Open and stream external thermal webcam with Open CV in Python

Question

My external thermal webcam is the PureThermal version 1.2.2. I'm on VS Code with a Python 3.9.16 environment and MacOS Ventura 13.3.1

Here is my code:

import numpy as np
import cv2

# Replace this with the correct camera index or device name
camera_index = 2
cap = cv2.VideoCapture(camera_index)       # apiPreference=cv2.CAP_AVFOUNDATION)
cap.set(cv2.CAP_PROP_FPS, 60)

if not cap.isOpened():
    print("Cannot open camera")
    exit()

while True:
    # Capture frame-by-frame
    ret, frame = cap.read()
    # if frame is read correctly ret is True

    if not ret:
        print("Can't receive frame (stream end?). Exiting ...")
        break

    # Display the resulting frame
    cv2.imshow("Webcam Frame", frame)

    if cv2.waitKey(1) == ord('q'):
        break
    
# When everything is done, release the capture
cap.release()
cv2.destroyAllWindows()

This code works perfectly with my built-in camera. However, it returns a black window with my external thermal camera. I have the correct index for my thermal camera.

Question: what do I need to add to my code to get my thermal stream working? Do I need to normalize, resize, or do something else?

does this work with VLC? or any other program? if not, then OpenCV is not the issue and must be excluded from the search space — Christoph Rackwitz, Apr 18 '23 at 18:45
The thermal camera works perfectly fine in Photo Booth, for example. What is VLC? — Ashton T. Sperry, Apr 19 '23 at 04:58
No. One built-in and one external thermal camera. The index of the built-in camera is 0 if no external camera is connected; however, the indexes change to 1 and 2 for the built-in and external thermal, respectively, when the external camera is connected. — Ashton T. Sperry, Apr 19 '23 at 05:01

Open and stream external thermal webcam with Open CV in Python

0 Answers0