Dali Technology and Flir Systems share with asmag their vision in thermal vision, especially with the increasing market propensity toward cost-effectiveness. Dali highlights its economical S230 monocular, while Flir talks about its first commercial-grade thermal camera, VT602.
Dali Technology and Flir Systems share with asmag their vision in thermal vision, especially with the increasing market propensity toward cost-effectiveness. Dali highlights its economical S230 monocular, while Flir talks about its first commercial-grade thermal camera, VT602.
Dali's S230 costs a few thousand US dollars, per unit. The monocular can detect images in total darkness during blackouts, said a source from Dali. The monocular uses an amorphous silicon mircobolometer detector and displays images or videos in black and white. The handheld device is suitable for law enforcement applications and has been deployed for coastal surveillance. It has also been installed onto cars, where it can detect objects in dark areas with no road lights or in poor weather conditions. The company aspires to make thermal cameras more affordable and more widely adopted, but progress has been slow.
Outside of the security scope, Dali and Flir also direct our attention to some very interesting thermal-imaging applications. In China, an end user came up with an innovative way of detecting horses with diseased legs, by scanning their legs with thermal cameras, said Cindy Zhang, Flir's former APAC Marketing Manager. Higher leg temperatures detected indicate that the horse might be sick. Dali offers a case in which researchers used thermal cameras to detect whether seeds were germinating. As seeds germinate, they tend to have higher temperatures, said the Dali source. “Most of the time, it's the end users that come up with creative applications that we never thought of.”
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Flir highlights the integration capability and affordability with its VT602. The long-range surveillance camera first manufactured in 2012 is capable of detecting people at a distance of 9 kilometers. It is the company's first commercial-grade camera aimed at European, Asian and South American markets. Compared to its predecessor (the HRC, which costs around $500,000), the VT602's price is slashed to $190,000. The camera is also compatible with ONVIF standards, Pelco-D protocol and related VMS.
Trafficon, which was acquired by Flir in 2012, also mentions its traffic detection video product, which is capable of detecting smoke and heat in tunnels, car counting, determining whether vehicles are moving in the wrong direction, and generating traffic data for control rooms. The smoke detection technology has been integrated into Flir's thermal cameras. The main challenges the traffic detection system needs to overcome are road, weather and lighting conditions, said Nico Verstraete, International Business Development Manager for ITS. The margin for error is low, as it has to be capable of making fast detections in a moving environment, he added. The detection system has been deployed in more than 60 countries, with the most installations in tunnels in Europe and on highways in the U.S. Verstraete observed that city administrators are now placing more attention to pedestrian detection than vehicle detection.
It remains to be seen whether increased competition will drive pricing further down.