FLIR Systems, Inc. announced two new products at CES designed to put thermal imaging into the hands of consumers. The first is a new, consumer-level infrared thermal camera sensor, while the second is a slide-on attachment for Apple iPhone 5 or 5s smartphones that makes use of said sensor. Both could be used to locate lost pets in the dark, look for energy leaking from your house, or to watch for wildlife.
Thermal cameras have a wide variety of uses, including by law enforcement to look for criminals at night or when hiding in brush, as a night vision system by the military, and by environmental inspectors looking for heat leaks from faulty insulation. They are also standard equipment on many UAVs.
FLIR says the technology also has many applications at the consumer level, including locating heating or cooling leaks in buildings, finding studs in walls, or locating water damage. Outdoor uses might include night navigation, wildlife observation, determining if your fish is fully cooked, or that a campfire is completely out. Firemen certainly could find many uses for the device, searching for hotspots or victims in smoke.
The company's Lepton Sensor is an OEM module that is the first IR thermal microbolometer that is near the size of the small cameras made to fit into a smartphone or tablet. Unlike some thermal cameras, this small unit does not require an external cooler and has all of its image processing in a single chip. It is also compatible with FLIR's patented Multi-Spectral Dynamic Imaging Technology, which allows pixels from a visible light camera to be combined with the low resolution thermal image to create an enhanced picture.
The Lepton Sensor will be available to OEMs and developers, along with a software development kit. FLIR sees the low-cost thermal sensor being put to work in other tablets, diagnostic tools, cars, toys, building controls, assembly lines, machine vision, and medical devices, and even gaming devices for human tracking.
Demonstrating the proof of its convictions, the company has also released the FLIR ONE. This is a packaged, consumer version of the Lepton IR sensor that takes the form of a sleeve that attaches to an Apple iPhone 5 or 5s. This could create entirely new uses for thermal cameras, as the FLIR ONE combines the thermal camera with the iPhone's abilities to capture, film, transmit, and share images.
"FLIR ONE represents a dramatic step in our pursuit of 'infrared everywhere.'" says Andy Teich, President and CEO of FLIR. "As the first truly consumer focused thermal imager, FLIR ONE introduces thermal imaging technology to a completely new group of customers."
The unit also includes extra battery power for the IR sensor and to extend the life of the smartphone, with the power pack providing about two hours of IR camera use. The FLIR ONE has two cameras – a thermal camera and a more conventional visible light camera. The special chip in the Lepton core combines the images for enhanced resolution, adding detail to the low resolution thermal image.
A worldwide rollout of the FLIR ONE is planned for the coming months, and the price point is expected to be around US$349. The FLIR ONE case will come in gray, white, or a designer gold color. An Android model is expected later in the year.
The following video demonstrates the FLIR ONE's capabilities.
Source: FLIR
Wait for a standalone lens that transmits via bluetooth.
We also need a line-of-sight/short range reflection pulsed messaging/voice application/capability. Photon-based pulse coded messages, when the radio frequencies have been jammed.
Someone's going to make serious money from that. You're welcome.
A thermal camera will also spot restrictions in blood flow in time to correct it if the camera is sensitive enough.
For any price under $500 dollars anyone that works with machinery can't afford to be without one. Comparing a picture of the the bearings and other moving parts after they have been running a few hours will show up problems in time to repair them before costly breakdowns. I can think of several time it would have paid for itself in one use.
For example; one afternoon we were harvesting cotton when I heard a bearing start to make noise on the main drive shaft off a cotton stripper. The bearing cost $75 dollars and took 8 hours to change. The stripper were making $500 dollars an hour. If we ran the stripper 10 more hours the repairs would cost $800 dollars and still only take 8 hours. Needless to say I worked all night and spent $800 on parts. Had I had a camera like this I would have worked all night the night before and spent $75 dollars for parts.
Gordon
Having said that, other aspects of the technology have obsoleted themselves over time. 15 years ago this tech would have cost $60,000 and would have weighed 5 pounds. Features will be added with improved phone hardware, and the external gizmos will shrink in size. Perhaps FLIR will break into the smart phone biz some day.
Cost has severely limited the application of this tech. Once it gets into the hands of a few hundred thousand plumbers, appliance repairmen, policemen, doctors, home inspectors, shop owners, etc., and their creative teenaged children, I think the application for this will explode making this one of the most exciting add-ons you can get for a phone.
As for long term usage and the notion that it will become obsolete, at the end of the day I have my old 3Gs from the early years and it still works just fine. If a business invests in getting a phone to power this thing and a couple of years down the track the phone is no longer current then so what, just shelve it and use it only as required. The 5 and 5s are very capable devices, and unlikely to become computationally obsolete in the next 3-4 yrs if it is used purely for these applications.
But they are shooting themselves in the leg by putting this breakthrough tech into an attachment for a niche product that only has a minority share of the market and that will be obsolesced in six months.
Yes, I know all this trendy marketing talk about standalone cameras giving way to smartphones, and all that. But in this case, a standalone camera would make much better sense, and avoid making FLIR Inc. into a hostage of another company's planned obsolescence cycle. Not to mention that a standalone could have better tech specs for the same price, and would be snapped up by various kinds of professionals (engineers, outdoor workers, medical personnel) as well as geeks, not just a handful of iPhone airheads on the hunt for another glitzy $500 attachment.
I predict that FLIR Inc. will not be able to keep pace with Apple and all the new iPhone versions, never mind the various Android smartphones out there. They will sell a couple hundred attachments, and fold the moment iPhone6 comes out. A pity, for such a revolutionary product.