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Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

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Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#71

Post by mushishi »

lmilcin wrote: post #41

If you are looking here to improve your webcam because you started to do remote work, don't. First try to improve lighting and audio. Any camera will look bad in bad lighting. It is always better to first improve your lighting before you invest in a new camera. Use high CRI lightbulbs and ensure even source color temperature in your room (ie. all lightbulbs should be emitting same color temperature). Audio is also ve…

+1 for improving audio quality. As a non-native English speaker, although I listen to daily podcasts without subs just fine, understanding an English speaking--possibly non-native, too!--person having a poor audio quality connection is a different story.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#72

Post by tweetle_beetle »

ansgri wrote: post #25

Sony recently added support for webcam-over-usb to a lot of their cameras, apparently. And they are known for video quality and good lenses. So that’s $700-800 for a very good camera (new) that also works as webcam. https://support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp/app/webcam/en/download/

So close, but annoyingly my older ICLE-6000 didn't make the cut. Thanks for the information.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#73

Post by kevincharm »

mattowen_uk wrote: post #20

I've also investigated this quite deeply. As I'm sure most of us know, the main problems with 'webcams', either the built-in ones or USB ones that you perch on top of your monitor, are the lens size, and the CCD/CMOS image sensor size. Manufacturers spouting specs like '4k' are deliberately misleading the public if the sensor and/or the lens aren't also upgraded. The only cost-viable methods to get 'broadcast quality…

I use a similar setup with a Panasonic GH5 I already had, but I bought one of those €15 Chinese HDMI capture USB UVC cards [1]. These work surprisingly well, and I've had zero issues using them for ~4 hours back-to-back Zoom meetings on my MBP. They've also received some good reviews on YouTube [2].

For audio, I use my Airpods. Great setup for meetings. Latency is good enough IMO.

--

[1]: https://www.amazon.nl/gp/product/B088ZTK56F

[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daS5RHVAl2U

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#74

Post by cookieswumchorr »

lmilcin wrote: post #41

If you are looking here to improve your webcam because you started to do remote work, don't. First try to improve lighting and audio. Any camera will look bad in bad lighting. It is always better to first improve your lighting before you invest in a new camera. Use high CRI lightbulbs and ensure even source color temperature in your room (ie. all lightbulbs should be emitting same color temperature). Audio is also ve…

exactly, audio is the most important. Nobody needs to see your unshaven sleepy quarantine face in 4K. But if they can't hear you, or there is a lot of noise, the meeting is ruined

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#75

Post by muro »

pembrook wrote: post #40

The reason you can’t buy a good webcam is the same reason you can’t buy a high quality monitor outside of LG’s unreliable apple collab. The lazy conglomerates who sell these peripherals often don’t actually produce the parts in them. They simply rebrand commodity cameras and IPS panels in a crap plastic housing and slap their logo on it. Then they give the product a hilariously user-hostile product name, like “PQS GR…

Dell sells good monitors.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#76

Post by jeswin »

mschuster91 wrote: post #30
glogla wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you mention a specific models that would work well in this use case?

Sony's A6000 works perfectly well, but I recommend you also grab a NP-FW50 dummy battery as it will drain the battery even when plugged in via USB over time. If you want better sound, grab the A6600 which can also sport the XLR-K2M microphone adapter. Regarding HDMI capture: the Blackmagic DeckLink card series works just fine in a Thunderbolt case (at work I run a 2x A6000 system + external HDMI input).

> Blackmagic DeckLink

And if you wanna save some cash, any $20-25 hdmi to usb capture card will work just fine. It won't give you uncompressed video, but you won't need it for this use case.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#77

Post by codethief »

> The simplest thing is to sit in a room so the window is in front of you and the Sun isn’t shining into a lens from behind your shoulder.

Unfortunately, this is a rather bad idea from workplace security point of view. You really don't wanna be looking at a screen that's in front of a window (i.e. parallel to the window), unless you like excessive eye strain.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#78

Post by avian »

pembrook wrote: post #40

The reason you can’t buy a good webcam is the same reason you can’t buy a high quality monitor outside of LG’s unreliable apple collab. The lazy conglomerates who sell these peripherals often don’t actually produce the parts in them. They simply rebrand commodity cameras and IPS panels in a crap plastic housing and slap their logo on it. Then they give the product a hilariously user-hostile product name, like “PQS GR…

> Then they give the product a hilariously user-hostile product name, like “PQS GRT46782-WT” as an extra f-you to the user.

That is also a strategy to prevent product comparisons and unbiased reviews. They quickly cycle through product names and sell a certain product no. only in a limited geographical area.

Doesn't matter if a consumer org/magazine/someone on reddit/your friend/etc. does a review. The product will be out of market by the time you read it, or will not be sold in your country. The similar looking product you find on the shelf might be the same, or it might have something completely different inside.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#79

Post by murkt »

milesvp wrote: post #69

This article sort of glosses over the actual cost of designing the hardware. You should be able to get 500 units made working through a factory. Though minimum qty for parts can be as high as 5000, usually factories can find most components in smaller qty for 2-5x the price, especially since they already have relationships with suppliers. At $25-$35 bill of materials for something retailing at $250-$300 you're only l…

> Though minimum qty for parts can be as high as 5000

It can be as high as 100 000. No stock anywhere.

> $30k is pretty cheap from a capital expense if you're just talking about testing a market.

Yep. That's what I thought before contacting SoC vendors.

> It would be easy to spend $100k in billable hours to bring something as complicated as a webcam to market.

I'm not in the USA, engineering hours are much cheaper in my country.

Re: Why can’t you buy a good webcam?

#80

Post by buro9 »

Light is the reason good webcams are not built-in.

With still pictures you can expose for longer and/or use multiple low quality sensors to build up enough information for software to construct a higher quality image.

With video you cannot expose for longer, and software building a picture would need to be near real-time.

So problem #1 is light... you need to get a lot more light into the sensor, but the laptop is thin and optics are large (and as glass and light, they cannot be made much smaller).

I have a good set up, but the thing I tell people who want to replicate it: Buy lights before you buy a camera... your built-in cam may be sufficient if you are well lit. Or even cheaper, if you have a desk facing a wall... there's no light source, so turn it around or face a window.

Failing improved lighting fixing it... you need a good sensor and a lens that lets in a lot of light, especially if you are going to be in a poorly lit space.

Sony produced the absolutely perfect form factor for this... https://www.sony.co.uk/electronics/interchangeable-lens-came...

It's basically a sensor in a minimal body that you can mount a standard lens on and then place on a tripod (which opens up any mount / arm thing).

Why then is it not popular?

It came too early, and wasn't quite ready for always streaming video... both the software in this older revision and the hardware have issues (cooling the sensor for constant video is the problem here as it wasn't anticipated to be used to stream for 10+ hours per day and struggles beyond 30 minutes as I understand). Additionally it only has a micro-USB connection, no HDMI or USB-C... and it really needs a single USB-C that can both power and handle the video. Things it doesn't need: battery or flash - but I guess keeping them means it plausibly could be a stills camera if needed.

If that format included the equivalent of the Elgato CamLink HDMI to USB-C device and priced around $300 then I think it would be a wild success. The BOM suggests this is possible.

Sony already have a lot of the pro-streaming market along with Panasonic, but if Sony made a specialist product for home streaming then I would buy it instantly... as it would liberate my a7rii from the job.

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