the article only tangentially touches on depth of field which adds very much to a professionally looking webcam video, when using a DSLR or other digicam with a decent lens. You have the blur in the background so can still see the person in their surrounding but not so much that you can see all the cruft lying around. Focus is on the face and it's much better than any software solution that blows up the computer fan.
Why webcams aren’t good enough
71–80 of 297 posts
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Still doesn't explain why a $300phone has a better camera than a $250 logitech BRIO. I recently bought a BRIO and in non optimal lighting the performance is just as mediocre as a $30 C230 so I returned it immediately. In the en I convinced my wife to just use the DSLR (she was hesitant at first because of the extra hassle). A modern DSL had good IQ even ad candlelight, you really almost can't mess it up. Only way to…
A DSLR with a lens costs thousands of dollars. A cheap continuous light with a cheap softbox costs about $150, and gets the job done.
Of course, the point was more that regardless of price the following holds in poor light: webcam And also, not everyone wants to sit in front of a bright light
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#73I also noticed fairly early on, that phone cameras were improving by leaps and bounds, while laptop webcams and USB webcams seemed to be at a standstill, image-quality wise. I don't know why that is, but even Apple would seemingly rather shave 50 cents off the BOM by speccing a 720p Facetime camera in their $3000 Macbook Pros, and trying to make up the difference with software, like with the new M1 Macs that have bet…
That's what I thought recently about the MacBook Camera. I have switched to Mac Mini M1 and bought Logitech StreamCam for ~£150. It sucks in every possible way: focus does not work properly in any conditions except natural daylight, CPU expensive, additional meaningless software for basic features, etc.
Now, I miss the MacBook camera. Yes, it is 720p, but do I need more for my meetings? Nope. It just works. The quality is acceptable, no problems with any applications/web-tools, plays well with system resources, etc. If we are talking about "Zoom me" cameras, I would prefer the MacBook's one. If we are talking about YouTube streamers, etc., then it is a bit different area, and yes, MacBook's camera will not help with this.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#74Is it possible to tag promotional blog posts? This must be titled: Why using our software is better than buying a web cam.
Tagging promotional posts gives you a false sense of security. It's best to rely on your own judgment.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#75But given that you have a 4K RED setup in your bedroom with a studio microphone, what technology actually preserves most of the quality over the video call? Let's say both participants have fibre connections and located in the same city.
Plain old RTMP stream with h.265 inside probably. The problem is that nobody uses this for streaming because h.265 encoding is expensive even for hardware encoders in GPU. So to satisfice, use h.264 at good bitrate. Over 80 Mbit should be fine ;)
How would that work? Which application supports it? I don't know of a native way to do this.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#76I also noticed fairly early on, that phone cameras were improving by leaps and bounds, while laptop webcams and USB webcams seemed to be at a standstill, image-quality wise. I don't know why that is, but even Apple would seemingly rather shave 50 cents off the BOM by speccing a 720p Facetime camera in their $3000 Macbook Pros, and trying to make up the difference with software, like with the new M1 Macs that have bet…
As smartphones essentially replaced point and shoot cameras, image quality became a major selling point. In fact, for many people, that's the only reason for getting a modern, high-end phone.
Laptop cameras are typically used only for the occasional video chat, with so much compression on the line that the image looks like crap anyways. And before 2020, I'm quite sure most laptops didn't see their webcam used even once.
Maybe for the following years, now that people realized that their laptop webcam is not just a place to put a sticker on, manufacturers will put on something better.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#77I got halfway down before realising this was an advertorial for the Camo product. Disappointing.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
> even Apple would seemingly rather shave 50 cents off the BOM by speccing a 720p Facetime camera in their $3000 Macbook Pros The reason I've heard is that the macbook display assembly simply doesn't have the depth to house a decent camera. The camera bump in phones exists for a reason - and phones are already way fatter than macbook displays. I have no idea if thats true though.
The display frame has plenty of space for a phone-type camera sensor of any resolution, it's just a flat CMOS. Even a really big phone sensor is only 8x6x3mm A good lens is more difficult to fit in the Z-dimension but that doesn't constrain the resolution of the sensor. A small bump in the bezel and a corresponding recess in the base would allow a better design of lens.
Yes exactly, there's plenty of space for a decent sensor and lens. On top of that we're talking about a wide-angle lens, which are generally flatter. Two things add thickness and complexity to camera lenses - telephoto and autofocus. Phones only recently started getting thick bumps for the rear camera when telephoto lenses became more popular. My phone has a sizeable bump for the telephoto camera but the ultra-wide angle one is outside of that bump.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
I also thought about this but then look at the iPad and iPhone Facetime cameras. They offer much better image quality than Macbook webcams. There are a few ways to offer "rear camera" quality on Macbooks, like having a little bump sticking out from the back. I don't think that's what people are asking for though. They just want a webcam that's as good as the webcam in their phone. Also this doesn't answer the questio…
Those devices are significantly thicker that a MacBook display. I could imagine a bump towards the front that would sink into the body when closed, but doing it in a way that looks and feels good also seems rather hard - but also harder to avoid should they want to implement things such as face id.
I guess we'll never know until we have the front camera assemblies from both sitting side by side.
Re: Why webcams aren’t good enough
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Couldn't you also just join the meeting from your phone? Or once from your phone and once from your PC?
Yes, this is what I used to to, but it has drawbacks. If you only join from your phone, you can't really see other participants (unless you use your front cam, and in that case your screen is obviously still very small) and you won't be able to screen share. If you join on both, you will be in the meeting twice (which can look weird to other people). In my case, I want to use a dedicated microphone, not my phone's mi…
Nice, I have joined a few meetings from my phone and my desktop simultaneously because my desktop didn't have a webcam or microphone. It worked in a pinch but I wouldn't do it on a regular basis.