iCam2 / News: Recent posts

v1.1 was packaged up on July 5th, and released with a generally minimal amount of fanfare. You can check it out over here: http://icam2.optera.net/#files

W00T! The MPEG encoding has gotten a bit more robust, and timing now operates independently of snapshot delays. (Basically, if you want a snapshot for your webcam every 5 seconds, but only want a frame for the MPEG every 30 seconds, go ahead. Or, if you want to stream to the MPEG as much as possible, but only want a snapshot taken for your website every 10 seconds, you can do that too).

Also, I added a script called nph-webcam.cgi. Works in NS/Mozilla, probably some others, but not IE. :( Anyway, if you set 'delay' to 0 in your .icam2rc (any delay, really, but 0 or 1 works best), you can get an idea of how to stream images over the web. Works pretty well for me, but YMMV.... read more

Got working machine, and a new (refurbished) webcam (Labtec, aka QuickCam Express). The new cam is still of crappy video quality, but much faster, and hence, less of a b*tch to code for. iCam2 v1.03 still seems to work, and I haven't made any real code mods to the core of it yet, but I have implemented MPEG video recording using libfame. It's pretty slick -- I'm just not sure precisely how to handle it best. Right now, every frame that gets snapped for the webcam, gets added to the video file (if you choose to create a video), which means you get a sort of time-lapse video. There's no mechanism right now to handle rotating the file or anything, so it grows quite large during a run of iCam2. Restarting iCam2 causes it to overwrite the video file, so that's something else to keep in mind... :)... read more

Wow. After a year of nothingness, I finally have a working PC heading my way so I can finally start doing some development again, and I also have a "shiny new" (Labtec USB) webcam heading out as well. A new approach to auto-brightness and white-balancing, and a clean attempt at an X11 interface and the next rev of iCam2 should be out in time for the new year!

About time.

...Or, has ANYTHING happened?

Well, sorry to say it folks, but due to hardware problems, my PC is down and out, and I'm not really keen on coughing up for another videocard...(lost my GF3 due to a slight heating problem...fan burned out, card subsequently did the same). (Lost the 40G disk as well, but Maxtor is giving me a new one, so that's no big deal).

So, really, nothing has been happening with iCam2.... read more

I stripped a bunch of code from the X11 sections, modified/rewrote some of what was left, and now, X11 "works." What I mean by works is: Three windows come up; one shows the current camera frame, and the other two update whenever a frame is grabbed for storing on disk. Of these two, one shows the image prior to any processing, the other shows the image after processing/timestamping/etc.... read more

As I sit here, poking and prodding little bits of code, it occurs to me that the documentation for what exists right now is lacking, and that this website doesn't do the best that it could for conveying important information in regards to this project...for that, I must apologize.

As time permits, and as I finish getting v1.03 stable, I shall make sure to get some sort of reasonable documentation out on the use of iCam2, and I will get a few more things up on the website -- some sample scripts for making use of the tweakfile, for instance; also, I will hopefully be getting my hands on a camera that is more fully supported and provides a higher framerate and better color than my QuickCam VC, at which point I can actually make some headway with the automatic image adjustment features...... read more

Well, there is some auto-whitebalance-adjusting code in the CVS codebase now, which is derived from the auto whitebalance code found in the ultracam module from the usb-video project. Unfortunately, due to the severe limitations of my camera, I am not sure if it works well or not. It doesn't for me -- YMMV...

If anyone knows of a good algorithm for adjusting whitebalance (or brightness, for that matter...or any video component.. :), please let me know! Thanks!