How can I get a thermal-infrared image preview when acquiring from a FLIR IR camera with Image Acquisition Toolbox?

I am using a FLIR GigE Vision IR (thermal infrared) camera (for example FLIR A615, A645, A655, or other GigE Vision models).

In Image Acquisition Toolbox the default preview image is grayscale / shades of gray, with low contrast, although the camera image is focused.

How can I get a preview image that uses a colormap similar to a conventional thermal infrared image (not the default grayscale colormap)?

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

The following MATLAB example code enables the full bit depth mode for camera preview, and specifies a jet colormap for the preview image.

To specify a manual signal range for preview, uncomment the last code section.

% Set preview data to native camera bit depth (default is 8 bit)
imaqmex('feature', '-previewFullBitDepth', true);

v = videoinput('gige', 1, 'Mono16');

% Create a preview window and get image and axes handles
im = preview(v);
ax = im.Parent;


% Specify scaled grayscale data mapping to colormap
im.CDataMapping = 'scaled';

% Specify a colormap to display grayscale image mapped to RGB image
colormap(ax, jet);


% Specify auto detection of CData limits
ax.CLimMode = 'auto';

% Or, specify a fixed signal data range to display
% signalRange = [10000 20000];
% ax.CLim = signalRange;

If desired, a custom preview functionality can be implemented as described in the following documentation page:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/imaq/preview-live-data-from-image-acquisition-device.html

Other predefined or custom colormaps can be used:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/colormap.html