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Owner of a Logitech Brio 4K here. The quality is terrible just like this article mentions and I would have happily spent the money elsewhere if I had options. I used to have a tiny Canon digital camera in 2003 that had better quality than this.
I use https://www.elgato.com/epoccam on my iPhone and for a few dollar is far superior than every webcam I've tried in my life.
I think the article is missing the obvious solution: if you can't buy a standalone webcam with as good image/sound quality as a phone, then use/make software that lets you use the phone hardware, there's no need to try to build your own camera.
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.
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/
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/
I found that using my standard zoom lens is fine, the 50mm portrait lens looks better for pictures but that is overkill for a Zoom meeting! Any DSLR camera will blow a webcam out of the water even in low lighting.
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…
It seems I needed to include a couple of shots - one is from my laptop webcam, and the other is from my phone. What "bad lighting" is changes very much based on the camera capabilities (lens, sensor, post-processing).
A better camera will be able to better compensate for bad lighting, but that doesn’t make the lighting good, and good lighting will improve the results of both. That’s why pro mage capturers (photogs and camera crews) spend a lot of time on getting the lighting as good as possible.
The trick to great picture quality is to use good lighting and drop the ISO on the video as low as possible. I've been using Reincubate Camo for my iPhone along with Key Light Air Lights. The quality is better than any webcam. Most webcams crank up ISO so they can work in the dark and that is what ruins picture quality.
This cannot be overstated. While I agree with many of the camera recommendations in this thread the most important factor is enough light. Even the worst webcams go from absolutely trash to something usable if you add better lighting to you subject. And when people start thinking over lighting you can move away from your window so you do not have that as a powerful backlight. Look out the window and the webcam will h…
Beyond that, the best is to use a stand for a recent phone rear camera (you can use a separate account and invite the phone to your meeting).
Owner of a Logitech Brio 4K here. The quality is terrible just like this article mentions and I would have happily spent the money elsewhere if I had options. I used to have a tiny Canon digital camera in 2003 that had better quality than this.
Under Linux, you can use guvcview to play with the settings to your liking. Here's an example command line for Zoom purposes:
v4l2-ctl --set-fmt-video=width=1280,height=720,pixelformat=MJPG --set-parm 30 --set-ctrl=contrast=32 --set-ctrl=sharpness=176 --set-ctrl=zoom_absolute=133 --set-ctrl=tilt_absolute=-36000 -d /dev/v4l/by-id/usb-046d_Logitech_BRIO_*-video-index0
For Windows, you can check out the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwXR27wLhoE
For webcams, the only other decent option is the Avermedia PW513, which only came out a month ago.