Photo: u/ghost_snyped via Reddit | Edited
Most luxury cars and even some in the affordable segments of the market feature a bird's eye view of the surroundings, helping the drivers maneuver the vehicle in tight spaces. Tesla models, sadly, are not among them, although Musk promised the feature almost three years ago. Thanks to the additional cameras in HW4-enabled cars, Tesla owners might finally get the coveted feature.
Having several cameras around a vehicle can be incredibly useful, not only for surveillance but also to help see what's happening when steering the car in tight parking spaces. The feature is present in most luxury and even more affordable vehicles and usually needs four cameras to function properly. In most cases, two cameras are integrated into the side rear-view mirrors, while the remaining two are in the front and rear bumpers. The software would then blend the images from all cameras to offer a 360-degree picture.
On the other hand, Tesla lacks such a useful feature, although its cars equip eight cameras. These are not properly positioned to offer a bird's eye view, with three of them installed behind the rear-view mirror facing forward. Four others are integrated into the B-pillars and on the front fenders, while the eighth is installed above the rear license plate. This setup leaves some uncovered areas and a huge blind spot in front of the car.
Nevertheless, Musk promised to offer a bird's eye view feature to Tesla vehicles via a vector-space 3D model. In other words, instead of the camera streams, the Autopilot computer would have been able to plot the surrounding areas and objects and represent them on the screen the way it represents other vehicles and pedestrians. After all these years, Tesla still hasn't offered this feature. With the ultrasonic sensors disappearing, parking maneuvers have become much more difficult for Tesla owners.
There's now a solution to this problem, but unfortunately, it is not available to those who already own a Tesla. This is because the bird's eye view can be offered on vehicles shipped with Hardware 4 computers and sensors. Since no retrofit is possible, current owners are out of luck. It's the same with all the parking assistance features, considering that non-HW4 vehicles lack not only USS but also radar and properly-positioned cameras. On HW4 vehicles, on the other hand, everything is as it should have been.
As evidenced in the HW4 computer teardown, the new sensor suite comprises ten external cameras instead of just eight. And it's not "two more," as it seems at first sight, it's three since Tesla dropped the third camera in the windshield array because the other two are higher resolution and can cover the whole field of view. As such, new Teslas with HW4 feature two more cameras at the front, integrated into the bumper or the headlights, and two at the rear instead of just one, covering the whole area behind the car.
This setup allows capturing a complete 360-degree image around the car, and probably better than any other vehicle on the market today. Tesla has increased the resolution of the HW4 cameras, and it also has two on either side of the car, for a total of eight, besides the two in the windshield and the one in the cabin. This makes the bird's eye view an easy task should Tesla chooses to activate it.
On the other hand, Tesla lacks such a useful feature, although its cars equip eight cameras. These are not properly positioned to offer a bird's eye view, with three of them installed behind the rear-view mirror facing forward. Four others are integrated into the B-pillars and on the front fenders, while the eighth is installed above the rear license plate. This setup leaves some uncovered areas and a huge blind spot in front of the car.
Nevertheless, Musk promised to offer a bird's eye view feature to Tesla vehicles via a vector-space 3D model. In other words, instead of the camera streams, the Autopilot computer would have been able to plot the surrounding areas and objects and represent them on the screen the way it represents other vehicles and pedestrians. After all these years, Tesla still hasn't offered this feature. With the ultrasonic sensors disappearing, parking maneuvers have become much more difficult for Tesla owners.
There's now a solution to this problem, but unfortunately, it is not available to those who already own a Tesla. This is because the bird's eye view can be offered on vehicles shipped with Hardware 4 computers and sensors. Since no retrofit is possible, current owners are out of luck. It's the same with all the parking assistance features, considering that non-HW4 vehicles lack not only USS but also radar and properly-positioned cameras. On HW4 vehicles, on the other hand, everything is as it should have been.
As evidenced in the HW4 computer teardown, the new sensor suite comprises ten external cameras instead of just eight. And it's not "two more," as it seems at first sight, it's three since Tesla dropped the third camera in the windshield array because the other two are higher resolution and can cover the whole field of view. As such, new Teslas with HW4 feature two more cameras at the front, integrated into the bumper or the headlights, and two at the rear instead of just one, covering the whole area behind the car.
This setup allows capturing a complete 360-degree image around the car, and probably better than any other vehicle on the market today. Tesla has increased the resolution of the HW4 cameras, and it also has two on either side of the car, for a total of eight, besides the two in the windshield and the one in the cabin. This makes the bird's eye view an easy task should Tesla chooses to activate it.
Vector-space bird’s eye view coming with FSD
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 3, 2020
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