How to set up Halcon for use with Swing Catalyst.
The release of Swing Catalyst 6.0 brings support for three of the most common machine vision standards.
USB3 Vision GigE Vision GENiCAM
Before You Start
This article predominantly covers the installation of Halcon, installation of the license and a rudimentary setup of a Ximea USB3 camera. We cannot guarantee compatibility with newer versions and Swing Catalyst does not support newer versions of Halcon than Halcon 12.
WARNING: Swing Catalyst does not support newer versions of HALCON above version 12.
- Halcon 12 supports: GenAPI v2.4.1.
Please see the articles specific to your camera for configuring it in Swing Catalyst after installing Halcon.
How do I know if my camera supports these standards?
Usually the camera manufacturer will explicitly mention it either through using the USB3 Vision, GigE Vision or GenICam logo for the respective camera, or it is written.
Example from Basler: https://www.baslerweb.com/en/products/cameras/area-scan-cameras/scout/sca640-120gc/
Note the mention of conformity, in this case the camera supports both the GenICam and GigE Vision standards. Will that work with Halcon? Yes.
Hardware requirements:
- Universal Camera Support dongle or license locked to network card.
- Camera compliant with USB3 Vision, GigE Vision or GenICam
- Spare USB port for the licensing dongle.
Please make sure your hardware is compatible with the manufacturers recommendations.
Please contact your local camera distributor for help to setup your camera to USB3 Vision mode.
Note: Manufacturer specific camera configuration can be found towards the bottom of this article.
More information:
- Ximea USB3 Vision information: http://www.ximea.com/en/usb3-vision-camera/usb3zone
- Point Grey USB3 Vision information: http://www.ptgrey.com/usb3-vision-cameras
- Basler USB3 Vision Information: http://www.baslerweb.com/en/support/knowledge-base/frequently-asked-questions
- GenICam (Generic Interface for Cameras): http://www.emva.org/standards-technology/genicam/
Software requirements:
- Halcon license file. You should have received this via email.
- Please make sure you are running the latest Halcon version installed, if you get a warning in Swing Catalyst, please contact support for assistance.
Installation:
Download & install Halcon
For USB cameras, please download Zadig (used to change the USB drivers).
Installing Halcon for Swing Catalyst
Double click on the halcon runtime exe file.
Click Next, then select the appropriate architecture.
If you don't know whether you have 64-bit or 32-bit (x86 is 32-bit Windows), have a look here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/32-bit-and-64-bit-windows#1TC=windows-7
Select Custom, and deselect OCR Fonts, as it's not needed.
Install the driver for the USB dongle (if you bought the USB dongle version)
Make sure to install the GigE Vision Filter (Note: this is required if you have a GigE camera).
Click Next, then Install.
Locate the license.dat file you received via email and click next.
Complete the installation. If asked to reboot, click yes.
Basic camera configuration of Halcon in Swing Catalyst
Please see the configuration instructions for the following manufacturers:
Ximea USB3 Vision: http://support.swingcatalyst.com/hc/en-us/articles/222004748
Basler GigE Vision: http://support.swingcatalyst.com/hc/en-us/articles/221632728
Interested in purchasing Halcon to use your cameras with Swing Catalyst?
Contact sales@swingcatalyst.com to order the Swing Catalyst Universal Camera support.