Raspberry Pi Camera: A high-speed camera at a bargain price

The Raspberry Pi Camera Module is one of the ecosystem's most popular accessories, and is compatible with other SBCs too. Based on the Sony Exmor IMX219, the 8 MP sensor is marketed primarily as a 1080p camera that can shoot at 60 FPS. However, someone has discovered that the module does not get the best out of the IMX219.

Cited by Hackaday, Gaurav Singh realised that while the module operates on two MIPI lanes, the IMX219 is capable of operating at double that bandwidth. Singh circumvented this restriction by connecting the IMX219 to a Raspberry Pi via a Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) and USB 3.0. Singh goes into depth across two blog posts about how achieved this, but the result is that the IMX219 can now shoot at up to 1,000 FPS.

Shooting at such a high frame rate does impact resolution, though. Accordingly, the IMX219 can only reach 1,000 FPS in 640 x 80. The sensor can also record in 640 x 128 at 682 FPS or 640 x 480 at 200 FPS. Additionally, the IMX 219 can reach 3,280 x 2,464 but only at 15 FPS.

Singh has also published a YouTube video on the project, which you can watch below.