Hi everyone. I’m trying to use my Arducam stereo camera with ROS, but I’m getting confused about OS support. The ROSberryPi docs seem to target Buster, while the Arducam driver stuff I’ve seen mentions Bullseye. Can the Arducam driver be installed on Raspbian Buster, or on Ubuntu 20.04 for Raspberry Pi (like the Ubiquity Robotics Noetic Pi image)? Any pointers appreciated.
Hi, can you tell me the exact camera model and what OS you’re currently running? Also, which Arducam docs are you following for the camera?
It’s the Arducam stereo camera kit for Raspberry Pi, model B0264 OV2311. I’m on the latest Raspbian Bullseye. For ROS I was looking at ROSberryPi (which is Buster-based) and the Ubiquity Noetic Pi image for Ubuntu 20.04. Docs I’ve been using: Making sure you're not a bot!, Image Downloads - Magni Documentation, and Picamera2 User Guide - Arducam Wiki
Thanks. Quick note: ROSberryPi is Buster-based, and Buster isn’t really supported anymore for this camera stack. For camera access on Bullseye you should be using picamera2 — see the PiCamera2 user guide you linked. Before we even talk about ROS, let’s make sure the camera itself works on Bullseye. Have you installed libcamera from the Arducam website? The getting-started steps are in the Libcamera user guide, and the camera setup is in the Multi-Camera CamArray quick start.
Yeah, I installed libcamera following the quick start. During the install I saw this warning: W: Repository is broken: libcamera-dev:armf (= 0.0.12 ) has no Size information. I assumed it wasn’t fatal, so I went ahead and tried libcamera-still -t 0. The output was ERROR: *** no cameras avaialble ***.
Can you try libcamera-still -t 5000 and paste the full output here? The -t 0 timeout can behave a bit oddly sometimes, and I want to see whether the camera is being detected at all.
Just tried it. All I get is: no cameras available. Nothing else.
Ok, before we go deeper into software, let’s rule out the physical connection. For this kit you need to use the yellow cable, not the white one. Also make sure the camera board is actually seated/connected to the cable. I’ve attached a few reference photos of the correct connection — can you double-check yours against them?
I checked the photos. I was using the white cable, and honestly the camera wasn’t connected to the cable properly. I’ve switched to the yellow cable now.
Good catch. But going back to your original ROS question — I want to set expectations. The driver for this camera is based on Bullseye OS. Raspbian Buster and Ubuntu 20.04 (including the Ubiquity Noetic image) are not supported for it. So the paths that would let you use ROSberryPi (Buster) or the Ubuntu Noetic image won’t work with this camera’s driver. You’ll need to stay on Bullseye for the camera itself.
Got it, that makes sense now. So just to make sure I’ve got this straight: stay on Bullseye, use picamera2 for camera access, and use the yellow cable? Any specific command I should run to verify?
Right. On Bullseye: install libcamera from the Arducam website using the getting-started steps in the Libcamera user guide, follow the camera setup in the Multi-Camera CamArray quick start, then run libcamera-still -t 0 to confirm the camera is detected. With the yellow cable connected properly it should enumerate. For picamera2, follow the PiCamera2 user guide. And as mentioned, the camera driver won’t work on Buster or Ubuntu, so keep ROS on a separate setup if you need it.