ESP32 Camera Driver

To use the driver in an ESP-IDF project, add the espressif/esp32-camera component as a dependency. You can do this via the CLI or by manually editing your idf_component.yml file.

Requirements:

• Enable PSRAM in menuconfig.
• Set both Flash and PSRAM frequencies to 80MHz.
• Include esp_camera.h in your source code.

These steps also apply to PlatformIO projects using framework=espidf.

idf.py add-dependency "espressif/esp32-camera"

You can quickly set up a working project by downloading the pre-configured camera_example using the ESP-IDF command line. This example includes the necessary menuconfig settings for the camera driver.

idf.py create-project-from-example "espressif/esp32-camera:camera_example"

For OV5640 modules with AF-capable lenses, you can enable autofocus via menuconfig (Component config → Camera configuration → Enable autofocus (OV5640)).

1. Include #include "esp_camera_af.h".
2. Get the sensor instance using esp_camera_sensor_get().
3. Initialize AF with esp_camera_af_init().
4. Trigger AF with esp_camera_af_trigger() or wait for completion with esp_camera_af_wait().

#include "esp_camera.h"
#include "esp_camera_af.h"

// After esp_camera_init(...)
sensor_t *s = esp_camera_sensor_get();

esp_camera_af_config_t af_cfg = {
    .mode = ESP_CAMERA_AF_MODE_AUTO,
    .timeout_ms = 2000,
};

ESP_ERROR_CHECK(esp_camera_af_init(s, &af_cfg));

// Trigger a single AF cycle
ESP_ERROR_CHECK(esp_camera_af_trigger(s));

// Wait for completion
esp_camera_af_status_t st;
ESP_ERROR_CHECK(esp_camera_af_wait(s, 0, &st));

The driver supports capturing single JPEG images or streaming a continuous MJPEG stream over HTTP.

• For single captures: Use httpd_resp_send() with the buffer from esp_camera_fb_get().
• For MJPEG streaming: Use httpd_resp_set_type() with multipart/x-mixed-replace;boundary=... and send chunks containing the boundary, headers, and JPEG data in a loop.

Installation depends on your development environment:

Arduino IDE

If you are using the arduino-esp32 core, no installation is required. The driver is available immediately.

PlatformIO

Add esp32-camera to the lib_deps section of your platformio.ini file:

[env]
lib_deps =
  esp32-camera

After adding the dependency, you can include the header in your code:

#include "esp_camera.h"

Note: You must enable PSRAM in menuconfig or by adding CONFIG_ESP32_SPIRAM_SUPPORT=y to your sdkconfig file.

If you need to serve BMP images, use the frame2bmp() function to convert the current camera frame buffer into a BMP format buffer.

// Assuming fb is a valid camera_fb_t from esp_camera_fb_get()
uint8_t * buf = NULL;
size_t buf_len = 0;
bool converted = frame2bmp(fb, &buf, &buf_len);

if(converted) {
    // Use buf and buf_len
    free(buf);
}
esp_camera_fb_return(fb);