Hello, I would like to introduce myself. I am not even a beginner with Arduino. I bought my son one and make the LED blink. That is my whole experience. I am familiar with electronic and coding, though.
Having said that, I need to build a proximity counter: Imagine a narrow sidewalk where on one side of it, I need to install a thing that would count passing people but just on one side (the closer one) of the sidewalk. People passing on the other side of the sidewalk should not be included. Therefore, the range should be less then 50 cm (20 inch). I went through some posts and found one but it will not work well for a distance less then 50 cm.
What technology should I use? I need something that would not be sensitive to light and quite short range.
Any thoughts?
Take a look here. The "May we also suggest" section has a number of options. I like the look of the time of flight sensors, but the description suggests that they may not have the range you're looking for if the pedestrians are wearing dark clothing on an overcast day.
Ultrasound should do just fine. Typical range 2-300 cm.
Thank you for your suggestions.
yeah !! you can use the ultrasonic sensor as wv marle said u can set a range and when an object passes in that range u can increase the count or blink an led etc
A TFMini TOF sensor can do up to 12M and has a 2 degree detection cone. Something in the SR04/05 family and the like emit a 15 degree cone. The ability of the TFMini is greater then a ultrasonic sensor. The other aspect of a TOF sensor is the data signal strength reading.
The combination of the distance returned and the signal strength can be used to determine where the return signal is coming from; the far or near sidewalk.
A, typical, ultrasonic sensor needs 60milliSec between pulses, at max distance, for accurate distance readings; less time if the max distance is set lower.
The TFMini is using light and light, as you know, is very fast.