2D Color Spaces and Output Formats

Zivid cameras can output colors as part of the 3D data or separately as a 2D image. Different camera models use sensors with different resolutions to capture a 2D image of a scene. Each camera model’s resolution is shown below.

Camera

Megapixels (MP)

Resolution

Zivid 2+

5

2448 x 2048

Zivid 2

2.3

1944 x 1200

The color information provided by Zivid can be obtained in different color spaces.

Color spaces

Color spaces define how the color values in an image should be interpreted and represented. The color space of an image will affect both how the image looks to human eyes, and how a device will interpret and display the image. With Zivid SDK, you can decide to represent the 2D data in two different color spaces:

  • sRGB:

    sRGB was designed to ensure consistency in color reproduction across different devices, such as monitors, cameras, and printers. It is the default color space for most consumer electronic devices and the internet. sRGB integrates a gamma correction, which takes advantage of the fact that human perception of brightness differences is non-linear. The gamma correction used in sRGB is 2.2. Due to the gamma correction, the intensity values in sRGB are not linearly proportional to the light intensity perceived by the camera.

  • Linear RGB:

    Linear RGB does not have a gamma correction, and thus the intensity values are directly proportional to the light intensity perceived by the camera. This color space is often utilized in image processing and traditional computer vision algorithms, as it simplifies certain mathematical operations, making them more predictable and consistent.

The main difference between the two color spaces is how the intensity values are encoded. The choice between them depends on specific application requirements. sRGB is commonly used to display and interchange images, while linear RGB is more common in traditional image processing pipelines. Zivid Studio represents colors from both 2D and 3D captures in sRGB. However, you can decide which color space to save the data as.

Note

Zivid Studio displays colors in sRGB. The histogram and the RGB color channel values for a given pixel are displayed in linear color space.

Below you can see the same image stored as sRGB and linear RGB. Note that monitors typically expect images in sRGB space and will do an inverse gamma correction before interpreting the image for display. This will make linear RGB images look darker when displayed on a monitor than they truly are. We therefore encourage our users to view 2D data in the sRGB color space when manually evaluating 2D data quality.

fig_srgb_mode

fig_linear_rgb_mode

Color represented in sRGB space.

Color represented in linear RGB space.

2D color output formats

From Zivid Studio, you can save the color image (File → Save Color Image) in the following formats: All formats support linear RGB and sRGB color mode.

  • PNG - Portable Network Graphics (*.png)

  • BMP - bitmap file format (*.bmp)

  • JPG - Joint Photographic Experts Group (*.jpg)

Zivid studio export options