Awhile back I saw that another team was able to successfully transmit an image from a raspberrypi over cellular using their dev kit. AND they shared their source code. With a bit of help from ChatGPT and the latest UART support for bm_serial.py I was able to cobble together a new camera module that transmits a compressed 640 x 480 pixel image over the Bristlemouth. The whole process takes about 15 minutes and requires ~70 cellular messages be sent in succession (currently limited by the transmit message size) but this is good enough for an MVP.
Big thanks to @Kaitlynyau and team for posting their Subsea Imaging Solution and sharing the source code.
I made a few tweaks to their code + the bm_serial.py code to be compatible with the Pi Zero and Blinka implementation of Ciruitpython. I’m still wrapping my head around GitHub and repos (sorry, I’m an ME by training and software is still magic to me) but with the help of ChatGPT I was able to come up with a working proof of concept. I’ll post more details once I get a fully working version of the hardware up and running for time lapse in the next few weeks.,
3D printed camera module housing, with RPi Zero + mote + 2x sets of Bristlemouth connectors
Fit check with all the PCBAs, I am using a “Bristleback” PCBA which is a smaller and more simple version of the Dev Kit board that allows this to be a smaller form factor.
And here is one of the first images that I was able to transmit over cellular using modified example code from the Subsea Imaging Solution reference code.Major thanks to the UC Santa Barbara team for sharing the code and documenting everything on GitHub. I’d like to do that same in the near future.
Next steps…get a CNC’ed plastic housing and make this waterproof.