How to Force Autofocus Using VAPIX

[kenichiishii]

I would like to force autofocus on a camera using VAPIX from my custom application. Is there a method or feature available for this? If there is such a feature, what CGI should I execute to achieve this?

[github-actions[bot]]

This automatically generated reply acts as a friendly reminder.

Answers to your questions will most often come from the community, from developers like yourself. You will, from time to time, find that Axis employees answers some of the questions, but this is not a guarantee. Think of the discussion forum as a complement to other support channels, not a replacement to any of them.

If your question remains unanswered for a period of time, please revisit it to see whether it can be improved by following the guidelines listed in Axis support guidelines.

[janssen70]

Details depend on the type of camera
If it has the opticscontrol API you can find details here: https://www.axis.com/vapix-library/subjects/t10175981/section/t10168762/display?section=t10168762-t10168761

If it is a PTZ camera you need the PTZ API which you can also find in VAPIX Library

If it is an older device it's more difficult. In general, you can try such things in the webGUI and see in browser debug window what's requested on the camera. Many times, the plain VAPIX is also used by the webGUI.

Note: autofocus is one of the areas where software can damage hardware. On most backfocus models the motor isn't made for heavy use. You will not hit a limit when triggering autofocus manually. But when programming it in a loop, you may.

[kenichiishii]

Thank you janssen70

We are assuming the AXIS Q1785-LE camera.

We would like to use VAPIX ["performAutofocus"] as you suggested.

I assume the following processing flow.

getFocus
Obtain opticsid
↓
performAutofocus
↓
getFocusopticsid
↓
end

I now understand the hardware burden of running a series of autofocuses.
I understand now.

[kenichiishii]

• Environments
  AXIS Q1785-LE
  FW:11.6.94

The following command was executed to search the API.

curl --anyauth "http://root:[email protected]/axis-cgi/apidiscovery.cgi" -d '
{
"apiVersion": "1.1",.
"context": "optics-control",.
"method": "getApiList", }
"params": {
"id": "optics-control", "method": "getApiList", "params": {
"version": "1.1"
}
}'

The result is as follows.
{"method": "getApiList", "apiVersion": "1.1", "data": {"apiList": []}, "context": "optics-control"}

Is it safe to assume that opticscontrol.cgi is not available for the model
Also, is there any way to make it available?

[janssen70]

Hi,

API-wise the q1785 is a PTZ camera, although it doesn't look like one, lacking the PT part.
So you can use the pan/tilt/zoom API to control focus. For this model the focussing hardware is designed for operational use so my comment about hardware wearing out doesn't apply

https://www.axis.com/vapix-library/subjects/t10175981/section/t10036011/display