Friday, October 1, 2021

ESP32Cam experiment board

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As the regular readers of this weblog know I have been experimenting with the ESP32-Cam a lot lately. The ESP32-Cam is a nice little board that has an ESP32, an SDcard interface and a real camera. It can be used as an IP-Cam, photocam and safety cam.

Programming the ESP32-Cam can be done by attaching wires to an FTDI but is more easily done with a programming board such as the one I described here: http://lucstechblog.blogspot.com/2021/09/esp32cam-programming-board.html

After it has been programmed I want to attach the ESP32-Cam to a breadboard. You can do that by using female to male Dupont wires. An easier and (short-circuit-wise) safer option is to build an experiment-board.

Stripboard.


To build the board I used stripboard.
The stripboard is small, just 10 holes wide and 13 holes high.
I removed the copper in the middle of the board so the upper headers would not be in contact with the lower headers. Just like the center of a breadboard does.



And here it is in real life.

Extra bonus

Here is something I just realised when the board was done. The ESP32-Cam has exact the same footprint as a Wemos D1 mini. So you can use this board for experimenting with both controllers.

Till next time.

Have fun,

Luc Volders