Hello everyone,

here comes an update that fixes quite a lot of bugs and brings some new features as well. As version 2 beta 5 was a bit flakey, I spent about a week dedicated to debugging for finding as many errors as possible. Well I succeeded and found some that were pretty nasty (e.g. buffer overflows). This release will be a lot more stable than the previous one and hopefully satisfy all of you.

Other than that I improved the overall performance of the system. Ad-hoc moves (like moves to the home position or all moves during SMS shots) are now smoother and more consistent in their behavior. I also added a new feature that lets you set your motor calibration from the miniEngine Studio. The new version of the Studio will be released in the coming days.

There are also 3 new features in this release which I implemented after some longer test-tours. These are the ones that I missed the most out in the field and decided to just add them:

Timelapse Preview

This was the feature that I wanted so much. Now you can run a Preview with which you will see the camera move as it will look like after the timelapse-video is fully rendered. It basically just speeds up the original move so that the total duration equals your playback-time. It can be started from the pop-up menu (which now can also be started via a long press of the menu-button).

Set Start / Stop point

These two functions were also added to the pop-up menu. now you can move your motors to your start-position and simply select the function “Set Start” for defining where to begin. Then you can move all your motors to the end-position to define where your move should end. Then simply select “Set End” and the parameters move-distance and direction are set automatically.

Max Speed Check

The system now precisely determines the max speed of any move to be done and checks it against the defined max speeds of the motors. If a defined move exceeds the max-speed limit, the move will not be executed and a warning will be displayed. If you are 100% sure what you do, you can disable it in the motor settings.

Enclosure(s)

I also developed an enclosure for the miniEngine v2 which can be 3D printed on even the smallest printers. It is build up from 4 separately printable parts (plus the buttons) and assembles like this:

It was designed using Google Sketchup and all files are now in the repository as well.

I also added the Acrylic-Enclosure from Eddy Hasby (thank you for developing and sharing this wonderful enclosure!!) which can be build via Laser-cutting. The files are in the Repository and here is a link to the forum thread as well: http://forum.airiclenz.com/showthread.php?tid=6675

When you update to this release, don’t forget to update the libraries as well!

Here is a detailed list of all the changes:

• fixed a bug that causes the initial move in SMS to be wrong
• fixed a bug in the painting routines that sometimes caused memory overflows
• fixed some bugs in the core motor routines that under some conditions caused instable behavior
• added core functions for analyzing the curves max speed
• added warning and abort if the motor-max-speed for a started action exceeds the defined limits
• activating the pop-up menu now also on a menu-button long-press
• added new pop-up menu functionalities:
  • Set start – Defines the new start position for a move (equals “set home for all motors”. This updates move-distance as well as move direction)
  • Set End – Defines the new end position for a move (updates move-distance as well as move direction)
  • Preview – Runs the timelapse setup with real-speed (with preview duration = playback time) to get a feeling for the planned moves.
• Increased Uplink functionality (for new minEngine Studio features)
• changed edit-granularity for the option “record time” to 1 second for all values below 1 minute
• changed the FPS setting to be settable to any value between 1 and 255
• optimized code for ad-hoc curve generation (e.g. one move in SMS; move to home) for smoother moves and more consistent behavior)

Cheers,
Airic