how do you create a webcam server in debian

baronobeefdip · 12-29-2011, 07:38 PM

i am trying to create a webcam server in Debian and all of the information on how to do this is out dated and vague when it comes to configuring the files that make the program work. i want it to only be available on a private network (only accessible to the computers on the LAN i don't want anyone on the outside to spy on me). i also want it to be view-able in VLC through the network option and if it's possible i want to know how to record streaming media and save it with vlc

Lexus45 · 12-30-2011, 05:10 AM

Zoneminder is the de-facto application for such a purpose in the Linux world.
If you will use IP-cameras, it'll be simpler, as many of them are able to put photo/video to some share folder and have many other features.

TenTenths · 12-30-2011, 06:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lexus45

Zoneminder is the de-facto application for such a purpose in the Linux world.

Have to agree, it works very well, does need a good server if you've multiple cameras, at the office I'm running it on a "dedicated" monitoring server, this is a virtual server built with CentOS, Nagios, Centreon, NagVis and ZoneMinder. I have the link to ZoneMinder in my Nagios instance so that I can easily access the cameras.

baronobeefdip · 12-31-2011, 02:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lexus45

Zoneminder is the de-facto application for such a purpose in the Linux world.
If you will use IP-cameras, it'll be simpler, as many of them are able to put photo/video to some share folder and have many other features.

the purpose of this project is to avoid buying expensive equipment that may get stolen or destroyed by people who look out for them. we have found some good web cams for very cheap at radioshack
http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...ductId=3792664
1.3 MP is fine for what we are using it for. so the cameras aren't a really big problem it's setting up the server that's the problem. also is there a way to make it motion sensed. it will only take pictures when it senses motion and use some decent quality to do so. i have discovered a program called Motion and it was working out to an extent until we saw the pictures it took. what i liked about them was the date and time print in the corner what i didn't like was the fact that they were so small the quality was bad and it seemed that you won't be able to make out a face with it even if you tried. i also found how to make them bigger and more defined but it was no longer motion sensed instead it took pictures endlessly and refused to stop when the room was still (no people, animals, shadows etc). maybe i was doing it wrong but you tell me.

and if it isn't too much trouble is it possible to rotate the picture being captured from the camera at 180 degrees. since the platform is at the bottom of the camera for the purpose of velcrow-ing it to a surface i presume i wanted to mount it by it's platform to a wall or ceiling and make the image rotated so it appears right-side-up in the video stream.

and after looking at zoneminder i remember trying to get it to work in debian but to no avail.maybe because i was installing it from source. how do you get it to work is it in the ubuntu repos or something?

tredegar · 01-01-2012, 11:56 AM

baronobeefdip,

motion will do all those things.
You need to make a backup of, and then edit /etc/motion/motion.conf

Quote:

i didn't like was the fact that they were so small the quality was bad

So edit

Code:

# Image width (pixels). Valid range: Camera dependent, default: 352
width 640

# Image height (pixels). Valid range: Camera dependent, default: 288
height 480

Quote:

it took pictures endlessly and refused to stop when the room was still

So edit

Code:

# Threshold for number of changed pixels in an image that
# triggers motion detection (default: 1500)
threshold 1500

Higher threshold means more motion needs to be seen before it is recognised as such. Mine is at 6000
When setting this up, it is a good idea to see how many pixels motion thinks has changed:

Code:

# Draw the number of changed pixed on the images (default: off)
# Will normally be set to off except when you setup and adjust the motion settings
# Text is placed in upper right corner
text_changes on

Quote:

it possible to rotate the picture being captured from the camera at 180 degrees

Yes, edit

Code:

# Rotate image this number of degrees. The rotation affects all saved images as
# well as mpeg movies. Valid values: 0 (default = no rotation), 90, 180 and 270.
rotate 180

There are many other things you can adjust in that config file. You can also adjust it with motion's GUI web interface at http://localhost:8080 (if you have it set up that way in motion.conf)

I suggest you run motion not as a daemon, until you get things adjusted to your liking:
In a terminal motion -n
and use CTRL-C to kill it, before editing motion.conf, and then rerunning it.

I set motion.conf to save videos as mpeg4 (.avi) not the default swf

In your browser go to http://localhost:8081 to see what your motion sees.

You can monitor motion over your LAN or the internet (for your LAN you need to edit motion.conf, for the internet you'll have to alter your firewall rules).

baronobeefdip · 01-01-2012, 07:58 PM

just tried it all and it's all working. but when it comes to the video feature it's not capturing it as video instead showing pictures progressively as the camera captures them. i want it to stream the video (and not record it to a file but ca stream it to a VLC program and i can record it if i want to but i don't know how to do that yet) also an Apache question how do i get Apache to direct to the port that it is on (localhost:8081 means it's on port 8081 and Apache by default goes to 80. i want the browser on another computer in the LAN to go to 8081 but i don't know how to do that either i know it has something to do with localhosts but when i go read up on it right now i wouldn't know what it's called.

remember i want video in the browser not pictures being progressively taken since there are gaps between what the subject of the picture is doing (it will skip some stuff) it's going at 1Fps and it will skip in-between seconds

and can i set up multiple web cam servers throughout the house and go to which ever i please at any time (of course i would like them to also be able to open and view in VLC media player through the network stream option since VLC has the ability to record the video that it is playing from either a capture device and hopefully a networking stream

i have to say so far this is going well i just wish it was on the Debian repos i had to get my install from the Ubuntu repos