gHacks technology news » webcam http://www.ghacks.net A technology blog covering software, mobile phones, gadgets, security, the Internet and other relevant areas. Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:26:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 Home Video Surveillance System Utilizing Webcams http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/09/home-video-surveillance-system-utilizing-webcams/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/09/home-video-surveillance-system-utilizing-webcams/#comments Wed, 08 Apr 2009 23:28:33 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/09/home-video-surveillance-system-utilizing-webcams/ ugologHome video surveillance system can cost thousands of Dollars. A cheaper but still valid alternative is to utilize equipment that is already available in the household. One of the possibilities includes webcams that can be used as video surveillance systems with the right software or service.

Ugolog is one of these services that can turn a webcam into a basic home video surveillance system. It has its limitations obviously as this is usually limited to single room surveillance unless multiple webcams are connected to the computer systems of the home. One of the major advantages of Ugolog besides offering a free version is that it requires no software installation. The full service is started and controlled on a web interface.

The limitations of the free service are a maximum utilization of two webcams, 500 snapshots and 5 minutes of video per day. Those are fairly acceptable values for a video surveillance system. Interestingly enough the premium plans are freely usable during beta phase with the state of the art plan allowing to add unlimited cameras with 15K snapshots and 4 hours of recording. These plans will eventually turn into subscriptions.

video surveillance system

Everything is controlled on the web interface of the service which is only available to registered users. Users can access previous recordings, watch a full day in fast access mode or record videos or snapshots. The main advantage of Ugolog is that it is operating system and web browser independent and that its only requirement is a webcam that is connected to a computer system. Grabmotion is a similar software that can be used to monitor a room.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/04/09/home-video-surveillance-system-utilizing-webcams/feed/ 5 Computer Mouse Head Control http://www.ghacks.net/2009/01/14/computer-mouse-head-control/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/01/14/computer-mouse-head-control/#comments Wed, 14 Jan 2009 11:17:46 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=9883 HeadMouse 2 is a interesting software program for computer users who cannot or do not like to use their hands when controlling the computer mouse. The software is compatible with most Windows operating systems including Windows Vista or Windows XP. The only other requirement is a webcam with a minimum resolution of 640×480. The program will initiate a user face detection during first run to calibrate the webcam for best results. All that is needed to do in this phase is to move the head until a drawing of a face appears in the middle of the computer monitor.

That’s the end of the calibration phase and HeadMouse 2 can be used from then on to control the computer mouse. The mouse cursor can be moved by turning the head into the direction it should be moved. Turning the head to the left side would move the cursor to the left while turning it up would move it up.

There are three different methods to perform a mouse click. A mouse click can be initiated by closing the eyes, opening the mouse or not moving the head around for 1.5 seconds. At least one method has to be activated. Objects like windows or icons can be moved using the very same principle by clicking once on the object to activate it, moving the head to move it and clicking again to place it.

head mouse

There are several occasions where HeadMouse 2 could come in handy. It provides the means to control the mouse with a webcam and movement of the head. While it is not as fast as using the hands to control the computer mouse it provides sufficient means to work with the computer.

HeadMouse2

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/01/14/computer-mouse-head-control/feed/ 8 Microsoft Touchless http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/22/microsoft-touchless/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/22/microsoft-touchless/#comments Wed, 22 Oct 2008 07:58:48 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=7786 Microsoft Office Labs are always good for a surprise. For anyone who does not know what Microsoft Office Labs is about: It basically is used to publish software programs created by Microsoft employees in their spare time that relate to Microsoft products.

Microsoft Touchless (via Shell City) is an interesting application that fits well into the touchscreen craze that Microsoft started with the Windows 7 announcement. Everyone knows that Windows 7 will provide better support for touchscreens. Users without a touchscreen could make use of Touchless which utilizes a webcam to provide a touchscreen-like experience.

A Touchless demo can be downloaded from the Office Labs project page which contains four demonstrations. Snake is the well known snake game while Defender offers a up to four player pong experience. Map is a basic map application which supports rotating, zooming and moving while Draw lets the user draw on the screen.

Touchless requires a computer running Windows XP or Windows Vista and a webcam that is DirectX9 compliant. The application can be started by extracting the contents of the archive to the computer system and double-clicking on TouchlessDemo.exe.

