Connect a Camera

The Connect tab is the first tab and the first stop after launch. Connecting selects a camera — frames only start streaming when you press Start Camera (main tab-bar corner).

Automatic connection on startup

A few hundred milliseconds after launch the app enumerates cameras in the background:

• Exactly one camera found — it is selected automatically and the app switches to the Overview tab.
• Multiple cameras — the device list is populated; pick one and click Connect.
• No cameras — a "No camera found" dialog appears; check cabling and the frame-grabber, then click Refresh.

After the camera step completes, the app also probes serial ports for the nanopositioner (status appears in the sidebar).

Connecting manually

1. Click Refresh to re-enumerate devices.
2. Pick a device from the Cameras, MindVision, or Framegrabbers groups. The list shows model name, firmware, and interface labels.
3. Click Connect. The status line confirms the selection and the app switches to Overview with the ROI overlay enabled.

Mock camera (no hardware)

The mock camera streams images from a folder on disk through the exact same pipeline as a hardware camera — useful for training, demos, and reproducing issues away from the instrument.

1. On the Connect tab, click Configure Mock….
2. Pick a folder of frame images (PNG/TIFF/JPEG/BMP; streamed in filename order — use numeric prefixes like frame_0001.png for deterministic playback), the target frame rate, and whether to loop.
3. Click Start Camera as usual.

Everything downstream — live view, processing, recording, review — behaves exactly as with a real camera.