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Lightcrafter: ability to apply monochrome bitmaps at high frequency

Albert Wildeman
Prodigy 30 points

Hello,

I would like to be able to control the mirror array from an external DSP. Ideally, the DSP would determine the bitmap that should be applied to the bitmap in real time and send it to the Lightcrafter at 1 kHz (rates up to say 10 times slower would be acceptable). Is there any way to achieve this, perhaps through the pattern sequence mode? If not, would there be a way to load to say 60 bitmaps into the Lightcrafter and control which one should be applied from the DSP (at the same ideal frequency of 1 kHz)?

Thank you,

Albert Wildeman

  • 0
    Prodigy 240 points

    If your DSP is fast enough, the pattern sequence mode exposure time is measured in us, so achieving 1 kHz seems possible. If you are computing the bitmaps in real time, then static image mode might be fast enough to switch images as it receives them. After all, 1 ms is a lot of time for a computer. I think a TI dev who knows a lot more than me should confirm this though.

  • 0
    TI__Genius 9935 points

    Albert,

    Welcome to the DLP & MEMS E2E forum.

    Please see the document DLP® LightCrafter™ Evaluation Module (EVM) User's Guide http://www.ti.com/lit/ug/dlpu006a/dlpu006a.pdf. See the sections on Pattern Sequences.

  • 0 in reply to Pascal DLP
    Prodigy 30 points

    Pascal, 

    Thank you for your reply, and my apologies for my delayed reaction. As an additional question, is there any way to alter individual pixels or rows? and if not, could you recommend an alternative DMD setup in which this would be possible?

    Thanks again,

    Albert

  • 0 in reply to Albert Wildeman
    TI__Genius 9935 points

    Albert,

    With the DLP3000 (used in the DLP LightCrafter) the only way to alter pixels is to send a new frame consisting of all the pixels in the frame. That is, there is no way to simply change certain rows without updating other rows.

    Some of the larger, more expensive DMDs, supported by the Discovery 4100 development kit, does allow the updating of groups of rows (partial frame), but this is much more involved.

    Can you say more about what you are trying to do?

  • 0 in reply to Pascal DLP
    Prodigy 30 points

    Pascal,

    I was getting the impression we might have to look at a Discovery 4100 (-related) kit. I'll try to summarize what we are trying to do:

    We are looking to optically stimulate samples, with patterns that are determined on the fly (ie, not in pre-defined sequences). Our preference for addressing subsets of the frame rather than the entire frame is based on the expectation that that would allow lower latency. Also, we would generally only want to alter a few pixels at a time. As a side note, we do not need a large resolution at all - even 20x20 would be acceptable. In our setup, a DSP would determine which pixels have to be changed, send that data through a 16-bit serial port (usb is also available on the apparatus in which the DSP is embedded, but seems like a slower/more convoluted option) and ideally the DLP/DMD would be able to receive and apply that data at a low latency (order of 1 ms is acceptable). Does this sound feasible, and if so, is there a particular system or approach you would recommend? We have already explored the optical and light source aspects of this approach and are confident we can make those work.

    Thanks again!

    Albert