Stereo Cameras
Stereo cameras are a computer vision system that uses two or more cameras arranged in a fixed configuration to capture images from slightly different perspectives, enabling depth perception and 3D reconstruction through triangulation. They simulate human binocular vision by calculating disparities between corresponding points in the stereo image pairs to estimate depth maps. This technology is widely used in robotics, autonomous vehicles, augmented reality, and 3D scanning applications.
Developers should learn stereo cameras when working on projects requiring real-time depth estimation, 3D scene understanding, or spatial awareness without relying on active sensors like LiDAR. Specific use cases include obstacle detection in autonomous drones, gesture recognition in AR/VR systems, and industrial automation for object dimensioning. It's particularly valuable in environments where cost, power constraints, or sensor limitations make passive vision-based solutions preferable.