Random, but it's a weird time to want to buy a thermal camera. Flir seems like the standard, but their USB-C options don't work with iPhone 15 (???) so you can only buy their most expensive wireless version. Doesn't seem like there's a lot of other options?
@christianselig I don't think FLIR has the best phone-attached options. I bought an Infiray P2 Pro last year that's way nicer/smaller and doesn't need to be separately charged. It also works with the USB-C to lightning adapter.
@christianselig They make the same thing in USB-C as well (originally for the Android side of things), but I don't know yet if it works with the USB-C iPhones.
@christianselig Seek’s cameras produce much sharper images (I have a Compact Pro). They claim their USB-C model doesn’t work with iPad Pro, though, which is definitely odd.
@christianselig The problem with smartphone attached cameras is you are dependent on the vendor maintaining the app and I don't even trust FLIR to do it well (I can see them dropping old cameras over time).
The best cameras are standalone cameras. FLIR also makes the best there.
A good cheaper alternative is Uni-T thermal cameras at many price points. The chinese-market sku can be bought off eBay and come fully in English. Some of them even have add-on macro lenses to allow focusing on PCBs.
@christianselig wait a little for the situation to sort itself out and then buy Flir. Basically the only reliable game in town for various hardware development related reasons.
If you want nothing even close to accurate buy whatever is cheapest
@tzeejay That's what I mean though, if they’ve had them for Android but haven't bothered to make them compatible with iOS despite iOS having USB-C for half a decade, I'm not holding my breath
@christianselig I had the Flir lightning version and sold it recently due to incompatibility. I didn’t try the usb-c to lightning adapter; I read on a forum that it didn’t work, so I wasn’t about to shell out $30 to test. The wireless version seems too clunky. From what I’ve read, it requires you to connect to an ad-hoc WiFi network each time you use it and even then it has worse frame rate than the hardwired version. I’m waiting to see if Flir or competitors have a better solution soon.
@christianselig I work at Seek, and we have the same issue with USB-C. I haven’t had time to chase it yet. Reading the MFi docs it doesn’t seem like any MFi is required, but my guess is our firmware is seeing an iPhone and then starting the MFi auth process. Doesn’t FLIR have their new wireless phone one?
@yertle I mentioned the wireless one in my post haha, it's really expensive for something I don't care about, but iPads have had USB-C for half a decade and it also doesn't work with those, I'm sure it's possible
@christianselig and, yeah, we tested on an iPad Pro back in 2018, and knew the new phone was coming. Just been busy on other stuff, and it’s a small market because we haven’t been updating it
@christianselig oops, didn’t read carefully. Seek’s USB-C version will technically work on an iPhone if you buy a new one, we had an excess of MFi boards and have been including the MFi chip on the Android version. We make good cameras, but the Compact series hasn’t seen a lot of updates and I’m not sure I’d recommend it right now. But if you find a good deal it’s not a bad idea
@christianselig apparently if you buy the Apple branded usb c to Lightning adapter it will let you use the FLIROne Pro iOS version. A few people have tested other adapters with less success.
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