ColorWatch

📝 Description

This project measures color changes in a user-defined region of interest (ROI) with an easy-to-use graphical user interface (GUI). ColorWatch was initially developed to monitor color changes in coupling reactions, but it can be applied to anything in need of color monitoring.

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📂 Table of Contents

• Features
• Installation
• Usage
• Instructions
• Contributing
• License

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✨ Features

• User-Friendly GUI: Built with Python and Tkinter
• Downloadable Executable: Easy and ready to use.

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🛠️ Installation

1. Install the executable

• GitHub Release

OR

1. Clone the Repository

git clone https://github.com/IsaacTieu/color.git

2. Create a Virtual Environment

Create a virtual environment using your preferred tool (e.g., venv, conda). Here are conda installation instructions.

cd color
conda env create -f environment.yml
conda activate colorenv

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🚀 Usage

The scripts can either be run with the executable, in an IDE or through the command line.

Run the Executable

1. Double click main.exe
2. This takes ~30 seconds - 1 min to load.

Run Through an IDE

1. Open main.py in your preferred IDE and press the run button.

Run Through Command Line

python src/main.py

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📥 Instructions

First Screen

• Camera Index: Specifies the camera to be accessed.
  Example: 1 for the first camera. For an external webcam, it is typically 1.

• Time Elapsed per Color Check (seconds): Specifies the rate in seconds at which pictures are saved.
  Example: 3 for a picture saved every 3 seconds.

• Warning Sign Length (frames): Duration of a warning sign being displayed on screen in frames.
  Example: 30 for a message to be displayed for 30 frames. For a 30 frames per second webcam, this would result in the warning sign lasting for 1 second.

• Webhook URL: Specifies the webhook to send Microsoft Teams notifications to. Webhooks can be created with this tutorial.
  Example: false for no Microsoft Teams message to be sent.

• Select Region of Interest (ROI): Press this button to select a ROI. This can be done by holding down left click on the mouse and dragging across the screen. Once finished, press and hold q to exit.

Second Screen

• (R/G/B) Value Change: This represents the R/G/B value change to be detected for each value. These values range from 0-255, so smaller values will detect smaller changes.
  Example: `256' for no R/G/B value change to be detected.

• Start Live Monitoring: Press this button to start the live monitoring. Once finished, press and hold q to exit.

Third Screen

• Save Files: Press this button to initiate file saving. .csv files will be exported containing R/G/B values and time data. A video of the session will be exported as a .mp4 file.

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🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Feel free to open an issue or submit a pull request.

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📜 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.

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📅 Last Updated

This README was last updated on April 29, 2025.