New to this site so hoping it's the right place to ask.
I'm trying to prototype something for use in a retail store and an idea a teammate had was using an RGB sensor to detect both ambient color as well as a proximity sensor to detect when someone is near the display and get the color of their clothing. We'd then use a series of LEDs to recolor the display to match that customer.
The problem I'm running into is that most RGB sensors I've found seem to only be accurate at a few inches (at most) and for proximity sensors it's a bit better but not enough for use in a store setup.
I have a pretty limited electronics background though so I'm mostly browsing Arduino suppliers. Does anyone know if you can get sensors with a larger distance and if so can they be controlled by something like an arduino?
One potential fallback is a camera like the MS Kinect with a full on computer but the client is weary of having a real camera for legal reasons.
Best Answer
Light sensors aren't limited to any distance. It makes no difference whether the photons they sense came from someone's clothes 1 foot away or the sun 93 Mmiles away.
Your problem with distance is probably that the light is not focused, so the sensor is seeing the average of a large angle. When a person is close, that angle of view will be dominated by light reflecting off their clothes. When more distant, all kinds of other ambient light is mixed in.
The solution is therefore to either focus the light so that only light arriving from a narrow angle hits the sensor, or to just block the light coming from outside the view of interest. The latter can be easily done by putting the sensor at the back of a tube that is diffuse black on the inside.