Face detection on ESP32Cam

[AndyGadget]

I was just having a quick fiddle with the ESP32Cam and face detection (not recognition) to see how easy it would be to make a simple face tracking camera. I'm using AnnexCAM DET 1.43.5 as I know that the face detection has been discontinued in the latest build. I'm finding results very hit and miss (mainly miss) and not at all reliable enough for face tracking.

Currently I'm using the TFT.CAMERA function to analyse the generated image headed for a face detection on a 2nd ESP32, but is this the only way to access the detection data? Is this not accessible on the ESP32Cam doing the detecting? (TFT.CAMERA generates a syntax error on the detecting device.)

[cicciocb]

Hi Andy,
I confirm that the face detection is not really reliable but this is not due to Annex itself but to the software driver implementation and also to low quality of the camera sensor. This explains why I removed this functionality.

I think that is not possible to extract the info on the module itself, probably I missed to implement these functions ( TFT.CAMERA is not implemented in AnnexCam).

Honestly, except to demonstrate the possibilities of the camera, the behavior of the face detection / face recognition functionality is absolutely not reliable

[AndyGadget]

Thanks Francesco.
It was just a bit of fun really.
I wasn't expecting great results given the processing needed and the driver / device limitations.

[PeterN]

Hi to all )

That was one of the results of my experiments with face detection and recognition:

[AndyGadget]

That's pretty good, Peter. It seems to work well under ideal conditions (full-frame face with good lighting)
I was hoping for detection of a partial frame tracking of a moving face under varying lighting; In hindsight, expecting a lot from the little ESP32.
The idea was for a pan and tilt servo to centre the face as part of a desktop toy.

[Electroguard]

A novel idea Andy, and perhaps could be adapted as a 'marble balancer' which would allow a small rolling ball to contrast sufficiently against the moving platform it was being balanced on.