Crowd Funding the Release of OpenCV 5

• Deep Neural Networks Module: $150k

Considering how important deep learning is for computer vision and image processing in general now, this is a very important. But will this be a completely new library for both training and inference? Why not use what's already out there, like Pytorch or ONNX? $150k pays for 1-3 developers for a year, depending on where they live.

• Accelerated image processing: $150k

I don't know what this means in practice, refactoring the code adding more SIMD code? OpenCL kernels? Again, the price tag seems steep, but maybe they will hire an expert for half a year?

• Improved support for fisheye camera calibration: [$100k + hardware ($20k approx) shared with multi-camera support]

I know OpenCV is often used with very expensive research cameras, but couldn't this development be done with a couple GoPros? If companies want to certify it for their esoteric cameras let them pay for the added expenses.

• $700k stretch goal, CI and build server.

Does this cost $100k?

Don't get me wrong, I like OpenCV, I've used it and will donate to this, but I don't get how these things can cost that much for an open source project. There's no price attached to the improved documentation and tutorials, those are important and take a lot of time. It's probably faster to write a canny edge detector than writing all the documentation and examples for it.

On a separate note, their $1M stretch goal mentions a future OpenCV cloud service. That seems like something that should be sponsored by one of the cloud providers, or handled by a separate company instead of a crowd funded open source library project.