
V002 Camera Live – Zoom with Your DSLR as a Webcam via USB - rayshan
https://github.com/v002/v002-Camera-Live
======
franga2000
Am I the only one with strong objections to using Zoom as a verb?

Putting aside the fact that it's already a verb, which courses plenty of
confusion, I can go along with using Photoshop as a verb, because it is
objectively the most powerful and widely used tool with a very long legacy.

But Zoom is a clunky insecure mess with impressive, but not nearly leading
market share. Is this really who we want to be gifting the recognition (and
money) that comes with generic verb for all videoconferencing? At least Adobe
did something to earn their verb...

P.S.: I see no mention of Zoom in the page. Does this fall under the "don't
mess with titles too much" rule of HN?

~~~
leoedin
Until recently "to Skype" was the generic term for video calling among most of
my friends and family. Given that nobody has actually used Skype for that
purpose for 5 years, this crisis has accelerated it's decline and
Zoom/WhatsApp/facetime is creeping into our vernacular.

So one crappy clunky video conferencing verb being replaced by another.

~~~
choward
What's wrong with just"video call"?

~~~
marzell
Yeah that's what I've been using, guess I'm turning into an 'old' as evidenced
by my hair now approaching ponytail length.

~~~
tyldum
"Teams-meeting" has become the norm for video-conference. One of my annoying
pet peeves is pointing this out and calling it "meeting on Teams" \- if that's
where it is.

Since I use up to 5 different platforms each day...

------
Ductapemaster
Please take care when using your DSLRs for video. Often the sensors are not
adequately cooled for long term usage as a video camera (>30m). You have the
potential to damage the sensor if it is not designed for continuous use and
doesn't have proper thermal protection. Newer cameras will shut down if they
get too hot, or have limits to how long you can run in video mode.

Stackoverflow discussion:
[https://video.stackexchange.com/questions/21932/can-
continuo...](https://video.stackexchange.com/questions/21932/can-continuous-
video-capture-damage-my-
dslr#:~:text=It%20depends%20on%20the%20camera,heat%20as%20they%20capture%20images.&text=Most%20modern%20cameras%20have%20temperature,as%20you'd%20like%20to).

~~~
paulgerhardt
Old wives tale.

Even the stackoverflow answers say as much. Most of the thermal ramping occurs
in the first five minutes and then stabilizes after cache is exhausted. As all
these dslr’s allow you to record 29m50s videos back to back all day long it’s
also indicative that it’s not a big enough issue in returns to warrant
addressing in their firmware.

As you’re not writing to the SD card, hdmi passthrough should yield an overall
lower operating temperature after an hour than writing to the SD card when
recording video after even 10 minutes.

I tried getting to the source of this rumor. Didn’t find one particular
origin, just speculation amongst Redditors and Twitch users about the 30
minute limit and bypassing it with the Nikon or Canon firmware mods will void
your warranty.

It _will_ however introduce more noise. Particularly at higher ISO’s.
Astronomy photographers (a major driver of the firmware hacks in the first
place - see “Nikon stareater bypass”) have cooling solutions available there
too.

~~~
myself248
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the 30m limit is due to some taxes or regulations
on "video cameras", right?

Edit: Yup. [https://petapixel.com/2012/05/21/30-minute-video-limit-in-
di...](https://petapixel.com/2012/05/21/30-minute-video-limit-in-digital-
cameras-may-be-on-its-way-out/)

> At present [2012], digital cameras' video cuts off after 30 minutes to avoid
> them being classified as video cameras (which attract 5.4% duty because they
> are considered to be video recorders

~~~
koolba
Reminds me of those light trucks that get ripped apart to create passenger
cars.

EDIT: I had it backwards. The tax is on trucks and it gets circumvented by
importing them as passenger cars:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax)

~~~
triangleman
Nah, light trucks are in a whole other category (or exempt, I don't know) in
"CAFE" standards, so that's why you see so many SUV's in America.

------
jammmety
Why not use Canon's own EOS Webcam Utility?

[https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/about/news...](https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/about/newsroom/press-
releases/press-release-details/2020/20200428-Webcam/20200428-Webcam)

~~~
robbyt
Canon's app only supports Windows

~~~
ianburrell
They just released the Mac version of EOS Webcam Utility.
[https://petapixel.com/2020/05/27/canon-unveils-free-
webcam-s...](https://petapixel.com/2020/05/27/canon-unveils-free-webcam-
software-for-mac-users/)

------
BobVawter
Switching to a "real" camera has been such a huge, huge improvement for me on
video calls all day, I machined a custom vesa mounting arm to hold my camera
in just the right spot.

[https://lightroom.adobe.com/shares/088254b7439745b982784c0a4...](https://lightroom.adobe.com/shares/088254b7439745b982784c0a4ca7a9e2)

~~~
biswaroop
Could you elaborate on how it's been an improvement? I always thought it'd be
overkill for regular business calls.

~~~
BobVawter
In a word: bokeh. I'm running a 50mm f/1.8 lens on a full-frame sensor. My job
requires me to interact with external customers, sometimes in a pre-sales
role. Appearances shouldn't matter, but they do. Anything I can use to present
a more professional and "expert" image is a win for me.

