You only need to add a camera and tweak your router??™s firewall settings
to enjoy this project to its fullest.
Almost any webcam will work??”as long as you can view yourself and capture
snapshots on your local PC, you??™ve met the minimum requirement to be able to use
your webcam for security or entertainment. The toughest part may be finding a camera
you like, or one that will support your operating system. I have three wonderful cameras,
but had to buy a fourth to use with Windows Vista, 32- or 64-bit.
If your camera has a face-tracking feature, as do many of the Logitech cameras, you
may want to turn off this feature until you get everything in the next few steps working
correctly. Another caveat before moving on to the step that enables you to watch your
camera on your local network or the Internet: after you have verified that your choice
of camera works, turn off the camera software! Windows is not yet smart enough to
allow you to run your camera??™s software and network/Internet camera software at the
same time and have both provide the camera image you want all the time.
Canon, Panasonic, and Sony offer selections of steerable webcams with incredible picture quality
and functionality. Since these products are in the $800-and-up price category, you will probably
find that your $20??“80 electronics store webcam from Creative or Logitech is more than adequate.
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note
38 Project 6
Step 1: Install the webcamXP Software
I found webcamXP while looking for an easy-to-use program to handle multiple
video sources??”both PC cameras and video capture sources??”as well as provide a
built-in web server, e-mail picture or video captures on schedule, and upload pictures
to web pages.
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