Microsoft Touchless provides access to the Touchless SDK which can be used to create third party applications that make use of the system. The whole package is Open-Source and could provide a way to add basic touchscreen support to webcam owners in Windows 7 which would surely explode the number of users that would make use of the Touchscreen features.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/22/microsoft-touchless/feed/ 5 Debut Video Capturing Software http://www.ghacks.net/2008/04/22/debut-video-capturing-software/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/04/22/debut-video-capturing-software/#comments Tue, 22 Apr 2008 13:10:07 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=3885 Debut [via Labnol] Video Capture Software is a tiny software that can capture the screen, a webcam or capturing device. The software has a size of only 412 Kilobyte and for that an immense amount of options and settings. Part of the screen or the full screen can be recorded into various output formats like avi, 3gp or mp4 which can be all configured to change the quality settings of the video. Naturally audio can be recorded as well using various available codecs.

While the normal options to record the screen or webcam are top notch Debut comes with a feature that I have not seen in any other video capturing software yet. Debut can start with Windows and start the recording process immediately. A maximum recording time can be specified with the option to start a new recording immediately afterwards or to stop the recording.

This is useful in combination with the next feature of Debut. A completed recording can be processed in a number of ways. The recording can be send as an email attachment, uploaded to an ftp server, mirrored on a local or network drive or sent to another executable that can be specified by the user.

video capturetransmit video

Debut is compatible to several Microsoft operating systems including Windows 98, 2000, XP and Windows Vista.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/04/22/debut-video-capturing-software/feed/ 4 Monitor a room with Grabmotion http://www.ghacks.net/2007/05/06/monitor-a-room-with-grabmotion/ http://www.ghacks.net/2007/05/06/monitor-a-room-with-grabmotion/#comments Sun, 06 May 2007 07:27:45 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2007/05/06/monitor-a-room-with-grabmotion/ If you are looking for a cheap and reliable way to monitor a room you could take a look at the freeware Grabmotion which uses webcams to monitor rooms. Grabmotion constantly monitors the room and starts default processes once a motion was detected. Processes that can be defined include sending an email with an attached image showing the room during the time the motion was detected, sending an sms through a gateway, saving an image to the hard drive or playing a sound alarm.

The main advantage of Grabmotion is that it is plattform independent because it was programmed in Java. It will work with most – the developer claims all – webcams and evidence will be saved even if the computer itself will be stolen or destroyed. (an email will be send with the image). It is also possible to request an image from Grabmotion which will also be send by email. It is possible to schedule monitoring times, it does not make sense to run Grabmotion if you are at home working on the computer.

monitor rooms with webcams

Installation instructions:

  1. Download the grabMotion software (2.5Mo)
  2. Install Java JRE (Java Runtime Environment) for windows download it at Java Sun site.
  3. Install JMF (Java Media Framwork) download JMF
  4. Open the command prompt
  5. Type : java -jar grabpack.jar
  6. … if you get an error try to type the full path like :

    c:\java\jdk1.4\java -jar c:\mydownload\grabmotion\grabpack.jar

Grabmotion can be easily bypassed by simply turning of the power supply for the computer. It is still nice to see if your brothers, sisters or friends do snoop around in your room while you are gone.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2007/05/06/monitor-a-room-with-grabmotion/feed/ 1 Dorgem Webcamp Capture Application http://www.ghacks.net/2006/05/13/dorgem-webcamp-capture-application/ http://www.ghacks.net/2006/05/13/dorgem-webcamp-capture-application/#comments Sat, 13 May 2006 12:34:17 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2006/05/13/dorgem-webcamp-capture-application/ Are you using webcams at home or in your company ? Maybe you wondered if it would be possible to record those webcam sessions ? Dorgem is a freeware application that lets you record your webcam(s). As you can see in the screenshot it´s very easy to use. It supports multiple cameras, has a build in webserver and can be used as a security camera because of its motion sensoring support.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2006/05/13/dorgem-webcamp-capture-application/feed/ 0 Two quick and dirty webcam searches http://www.ghacks.net/2005/10/27/two-quick-and-dirty-webcam-searches/ http://www.ghacks.net/2005/10/27/two-quick-and-dirty-webcam-searches/#comments Thu, 27 Oct 2005 18:24:26 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=67 Just check out this two relatively new webcam searches using Google. Happy hunting.

intitle:”Biromsoft WebCam” -4.0 -serial -ask -crack -software -a -the -build -download -v4 -3.01 -numrange:1-10000

site:viewnetcam.com

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