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External Device Connectivity

The Open-Motion device exposes Trigger and Sync capabilities for integrating with other instruments in your experimental setup. These can be enabled through SDK functions.

Sync output

When the system is powered on, the Open-Motion Console outputs a 40 Hz square wave on its SMA sync-output port. The square wave is triggered by the camera capture, so you can use it to synchronize external recording devices, event markers, or stimulation hardware to the Open-Motion frame timeline.

Trigger input

The Console also has an SMA trigger-input port for synchronizing Open-Motion acquisition to an external TTL signal.

Roadmap feature

Syncing Open-Motion with an incoming TTL signal is an active roadmap feature and is currently being developed. The hardware port is present; the software/firmware support is in progress. Track development on the openmotion-console-fw repository.

Connection guidelines

For both ports:

  • Use 50 Ω SMA cables of appropriate length for your bench setup.
  • Trigger input expects a TTL-level signal (3.3 V or 5 V tolerant — check the Console board specifications for exact thresholds).
  • Sync output is a TTL-level signal at 40 Hz when the system is acquiring.

Programmatic access via the SDK

Trigger and sync configuration is exposed through the openmotion-sdk. See the SDK documentation under openmotion-sdk/docs/ for the function-level API.

Use cases

Common integration patterns:

  • Stimulation studies — drive a TMS, tACS, or sensory stimulator off the sync output so each stimulation event is timestamped to a known camera frame.
  • Multimodal recording — feed the sync signal into an EEG amplifier's digital input or an analog DAQ to align Open-Motion data with other physiological streams.
  • Triggered acquisition (roadmap) — start Open-Motion acquisition on receipt of an external event from a behavioral apparatus.