Reducing your Camera’s Frame Rate to Compensate for 50 Hz Lighting

Last Revision Date: 4/8/2016

To compensate for the effects of 50 Hz lighting, adjust the frame rate on the camera.

Using Spinnaker SDK

To adjust the frame rate on the camera:

1. 1. Connect the camera to the PC.
   2. Start SpinView and select the camera.
   3. Enable Acquisition Frame Rate.
   4. Enter 50 for the Acquisition Frame Rate.

Using FlyCapture SDK (except for Firefly2, see below)

To adjust the frame rate on the camera:

1. 1. Connect the camera to the PC.
   2. Start FlyCap and select the camera.
   3. Ensure that the camera isn't grabbing images.
   4. Open up the Camera Control dialog.
   5. Select the General Settings tab.
   6. Deselect Auto for the Frame Rate parameter and manually enter a frame rate of 50 Hz.

This can also be done by manually adjusting the ABS_VAL_FRAME_RATE register (968h).

For Firefly2 cameras

On the Firefly2 camera, this mode can be accessed by setting bit [24] of register 0xF20 to a value of 1.

You can achieve this using FlyCap as follows:

1. 1. Connect the camera to the PC.
   2. Start FlyCap and select the camera.
   3. Ensure that the camera isn't grabbing images.
   4. Open up the Camera Properties dialog.
   5. Select the Registers tab.
   6. Enter 0F20 into the register field (VIDEO_OPTIONS_CNFG) and click the Get Register button.
   7. Change the 24th bit to 1. (Do this by changing the 7th number to an 8. On the color camera, 33 63 00 03 becomes 33 63 00 83.)
      
      This reduces the frame rate to 83.3% of the reported frame rate. It turns 30 Hz into 25 Hz, or 15 Hz into 12.5 Hz.
      
      
   8. Click the Set Register button.
   9. Start grabbing images.

For a complete list of registers see the Digital Camera Register Reference.