abroad. By the way, the first man from another country who bought the FPV camera 3D Transformer was Daniel Hibben. Daniel loved the 3D FPV Transformer. We often communicated with Daniel and after a while I realized that Transformer was good camera, but it wasn`t not perfect. We discussed and thought over what can be improved in 3D FPV Transformer.
So we identified the following shortcomings:
• Connector for connecting the batteries and the video transmitter was small and not very reliable and frequent loss of connection could damage the cable. And it also was in front of the camera, which could lead to the ingress interface cable into the lens.
• Separating modules to connect them, it was necessary to use two cables connecting the upper and lower connectors.
• Transformer supplies from 5 Volts, and all video transmitters operate from 3S LiPo Is 11.1 Volts. It had to install additional devices.
• Transformer had no light indicator that would show that the camera works.
Having set the tasks for us to correct all that things, we began work about new 3D camera... and after some time we have made the first and revolutionary stereo camera The BlackBird, which began its journey in changing the world of FPV.
