These demos only work with the Kaluga version 1.3. They are not compatible with version 1.2. Check your board's silkscreen to find the version.
On the Kaluga, the camera connector shares pins with the JTAG debugging facility. It is not possible to use a JTAG debugger together with the camera on this board.

Setting 'reserved PSRAM'

The 'reserved PSRAM' setting was discussed earlier, but here's a reminder now that you've got CircuitPython installed:

Edit the settings.toml file within the CIRCUITPY drive, creating it as an empty file if necessary. Add a line that says CIRCUITPY_RESERVED_PSRAM=1048576

The setting will become effective when the board is reset with the reset button. You can check it by opening the REPL and running the following lines:

Adafruit CircuitPython 8.0.0-rc.1 on 2023-01-30; Kaluga 1 with ESP32S2
>>> import espidf
>>> espidf.get_reserved_psram()
1048576

Camera Module Connections

Take the assembled Kaluga board stack (all three boards) and attach the camera at the dedicated header, making sure the pins are inserted properly.

The camera pins are as follows (though in CircuitPython they also have meaningful names that should be used when available):

  • GPIO8 is CAMERA_SIOC - the SCL pin of the camera
  • GPIO9 is CAMERA_SIOD - the SDA pin of the camera
  • GPIO33 is CAMERA_PCLK - the pixel clock of the camera
  • GPIO2 is CAMERA_VSYNC - the vertical sync of the camera
  • GPIO3 is CAMERA_HREF - the horizontal sync of the camera
  • GPIO1 is CAMERA_XCLK - the input clock pin of the camera
  • GPIO36, 37, 41, 42, 39, 40, 21, 38 are CAMERA_DATA - the 8 data pins of the camera

LCD variants

There are at least 3 variants of the LCD board that ship with the Kaluga:

  • st7789
  • ili9341
  • ili9341 with rotation=90

There are no markings to distinguish the three, so for demos that use the LCD you will need to try each variant until you find the one that works.

This guide was first published on Feb 21, 2023. It was last updated on Mar 28, 2024.

This page (Espressif Kaluga Pinout) was last updated on Mar 08, 2024.

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