Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:24:04 +1000 From: Stephen Hocking <sysseh@devetir.qld.gov.au> To: multimedia@freebsd.org Subject: Another colour camera, using serial port (fwd) Message-ID: <199605292324.XAA25634@netfl15a.devetir.qld.gov.au>
next in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
------- Forwarded Message
Received: from pandora.devetir.qld.gov.au by netfl15a.devetir.qld.gov.au
(8.6.8.1/DEVETIR-0.1)
id WAA23778 for <sysseh@netfl15a.devetir.qld.gov.au>; Wed, 29 May 1996
22:13:35 GMT
Received: from bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au by pandora.devetir.qld.gov.au
(8.6.10/DEVETIR-E0.3a) with MHSnet
id IAA19833 for sysseh; Thu, 30 May 1996 08:10:40 +1000
Received: from ns.crynwr.com by bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au with SMTP (PP);
Thu, 30 May 1996 08:09:08 +1000
Received: (qmail-queue invoked by alias); 29 May 1996 22:07:08 GMT
Delivered-To: quickcam-drivers-list@ns.crynwr.com
Received: (qmail-queue invoked by alias); 29 May 1996 22:07:08 GMT
Delivered-To: quickcam-drivers@crynwr.com
Received: (qmail-queue invoked from smtpd); 29 May 1996 22:07:04 GMT
Received: from gutso.american.com (HELO gutso.foxharp.boston.ma.us)
(204.253.111.241)
by ns.crynwr.com with SMTP; 29 May 1996 22:07:04 GMT
Received: from gutso (localhost [127.0.0.1])
by gutso.foxharp.boston.ma.us (8.7.1/8.7.1) with ESMTP id RAA29899
for <quickcam-drivers@crynwr.com>; Wed, 29 May 1996 17:46:07 -0400
Message-Id: <199605292146.RAA29899@gutso.foxharp.boston.ma.us>
To: quickcam-drivers@crynwr.com
Subject: winc 1.0 -- unix software for the WinCam
Reply-to: pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 17:46:07 -0400
From: Paul Fox <pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us>
i realize this is marginally off-topic for a quickcam list, but
to the extent that our subject is 3rd-party software for controlling
small inexpensive digital cameras that attach to an i/o port on
your PC, well, i figure the topic is pretty close. :-)
some of you may know about the WinCam. if you don't, you can see
and read about it at www.wincam.com. it's a 640x480 24bit color camera
with a serial interface. it comes with Windows software, which didn't do
me a whole lot of good. i should say concerning the resolution that the
camera actually returns 512 pixels horizontally, with an aspect ratio that
forces you to stretch it out to 640. so it's not _really_ 640x480. but
it's actually 492 vertically, so that sort of makes up for it. :-)
now, with the serial interface, this thing is never going to do good
motion video -- the camera itself does no image compression, so the
whole of your image has to flow across the wire. but for webcam's,
or very low-bandwidth surveillance, it seems like just the solution.
and because it's serial, it may be a solution for all those "i can't
put my quickcam far enough from my PC" whiners. :-)
anyway, i helped persuade the folks at Stardot Technologies, who make
the thing, that they would be well-served by releasing programming
specs. they met me part way. they will release programming information
to just about anyone asks if you'll sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement).
they are fully aware that people in the UNIX community probably aren't
interested in doing that if they can't then release source code based on
the NDA'ed information. so the NDA covers that, as described in the
README for my package, which i'll attach down below.
anyway, i've done a library of code for linux, which should be pretty
portable, and a main.c that calls the library, and lets you do
"viewfinder" (low-res) grabs at multiple zoom levels, and full-size 8-bit
greyscale grabs, in multiple resolutions.
i haven't done color yet. it's harder, and well, first things first.
the library is available for ftp at:
ftp://id.wing.net/pub/pgf/winc/winc-1.0.tar.gz
this site is notoriously hard to get into. i'll see if i can make other
arrangements. for now just set up ncftp for periodic "redial", and put it
in the background -- you'll get it eventually.
let me know what you think. there's lots of work to be done. and i
promise i'll form a new mailing list pronto if it looks like this
merits it...
paul
(p.s. if it wasn't for the 3rd-party quickcam effort and the existence
proof it provided, i never would have attempted this! so thanks! for all
the great work.)
- ---------------------
paul fox, pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us (arlington, ma)
- -------README for winc 1.0---------------------------------
Wed May 29, 1996
This package, which i call "winc", is a little set of utility code
useful for getting images from a WinCam digital camera. See the
Stardot Technologies website at http://www.wincam.com for more information
on this camera. It's a slick little color camera, connected to your
computer via serial port (can even be modem-connected). The price
right now (May '96) is $200.
See the man page and/or the usage message for information on how
to use winc.
StarDot Technologies, the makers of the WinCam, have a developer program
of sorts, in which they make available some of their more private stuff
to those simply willing to sign an NDA. Kindly, their NDA explicitly
permits the publication of source code based on a reading of that "private
stuff". The only real restriction (besides as usual promising not to
republish the "private stuff") is that any code based on looking at this
"stuff" be marked as having been "created with the help of proprietary
information belonging to StarDot Technologies". You will see this
disclaimer sprinkled among the source files of winc. Contact
"info@wincam.com" for more information about their developer program.
TODO, as of version 1.0:
- no color support yet. hey, 640x480 b&w is nothing to scoff at.
but i'm definitely going to be working on color...
- no easy support for multiple cameras. i only own one. the
code is all pretty capable of it -- it's just the very
top end that isn't written.
- no image display capability. that awaits a different client
of this library. right now you need to use xv, or
gimp, or something like that.
- no built-in image processing: output must be piped through
filters (e.g. "winc | pnmscale -xscale 1.25 | cjpeg | xv -")
to be useful. i'm kind of fond of this approach, myself.
- no output file creation -- all output goes to stdout. it
would be useful to be able to name the file, and have
winc itself do its writes to a temp file followed by
a rename. this would alleviate locking problems when
trying to access the image asynchronously, like from
a web server. if this is done, perhaps there should
be a provision for specifying filters (like those above)
to be run on the image before it is closed and renamed.
- port to other than linux. i'm not really interested in
portability to everything under the sun, but obviously
there's more to the world than linux. the code is
pretty strict ANSI and POSIX. i'd like to keep it that
way if possible. the makefile uses gmake. i'm not
wedded to that, but it does do a few things easily.
- i'm not really interested in learning all about image
manipulation myself. so, for instance, the WinCam has
a tendency to produce images with dark corners or edges.
i'd love it if someone could point me at a filter to help
correct that.
paul fox
pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us
------- End of Forwarded Message
--
The views expressed above are not those of the Worker's Compensation Board of
Queensland, Australia.
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?199605292324.XAA25634>