Zivid


Zivid is a Norwegian machine vision technology company headquartered in Oslo, Norway. It designs and sells 3D color cameras with vision software that are used in autonomous industrial robot cells, collaborative robot cells and other industrial automation systems.
The company's primary hardware product is the Zivid One+ 3D color camera. It is supported by companion software products: the Zivid Software Development Kit and the Zivid Studio, a graphical user interface.
The Zivid company was founded in 2015, by Henrik Schumann-Olsen and Øysten Skotheim, who were colleagues at SINTEF, Norway's largest independent research organization.

History

2000–2011: Research

Henrik Schumann-Olsen and Øystein Skotheim worked together at SINTEF, conducting research into machine and robot vision solutions covering a range of different 3D imaging techniques.

2011–2014: Prototype

In 2010, Microsoft had launched the Kinect motion sensor add-on for Xbox, integrating a new form of 3D depth camera. Kinect enabled researchers and tech-enthusiasts to modify an off-the-shelf 3D camera, and at SINTEF the vision team's concept of a ‘Kinect for Industry’ was born. By the end of 2014, a prototype product named ShapeCrafter 3D, was introduced, showcasing 3D vision capabilities and color point clouds. ShapeCrafter was demonstrated for the first time at VISION 2014 in Stuttgart, Germany.

2015: Foundation

The Research Council of Norway provided 6M NOK for further research into 3D industrial machine vision cameras. Henrik Schumann-Olsen and Øystein Skotheim founded Zivid Labs as a spin-out from SINTEF.

2017: First product

In March 2017, Zivid Labs introduced its first mass-produced product, the Zivid One 3D color camera. The camera was rated IP65 for industrial use.

2018: Second product and success

An upgraded version of Zivid One, the Zivid One+ was launched in November 2018 at VISION 2018 in Stuttgart, Germany. The Zivid One+ product portfolio included three 3D color cameras spanning working distances from 30 cm to 3 m.
In September 2018, logistics company DHL installed its first fully automated e-fulfilment robot in its Behringe, Netherlands warehouse. The robotic system integrated the Zivid One 3D color camera and was used for de-palletizing, picking, and order-fulfilment operations.
The Zivid One 3D camera received Red Dot's "Product Design" award, Vision System Design's "Gold Innovators Award" and inVISION Magazine's "Top Innovation Award".
Zivid appointed Thomas Embla Bonnerud as CEO. The company changed its name from Zivid Labs to Zivid.

2019–present: Enhancement and expansion

Zivid introduced new software development kit and graphical user interface in March 2019. The SDK provided Windows and Linux support, and included a re-engineered API and a second-generation vision engine. The Zivid Studio GUI provided developers with a ready-to-use application for 3D point cloud capture, visualization and exploration.
Zivid opened sales offices in China, South Korea, and North America, and appointed first distributors in Canada, China, Japan and USA.

Technology

To obtain a machine-readable 3-dimensional image of a target object, the Zivid camera technology uses a technique known as structured light, or fringe projection, to arrive at a high-definition point cloud, a highly-accurate set of data points in space. A defined grid pattern is projected onto an object in white LED light, and a 2D color image sensor captures any distortion of the pattern as is strikes the surface. By merging multiple images, complete object depth and surface data are acquired and used to create a full-color 3D point cloud. The Zivid 3D color camera integrates a 1920 pixel x 1200 pixel image sensor to produce a high-quality 2.3 Mpixel point cloud resolution, with XYZ coordinate, native RGB and contrast data for each individual pixel in the point cloud. A good point cloud is characterized by a high density of points and no missing data, yielding a lifelike 3D model of the captured scene.

Products

The Zivid One+ 3D color camera has three variants, named Small, Medium and Large. They are each supported by the Zivid Software Development Kit and the Zivid Studio software.

Zivid One+ 3D color cameras

The cameras share a common hardware platform:
The three Zivid cameras are designed with overlapping range, precision, and field-of-view:
ModelApplicationsOptimal rangeMaximum rangeField of viewSpatial resolutionPoint precision
Zivid One+ SmallTiny and small objects, trays and boxes300 mm - 800 mm1000 mm164 mm x 132 mm @ 300 mm0.12 mm @ 300 mm30 µm @ 300 mm
Zivid One+ MediumSmall to medium-sized objects, totes and bins600 mm - 1600 mm2000 mm433 mm x 271 mm @ 600 mm0.23 mm @600 mm60 µm @ 600 mm
Zivid One+ LargeMedium to large sized objects, standard EU/USA pallets1200 mm – 2600 mm3000 mm843 mm x 530 mm @ 1200 mm0.45 mm @ 1200 mm300 µm @ 1200 mm

Zivid Software Development Kit

The Zivid SDK aids the development of machine vision applications using the Zivid One+ 3D color cameras. Built on a GPU framework, it ensures efficient, scalable 3D point cloud generation. A core API provides access to the Zivid Vision Engine, camera controls, and hardware drivers. The Software Development Kit is designed to be cross-platform and supports both Windows and Linux operating systems. It can be programmed using C++,.NET, ROS, Python and GenICam. A shared code library, tools and utilities are included.

Zivid Studio

Zivid Studio software provides a ready-made graphical user interface for exploring the Zivid One+ 3D color cameras. It enables developers to visualize the 3D point cloud, 2D image and depth data, to view the 3D point cloud in real-time, and to save the point cloud to disk.

Application

The Zivid One Plus 3D color cameras and software are being used as the machine vision sub-system for a variety of autonomous industrial robot cells, collaborative robot cells and other industrial automation systems.
Covering the range from 300 mm to 3,000 mm, the cameras are applied to tasks including random bin picking, pick-and-place, de-palletizing, assembly, packaging and quality inspection in a range of different manufacturing and logistics sectors.

Corporate identity

The company name Zivid was derived by combining the English word ‘Vivid’, meaning very bright, clear and detailed, with the letter ‘Z’, the depth parameter in a 3D image.

Board of directors