[mikegrundvig]

To get bright lights with no chance of distracting other drivers as well as massively reducing the likelihood of swamping from other light sources teams should use optical bandpass filters.

I'm sure other teams have done this before but I've not seen it. We did it last year with our vision system that worked great - too bad the shooter didn't work well enough to make it effective in the end. We used high wattage LEDs with peak output in the IR range that matches the bandpass filter built into the Kinect. You can do the same thing with a filter purchased from Edmund Optics or some other supply house.

This worked incredibly well for our vision system. We'd get pitch black images with the retroreflective tape glowing bright white. Basically ideal conditions for computer vision. If even worked with sunlight streaming in the windows at the camera and it produced no visible light to distract drivers.

-Mike