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Using a Camera

Can't Connect to Camera, or No Camera Image

If LightBurn can't see your camera, or its capture is only a black screen:

  • If you're using a USB extender, try taking it out of line and connecting the camera directly to your computer. USB cables are limited to 3 meters (16 feet) long — anything longer can cause transmission loss. To connect over a greater distance, you must use an active, externally powered extender.

  • Make sure you have granted LightBurn permission to access your camera in your system settings:

    • For Windows:

      • Click the Start menu, type “camera privacy” and click the Camera Privacy Settings entry.
      • Check that Allow apps to access your camera is enabled.
      • Scroll down below the list of Windows apps and check that Allow desktop apps to access your camera is enabled too.
      • If LightBurn isn’t in that list, it should be.
      • You might need to reboot your machine and try again after the settings change.
      • If LightBurn still can't access the camera, and you're using Windows, try changing the Camera Capture System from Custom to Default in your Settings/Preferences.

    • For Mac:

      • Go to System Preferences → Security & Privacy → Privacy → Camera
      • Make sure the box next to LightBurn is checked
      • In some cases, Macs require active, externally powered USB-A to USB-C adapters/hubs in order to connect to cameras.

Lens Calibration

If you're having trouble getting valid captures, or a good final calibration:

  • Keep the circle pattern as flat as possible by gluing it to wood, foam board, or any other perfectly flat material. If it isn’t flat, the curvature will be considered part of your lens distortion.
  • Make sure the circle pattern is in focus, and not shaking. If you're unable to keep your hand steady while holding it, place it on something instead.
  • The calibration card should be facing directly at the camera for a fisheye lens, or perfectly flat and parallel with the lens for a non-fisheye lens.
  • The circles pattern should fill roughly 1/9th of the view of the camera for each captures. If it’s much too small or too large, you won’t get good results. You can rescale the pattern or move the pattern or camera closer or farther from one another to adjust the relative size of the pattern in the camera's field of view.
  • The camera doesn’t need to be on the machine for the lens calibration — it’s only the lens and pattern that matter for this part.
  • If you do it on the machine, and you have a honeycomb bed, cover it (bedsheet, paper, wood, etc) — the pattern gets misinterpreted as more circles and confuses the software.

Overlay Misaligned

Misaligned on First Setup

If your camera overlay is misaligned immediately after your first setup:

  • Re-run the camera alignment process, taking care to tag the target markers as precisely as possible.
  • To improve accuracy, zoom in on the target markers using the mouse scroll wheel or two-finger dragging.
  • If possible, increase the Scale of the target marker engraving. The farther apart the target markers are from one another, the more accurate the alignment will be.
  • If the alignment is close, but still a bit off, use the Width, Height, X Shift, and Y Shift fields in the Camera Control window to fine-tune placement and scale.

Misaligned Between Uses

If the overlay becomes misaligned between uses, it means the position of your camera relative to your laser's work area has changed from when you did your initial alignment.

  • Make sure your camera is securely mounted, with no room to wiggle.
  • If it's mounted on a lid, make sure the lid is returning to exact same position it was in when you completed the alignment process.
  • Make sure there is no side-to-side play in the lid's hinges.
  • You can use a cord or rod to ensure the lid is always at the same position when opened.
  • If you have tabletop engraver, make sure it cannot move at all — the motion of the laser head during engraving can sometimes jostle the entire machine if it is not secured down.

You’ll need to address these issues, and then re-run the alignment process.

Misaligned When Switching to Thicker/Thinner Materials

If you switch to a thicker or thinner material than the one you used to complete the alignment process, and your laser does not have an adjustable height bed, that will cause a misalignment — the height between camera and work area will have effectively changed.

The amount of misalignment will depend on the lens angle of the camera, the mounting angle, and how different the height is from the aligned height. If you’re using a top-down view with a narrow angle lens, the difference will be much less than if your camera is wide angle, or viewing from an angle.

  • You can perform an alignment for a given height by engraving the and tagging the alignment marks at that height.
  • Right-click in the Camera Control window and select Export Camera Settings to save that alignment information.
  • Then, perform another alignment at a different height, and save that one too.
  • Give the saved alignments names based on the heights they were performed at.
  • Later, right-click and Import Camera Settings for the closest height to whatever material you’re engraving.

Export and Import Camera Settings

For more help using LightBurn, please visit our forum to talk with LightBurn staff and users, or email support.