Using another webcam ?

[Midori]

While my friend's isight functions well, it is not well placed on her iMac, so she wants to use the usb webcam instead, but it does not seem to work (she cannot choose to disable the isight). Is there any way to do so (or a preference somewhere in the pedia about which camera to use ?)

Midori

[Nora]

The Pedias lets OS X pick its preferred camera. If you have two cameras connected and you are using the preferred camera in another application it will force the program to select the second camera. For example open the iChat AV preferences and select the camera you don't want to use and then open the iSight in your Pedia program.

You might also find this script useful which disables and enables USB cameras (built-in iSight) therefore only allowing the external (firewire) camera to work.

[Conor]

We are looking at trying to prefer the external camera if connected, but it's not looking promising yet.

[Midori]

I will already give her all that information. Thank you very much for your swift answers.

Midori

[FineWine]

We are looking at trying to prefer the external camera if connected, but it's not looking promising yet.

I suffer from Familial Essential Tremor of the hands which makes it near impossible for me to hold the item to be scanned steady long enough for the inbuilt iSight camera to read the bar code. I have an aGent V5 HD webcam by http://agent.liquiddigital.com.au/ which I can use as a scanner as I can brace my elbows which steadies my hands.

But to use this external cam I must first ensure that iSight is in use by another program (Skype).

Would it not be a better solution, than in the quote, to make these external webcams and/or scanners selectable via a Scanner Tab within Preferences where you select the preferred device from a drop down list. Most other programs that use webcams have this facility such as Skype. Of course the default would be iSight.

Your thoughts.

Cheers

[Conor]

Please try out our Bookpedia beta 24 or DVDpedia beta 24. When pressing the iSight button if several video sources are available it will prompt for which one to use. After that it will always use the selected video source if available. To change cameras, after the initial selection, hold down the control key while clicking the iSight button.

[FineWine]

Please try out our Bookpedia beta 24 or DVDpedia beta 24. When pressing the iSight button if several video sources are available it will prompt for which one to use. After that it will always use the selected video source if available.

That works really great on both programs.

Suggestions:
1 - The Camera Selection Panel needs a "Cancel" button. I know the panel will close if you select even the current camera but I am thinking of those users who are not so computer literate.

2 - The currently selected camera needs to be the one that is "high lighted blue". At present the iSight camera is always "high lighted blue" even if it is not the currently selected camera.

3 -

To change cameras, after the initial selection, hold down the control key while clicking the iSight button.

This wording or some thing similar needs to be placed into the Camera Selection Panel.

Thanks for the great adaptation.

EDIT: And I must add that the (presumed) new scanning algorithm and increased green scanning area is fantastic. Even with my hand tremor I can now use the inbuilt iSight camera with accurate results within a few seconds. Though I will continue to use the External camera as it means I do not have to lean forward.

really REALLY THANKS

[Conor]

Thank you for all the feedback. We are very happy the improvements for the next version are working out, both the ability to select cameras and the new scanning algorithm. We thought about the cancel button but decided to keep it simple and provide a selection if two cameras are detected, as user with a single camera would have launched directly into the iSight window (we are also saving the third button for the extreme case of three cameras connected to a single computer). Will add all this information into our help files as well, but I think after an initial selection most users will continue to use the same camera. If we happen to be wrong and there is confusion we might take the route of making it a preference option (as in iChat) that Mac users might be more comfortable with.

Thank you for adding information to the forum post that I missed to update.