Simple Raspberry Pi Color + B&W Camera

A compact digital camera for a Raspberry Pi Zero, Raspberry Pi Camera Module, 1.14-inch IPS display, and UPS-Lite. The display provides a live viewfinder, while a single physical shutter button captures matching full-resolution color and black-and-white JPEGs from the same exposure.

Each press saves a timestamped color JPEG and a matching neutral black-and-white JPEG derived from the same captured pixels.

Sample capture

Color	Black & white

Features

• Live 240x135 color viewfinder with a center-cropped 16:9 preview
• Quick shutter-frame and flash animation when a capture starts
• Full-resolution capture using the connected camera sensor's native resolution
• Matching color and neutral black-and-white JPEGs from the same exposure
• Automatic exposure and white balance
• High-quality JPEG output at quality 95
• Simple one-button shutter with no touchscreen or desktop environment required
• Automatic startup through systemd

Hardware target

• Raspberry Pi Zero W or Zero 2 W
• Raspberry Pi Camera Module v1.3, v2, or another Picamera2-compatible CSI camera
• 1.14-inch 240x135 IPS SPI LCD using the ST7789 controller
• UPS-Lite for Raspberry Pi Zero
• Normally-open momentary shutter switch

UPS-Lite supplies power only and needs no integration in the app. Shut Raspberry Pi OS down cleanly over SSH before switching off the UPS-Lite; the shutter has no secondary or long-press action.

The included display driver is configured and tested for the 1.14-inch 240x135 ST7789 module. Similar SPI LCDs can also work, but they are not drop-in replacements. Depending on the panel and controller, adapt st7789.py for its resolution, initialization commands, orientation and color order, display-RAM offsets, SPI speed, and GPIO mapping. A display using a different controller will generally need its own driver implementation.

Wiring

The display is the eight-pin, 1.14-inch 240x135 IPS module with an ST7789 controller and pins labelled GND VCC SCL SDA RES DC CS BLK. Despite their names, SCL and SDA carry SPI clock and data; do not connect them to the Pi's I2C pins. GPIO numbers below are BCM numbers.

Part	Module label	Pi function	Physical pin
LCD	GND	Ground	6
LCD	VCC	3.3 V	1
LCD	SCL	GPIO11 / SPI0 SCLK	23
LCD	SDA	GPIO10 / SPI0 MOSI	19
LCD	RES	GPIO27	13
LCD	DC	GPIO25	22
LCD	CS	GPIO8 / SPI0 CE0	24
LCD	BLK	GPIO18	12
Shutter	one terminal	GPIO26	37
Shutter	other terminal	Ground	39

Use 3.3 V for the display supply and logic. No MISO wire is required because the LCD only receives data. The app drives BLK high after initialization and low during shutdown; do not connect BLK to both GPIO18 and 3.3 V. Switch off and disconnect Pi power before changing any wiring.

The shutter uses the Pi's internal pull-up. Do not add a connection to 3.3 V.

Connect the camera module to the Pi Zero's CSI connector with the Pi powered off. The v1.3 and v2 modules require a Pi Zero 22-pin-to-15-pin camera cable rather than a standard 15-pin cable. Seat both ends squarely and close both locking tabs.

Raspberry Pi OS setup

Use current Raspberry Pi OS Lite. Enable the camera and SPI interface:

sudo raspi-config

Under Interface Options, enable SPI. Current Raspberry Pi OS camera support uses libcamera/Picamera2 and normally needs no legacy-camera setting. Reboot, then install the platform packages:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y python3-picamera2 python3-opencv python3-numpy \
  python3-gpiozero python3-spidev

Copy or clone this repository into the Pi user's home directory, then verify the app before installing the service:

cd ~/rpi-simple-camera
python3 camera.py

Pictures are written to ~/Pictures, which is created automatically. Stop the manual run with Ctrl+C.

To copy all captured JPEGs to another computer on the same network, run this on that computer and replace the destination path as needed:

scp 'YOUR_USER@raspberrypi.local:~/Pictures/*.jpg' ~/Desktop/

Start automatically at boot

sudo cp systemd/rpi-simple-camera.service /etc/systemd/system/
sudo systemctl daemon-reload
sudo systemctl enable --now rpi-simple-camera.service

The bundled service file assumes the Pi username is pi and the repository is at /home/pi/rpi-simple-camera. If either differs, update User, WorkingDirectory, and ExecStart in the service file before installing it.

This is a console service and does not need X11, Wayland, a desktop session, or a framebuffer mirror. The app sends the 240x135 preview directly to the ST7789 over SPI.

Useful diagnostics:

sudo systemctl status rpi-simple-camera.service
sudo journalctl -u rpi-simple-camera.service -f
rpicam-hello --list-cameras
ls -l /dev/spidev0.0

Run the small image-helper test suite on the Pi with:

python3 -m unittest discover -s tests

Camera and display settings are kept in camera.py and st7789.py for straightforward customization.