Logitech Quickcam Pro 4000 on Linux

This post is about using a Logitech Quickcam Pro 4000 on Linux (Fedora 8) to store snapshots and producing a movie.

# Install xawtv (xawtv-3.95-7.fc8)
> yum install xawtv

# Install mencoder (mencoder-1.0-0.90.rc2.lvn8 from the livna repository)
> yum install mencoder

The xawtv package contains tools which allow you to connect to the webcam, grab pictures and videos on the fly and also produce movies from the snaps.

# Check that the webcam is recognized and broadcasting:
> xawtv -c /dev/video0 &

/dev/video0 : the device (use xawtv -hwscan to see which one it is for you)

# You can grab pictures in two ways with xawtv: using webcam or using streamer.

# grab snapshots using streamer
> streamer -c /dev/video0 -j 85 -t 1200 -r 0.03 -o office-0000.jpeg

/dev/video0 : the device
85 : JPEG quality
1200 : number of snapshots to grab
0.03 : frames per second (here it's about 1 snap every 30 seconds)
office-0000.jpeg : output file with counter to accomodate 4 digits here

# grap snapshots using webcam
> webcam webcam.conf

All configuration is read from file. My webcam.conf is:

[grab]
device = /dev/video0
text = Atlanta GA - %Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S
#infofile = infofile.txt
fg_red = 255
fg_green = 255
fg_blue = 255
width = 320
height = 240
delay = 30
wait = 0
#input = camera
brightness = 100
#norm = pal
rotate = 0
top = 0
left = 5
bottom = -1
right = -1
quality = 85
trigger = 0
once = 0
archive = office-%Y%m%d-%H%M%S.jpg

TODO Explanation to follow...

# make movie using mencoder (you can also use streamer but I didn't try it yet)
> mencoder "mf://${CURR_DATE}/*.jpg" -msglevel all=-1 -mf fps=12:type=jpg -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=mpeg4:trell:mbd=2:dc=10 -oac copy -o "movie_${CURR_DATE}.avi"

... to be continued