Dark Bit Factory & Gravity

GENERAL => Challenges & Competitions => Topic started by: benny! on August 28, 2008

Title: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on August 28, 2008: Hi all,

here is my little entry for this cool and inspiring competition called:

LOWRES CAM (http://labs.weltenkonstrukteur.de/lowrescam).

About

It streams the webcam picture of a resolution of 160x120 pixels
and transforms them into only four colors. The four colors are:

0x00000000 / 0x00006600 / 0x0000AA00 / 0x0000FF00

So, I hope this entry matches both limitation of this contest ::)

The actual screen dimension is the camera resolution (160x120) multiplied
by 4 (=640*480). That means that each "pixel" has a width and height of
4. The app requires a webcam to run (hope the majority of you has one
- I may supply a video for ppl without a webcam).

Before I touched the flash platform I did play with several other techniques
like Java Media Framework, Processing and avicap32.dll using some WinAPI.
However, I must say using FLASH makes it pure fun to access the webcam
and play with it.

Credits

Pure ActionScript3.0 code by benny!weltenkonstrukteur.de
Music by Andrew Potterton

Ok ... I attached some screenshots - have fun!!!
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Rbz on August 29, 2008: hmm, I don't have a webcam here...
But it looks really nice, great idea too
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Voltage on August 29, 2008: Nice use of technology Benny. I really like this. :clap:
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on August 29, 2008: @Voltage:
Yeah - cool that you posted a screenshot.

@all:
Feel free to add more screenshots ;-)

@rbz:
I am sorry to hear that - I'll try to make a little video of
it ...
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Shockwave on August 29, 2008: Really original thinking here Benny :)

I don't have a web cam either but I really appreciate the originality of this entry. Seriously brilliant thinking here. Well done! Another strong contender for the prize I think :)
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on August 29, 2008: Thanks, Shocky.

I must say that I expected that more ppl here own a webcam. I
didn't bought one either - but it was implemented in my laptop.

I already made a little video already - just need a little tool to
convert an uncompressed AVI file into a proper format to upload
it to youtube. When it is town I'll post it.
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: gooner on August 29, 2008: No webcam here either Benny so looking forward to the video mate. 8)
Love the concept of what you've done and the thought process you went through to do this.Excellent music as well.Well Done mate :clap:
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Pixel_Outlaw on August 29, 2008: It reminds me a bit of the nightvision goggles I used.

Very cool!
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on August 29, 2008: @Gooner & PO:
Thanks guys.

@all:
For all you havent the chance to test it - here is a little (~30secs)
capture of the programm in action:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/v/-B4W5UADRW8[/youtube]
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Shockwave on August 29, 2008: Peace to you too mate :)
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Xalthorn on August 30, 2008: Looks fun, but I don't have a cam to try it
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Shockwave on August 30, 2008: Quote from: Xalthorn on August 30, 2008
Looks fun, but I don't have a cam to try it

Benny posted a youtube video of it working above ^^ :)
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Xalthorn on August 30, 2008: I know, and it also has a scrolltext (paper moving across the screen qualifies, right?) but it would be so much more fun to try myself :D
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on August 30, 2008: Yeah. Maybe you have a digital cam which can be used
as a webcam ???

Did some more research and I am still playing with the
webcam + flash capabilities. Some nice things are pos-
sible with it. Even some EYE-TOY like games.

Wonder how much percentage of the users here have a
webcam ?
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Xalthorn on August 30, 2008: I would guess a high proportion have one, it's just not something I've looked into getting. I might now though ;)
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: hellfire on August 31, 2008: I very much like the interactive nature of your entry, but what I like the most is, while all the others tried to get "more" out of the limitations, you used it as a lo-fi stylize-filter. cool!
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Praecor on September 01, 2008: Yay, I left watching benny!'s entry last this time, because in PLANTLIFE I checked it out first (and it rocked).

And this was a nice surprise again, he's discovering areas no-one else even had in mind.

Webcam stuff. Really interesting to play around with the possibilities it opens surely. I recall Carmack also said
in his blog once that he thinks webcams have some cool potential that's just yet to be revealed.

I must find my webcam, I know it's somewhere.

10/10 for uniqueness (it's great ppl try something new)

EDIT : found crappy webcam, adding few screenies:
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on September 01, 2008: @hellfire & praecor:

Thanks a lot for the kinds words. Glad you like it!
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Praecor on September 02, 2008: Added some webcam screenies to my last reply. This thing is just cool!! :D Good work.
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: benny! on September 02, 2008: @Praecor:

ROFL ... that's pretty cool :D . Where do you get all this cartoon
stuff from ??
Title: Re: [REDUCED RES] LowRes Cam
Post by: Praecor on September 04, 2008: ;D Glad you like, I dunno, guess have just always been in the middle of all kind of toys, legos
and other wicked stuff almost automatically :stirrer: Those keep your inspiration flowing.