Will Whang Launches the FourThirdEye, Giving the Raspberry Pi 5 Micro Four Thirds Support for $399

Developer and custom camera creator Will Whang is selling pre-built models of his FourThirdEye camera module — designed to connect to a Raspberry Pi 5 and provide support for the Micro Four Thirds lens ecosystem.

"This is a M4/3 [Micro Four Thirds] camera module for [Raspberry] Pi 5 based on [a Sony] IMX294 camera sensor," Whang explains of the device. "Specifically, it supports the [Raspberry Pi] boards with four-lane MIPI [Camera Serial Interface], like [the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 4] IO Board or [Raspberry Pi 5]."

Whang unveiled the FourThirdsEye back in June last year, as a follow-up to his earlier OneInchEye and StarlightEye camera modules. While all use Sony image sensors, the FourThirdsEye was his first to use a sensor designed for Micro Four Thirds system cameras: the Sony IMX294. "FourThirdsEye captures 10.7 [megapixel] images and 4k (4096×2160) videos with improved low-light performance and dynamic range (4.63µm pixel size)," Whang wrote at the time. "It's perfect for photography enthusiasts, developers, and makers who want to level up their Raspberry Pi projects with a powerful camera."

As with all of Whang's cameras, hardware design files including Gerbers for having PCBs produced were published under the permissive MIT license — but now the maker is selling pre-populated boards, with all components installed and almost ready to use out-the-box. "Unlike my other camera modules [the] IMX294 package is too large for the off-the-shelf C mount," Whang explains, "and you will need to come up with your lens design (Bring Your Own Lens Mount). A passive E-mount 3D printed adapter step files is provided in [the] GitHub page as your reference."

"Given that both lens and filter are not included, this is not going to be out-of-box usage and this is targeting mostly for those who are aware of this project already," Whang continues, "so if this is the first time you see this camera module I'll recommend you look elsewhere for better out-of-box experience. Additionally this board is not going to support any kind of electronic control mount like E-mount/EF mount."

The assembled camera modules are now available to order on Whang's Tindie store at $399; design files are available on GitHub under the permissive MIT license. "Note that the driver and libcamera support is not in the upstream," Whang adds, "so currently you will have to use my libcamera fork, additionally there [is] still quite some work on the driver side that needs some cleanup."