Horus Installation > Calibration: Failing with Dark Screen

If you can’t get to Calibration because of a Wrong Camera ID error, see my other post here: https://forum.lulzbot.com/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=2580

Note: I am operating a personal computer, which is a MacBook Air (11-inch, Late 2010) with Mac OS X Yosemite (10.10.5). I just downloaded the latest version of Horus from bq (Version 0.1.2.4, Build 259, GitHub 38df73b).

:question: Check is complete, ready to proceed with Calibration, however it keeps failing and the webcam preview screen in Horus appears to be completely black…

Spoiler Alert: Not a software a problem, a hardware/environment problem. The room was too dark! I walk through the process of figuring that out, but jump down to see the brightness I needed to proceed with calibration. Sharing all these details because, why not?

My first hunch was that something was wrong between my computer and the camera. Looking in the bq documentation https://static-bqreaders.s3.amazonaws.com/file/ciclop/Horus_User_manual_EN.pdf I saw driver-related steps for Windows (and no specific directions for Mac OS X). I began to hunt for something related to the included Logitech HD Webcam C270 thinking I missed something, even though I’d already downloaded and installed the bq-provided FTDI drivers.

A user in this Apple forum suggested a downloading a Logitech program https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4247228, which I did however I was never able to get that to program work. Frustrated, I moved to the Photo Booth program that comes with Apple computers, however I found that screen was dark too.

In reading Amazon reviews http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004FHO5Y6/, watching a review on YouTube https://youtu.be/qkAZtYn2NJ0, and not seeing anything special on the Logitech page http://support.logitech.com/en_us/product/hd-webcam-c270 the camera should have been working…

I physically took the camera off of the Ciclop and saw a flash of light across the screen. Turns out it was working fine :laughing: I moved the camera around realized it was light coming through the balcony doors behind me.

:bulb: To solve this: The area was too dark! I moved to my kitchen, which has much brighter GE Lighting 89989 LED 12-watt 850-Lumen Dimmable PAR30 Indoor Floodlight Bulb with Medium Base, Soft White light bulbs http://www.amazon.com/GE-Lighting-89989-850-Lumen-Floodlight/dp/B00MENVDVQ/

As an aside, during this process I looked at the Logitech product page on Amazon. The C270 is basically the lowest grade camera they carry there, I think using experimenting with other cameras would be interesting.

I actually have one of the 1080p logitceh webcams on my other computer. As part of the frame rebuild I am working on I was considering incorporating it as an option to see if it is an improvement. I haven’t got that high up on the frame yet though.

You can use a different camera. It technically doesn’t even have to be mounted to the Ciclop…

The Logitech C920 does great and has a lot of features. If you try to use a newer camera like the C920 make sure you disable autofocus or you’ll be really sad. There’s a software configurable focus that you can tweak. Much nicer than opening up the C270. :smiley: