RasPi Camera Board and Motion

Question

I just got my Camera Board and a Model A Raspberry Pi to use as a security camera for my house. I had been using Motion with a Logitech C170 USB camera on my Model B board and it worked great except for the quality. I was expecting the Raspberry Pi Camera Board to show up as /dev/video0 but when I run Motion I get an error:

Failed to open video device /dev/video0: No such file or directory

The camera works fine with raspistill -d. This has to work with Motion as it has to take videos/pictures when movement is detected and I have to be able to access it from work.

This question was no good for me as it never answered my question and I'm not using python.

11chubby11 · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-21T02:51:03.603

57

You can access the camera board on /dev/video0 by running the command:

sudo modprobe bcm2835-v4l2

This will have to be run on every boot of the device. Or you can put modprobe bcm2835-v4l2 in /etc/rc.local to make it run on every boot automatically.

edited Feb 21 '16 at 02:51

answered Dec 31 '14 at 01:37

11chubby11

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You can add the line to /etc/modules to get the kernel to insert the module on boot automatically. echo "bcm2835-v4l2" | tee -a /etc/modules Ensure you can run the command first sudo modprobe bcm2835-v4l2 – Drew Anderson Feb 03 '15 at 22:16
Note: it is an "L" not a "1" for bcm2835-v4l2. – Timothy L.J. Stewart Jan 28 '18 at 23:47
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why does this work ? what's the magic behind it. – AK_ Feb 12 '18 at 02:06
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is there any rationale behind it not being enabled automatically on every boot? Any clue why raspi-config doesn't do that when you enable the cam? – dethSwatch Sep 09 '18 at 04:20

score 11 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 25 '17 at 16:06

11

to load the model after each reboot, use this setting

sudo nano /etc/modules
enter bcm2835-v4l2
exist and save the fle
sudo reboot

answered Mar 25 '17 at 16:06

jefwu

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score 5 · Answer 3 · answered Nov 02 '13 at 14:03

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The standard motion dosn't work with the RPI camera. There is a variant called motion-mmal in development which works with the RPI camera

http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=44966&p=379561#p374790 is a forum chat on setting it up

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/665518/Raspberry-Pi-as-low-cost-HD-surveillance-camera this is a guide on using motion mmal to set up a security camera.

answered Nov 02 '13 at 14:03

Graeme

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The standard motion works fine through v4l2 after loading module bcm2835-v4l2. Though probably not as good as with MMAL. – scai Feb 15 '17 at 18:41

score 2 · Answer 4 · answered Jul 12 '14 at 16:51

to get motion to work(out of the box) you can install the Userspace Video4Linux2

It will create the /dev/video0 device node correctly on the Raspberry Pi.

I have just followed the install instructions and not only does motion just work, the example(optional) motion.conf sets up the Pi as a streaming server so that you can access it remotely in a browser.

the developer is asking for donations, I am definitely going to contribute.

score 2 · Answer 5 · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:56

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(from https://raspberrypi.stackexchange.com/a/18214/12486)

You will be able to access to the raspi camera like other V4L2 device using :

the official kernel V4L2 driver bcm2835-v4l2

sudo modprobe bcm2835-v4l2

the unofficial userspace V4L2 driver for the Raspberry Pi Camera Module

uv4l --driver raspicam --auto-video_nr

edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:56

Community

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answered Aug 23 '14 at 17:54

mpromonet

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score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Nov 16 '13 at 18:19

I had the same problem. I tried this, it set up /dev/video0 OK but it did not work with motion: http://www.linux-projects.org/modules/sections/index.php?op=viewarticle&artid=16

But then found this blog which seems to work: http://rbnrpi.wordpress.com/project-list/setting-up-wireless-motion-detect-cam/

Note that the motion-mmal apparently only supports 3 resolutions right now: 352x288; 640x480 and 1024*576

Hope this helps.

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Dec 04 '15 at 15:18

I had a similar problem.

Today it was working, the next day it died.

tried a couple of the stuff here and other procedures found on google.

I eventually fixed it by activating the I2C protocol in raspi confing.(didn't think that was the problem since from what i know the camera uses the CSI-2 protocol and I never tweaked with it)

score -1 · Answer 8 · answered Dec 31 '14 at 04:39

-1

I used motionpie https://github.com/ccrisan/motionPie to turn it into a IP cam.

answered Dec 31 '14 at 04:39

Aaron

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RasPi Camera Board and Motion

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