------
reedlaw
This is possible in Linux using v4l2loopback and gphoto2.

~~~
dllu
Indeed.

I use my Sony a7r II as a webcam on Linux using gphoto2 with v4l2loopback:

[https://daniel.lawrence.lu/blog/y2020m03d31/](https://daniel.lawrence.lu/blog/y2020m03d31/)

    
    
        sudo modprobe v4l2loopback devices=1 exclusive_caps=1 card_label="pupcam"
        gphoto2 --stdout --capture-movie | ffmpeg -i - -vcodec rawvideo -pix_fmt yuv420p -f v4l2 /dev/video0

~~~
reedlaw
Nice! I have a Canon 70D for which I simply use:

    
    
      sudo modprobe v4l2loopback
    

And then the identical invocation of gphoto2 as yours. Seems gphoto2 includes
a wide range of camera support.

------
mikece
For folks with Nikon DSLRs and Windows, there's an app called SparkoCam which
uses the your camera as a video feed source and appears to the host operating
system as though it were a webcam. Works for Canon as well though Canon and at
resolutions higher than are currently supported by Canon's "use your camera as
a webcam" software.

The best results require the use of an HDMI capture device... and all of the
good ones sold out almost immediately when the quarantine started.

------
evan_
For non-Canon cameras I've been having luck using Cascable Pro Webcam:

[https://cascable.se/pro-webcam/](https://cascable.se/pro-webcam/)

~~~
rayshan
I tried Cascable with my Fuji X-T30. Works well for wireless connection but
not for wired.

Another option is Ecamm Live: [https://www.ecamm.com/](https://www.ecamm.com/)

Camera Live does work with other cameras. Nikon is coming in the next release.
See github issues.

------
pocket
It works(ish) but worked better before most of the major players locked
virtual cameras out with updates. Issues with unsigned code, so then some
folks started unsigning apps smh. Still works with Chrome based version of
several tools, and it’s cool when it works, but definitely a bit on the
fragile side. The Canon software has the same limitations and just lets you
use software from a perhaps more trusted source depending on your perspective…

~~~
dylan604
And what is/was the point of locking out the virtual cameras?

~~~
Terretta
Making it a touch harder to use Snap Camera and other silliness, as well as
Xsplit, OBS or other video produced sources, for “Zoom bombing”.

------
sqs
I listed the gear I use for high-resolution video calls at
[https://slack.org/high-resolution-video-calls](https://slack.org/high-
resolution-video-calls), along with links to other people who’ve done the
same.

------
dgorges
> The camera sends the image used for Live View - the dimensions will not
> match the camera's movie recording settings.

This sounds like a bummer. I want to try this anyways to give my old Powershot
a new purpose.

Did anybody check this out yet?

~~~
tomatocracy
The Elgato Cam Link is worth checking out if you're serious about this - it's
an HDMI video capture device which presents itself on the computer end as a
UVC compatible USB webcam and will accept the HDMI streams DSLRs usually send.
They're expensive though.

There are other similar devices on the market too but not sure how good they
are for this situation.

~~~
kbouck
Elgato sells other capture cards (eg. HD60), which still seem available.

I recently bought a raspberry pi hi quality camera (and lens) to tinker with,
and was able to connect it to my mac via pi->hdmi->capture-card to make a nice
webcam view with the bokeh effect.

the total cost of this example does add up, but still cheaper than a DSLR
setup.

~~~
stragies
If you use the usb gadget mode of the raspberry pi to present the PI as a USB
WebCam, you can forego the HDMI-connection, and thus the need for the HDMI
capture card.

~~~
lurquer
I've been trying to get a FPV drone camera feed into my Windows 10 computer so
OpenCV can muck around with it.

OpenCV easily recognizes Webcams, but sucks at picking up 'video adapter'
kinda stuff. (That is, I'm going to be using an RCA to USB dongle, such as
EasyCap.)

If you can 'trick' OpenCV into thinking a webcam is attached at the USB,
everything is golden.

Can you describe this raspberry pi method of 'presenting' the device as a USB
WebCam? That sounds promising...

edit: Forgot to mention OpenCV is part of a c++ 64bit program I'm writing.

~~~
kbouck
here's a couple of links discussing how to set up and working through the
issues.

[http://www.davidhunt.ie/raspberry-pi-zero-with-pi-camera-
as-...](http://www.davidhunt.ie/raspberry-pi-zero-with-pi-camera-as-usb-
webcam/)

[https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=148361](https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=148361)

------
boromi
with your Canon* DSLR....

~~~
rayshan
It does work with other cameras. Nikon is coming in the next release. See
github issues.

------
whoisjuan
Is there something like this but for GoPros?

~~~
jpalomaki
Camlink adapter converts a camera with HDMI output to webcam.

According to following works also on certain GoPro models:
[https://www.knowhero.com/guides/goprowebcam](https://www.knowhero.com/guides/goprowebcam)

------
wellthisisgreat
Is there action camera or mirrorless camera that has webcam feature natively?

