by Jeff Bier
President of BDTI and founder of the Embedded Vision Alliance
I’m thrilled to welcome you to www.embedded-vision.com, the web site of the Embedded Vision Alliance.
My colleagues and I at BDTI started the Embedded Vision Alliance in 2010 because we believe that embedded vision – the use of computer vision in embedded systems – has vast potential: the potential to save lives, to entertain us, and to make our interactions with complex equipment more intuitive, to name just a few.
Plus – let’s face it – it’s really cool! Rarely in my 25-year career in the electronics industry have I worked with technology as instantly understandable to my non-technical friends and relatives. And rarely have I worked with technology that so consistently evokes reactions of amazement from technical and non-technical people alike.
As a consumer, I’ve been an early adopter of embedded vision technology. I have a vision-based safety system in my car. We use smart surveillance cameras in our offices. I play video games using the Microsoft Kinect. And I control my PowerPoint presentations using a gesture-based user interface. My experiences with these products have convinced me that this is a technology that is ready for the mainstream. We’ve formed the Embedded Vision Alliance to help make that happen.
The mission of the Embedded Vision Alliance is to inspire and empower design engineers to incorporate vision capabilities into their products. Initially, we’re doing this by highlighting outstanding examples of embedded-vision-enabled products and emerging technologies, by providing practical technical articles and training, and by providing information on relevant enabling technologies and products. We’re also creating a venue for interaction between experienced practitioners and newcomers to the field, between vision algorithm experts and those focused on creating efficient system and chip designs, and between technology suppliers and technology users. Embedded vision is a big field, spanning many applications; it’s moving fast, and there’s a lot of territory to cover. We can’t cover it all immediately, and – even with the combined resources of our 16 founding member companies – we can’t do it alone. I therefore invite you to join us in helping embedded vision technology reach its potential.
BDTI first got involved in embedded vision applications because embedded vision relies on two technologies that have long been focus areas for BDTI: high-performance embedded processors, and digital signal processing algorithms. But embedded vision encompasses many other technologies, including image sensors, lenses, lighting, networking, and development tools. By creating a focal point for information and discussion about all of the relevant technologies, we believe that the Alliance can speed the industry’s progress.
If your company is a provider of products, technology, or services for embedded vision applications, please contact us to find out about membership options and benefits. If you’re an engineer with embedded vision expertise you’d like to share, please visit the Embedded Vision Alliance discussion forums to see what kinds of questions are being posed, or to propose an article, demo, or tutorial. If you’re an engineer getting started with embedded vision, please explore the site and give us your feedback and suggestions on what additional resources you’d like.
In the medium term, we’ll explore other ways in which the Alliance can facilitate the efficient and effective use of embedded vision technology. This may include creating technical standards, defining common application development infrastructure, or other activities. I’m looking forward to hearing your ideas about how we can best enable the effective use of embedded vision technology. Please write to me at [email protected], or join the conversation in the Embedded Vision Alliance discussion forums.
To welcome you to the EVA community and learn more about the website, read this editorial from Scott Gardner.
