1. Home
  2. General Robotics Forum
  3. Logitech Sphere/Orbit webcam for robot vision? (Q for Java code)

Logitech Sphere/Orbit webcam for robot vision? (Q for Java code)

Hi, Logitech has this cool new webcam that is called Orbit (or Sphere in Europe), with built in servos for pan and tilt action. It uses a face tracker to follow the user in front of it. Pretty cool.

I searched the net and found that someone had made a Linux driver for this camera, but I was looking for some way to control the pan/tilt from a Java application running on WinXP. I am quite sure I can get image information through JMF (Java Media Framework), but I am not sure if they have pan/tilt controls in there too.

Does anyone have any information about this and how I could control it from Java?

Thank you, JC

Reply to
Jeceel
Loading thread data ...

Did you want the Java application on the same computer, or a Java web interface to remotely control the camera? Either way you'll need to find out how to hook into the pan/tilt commands. Does the software allow you to manually pan and tilt the camera? You might be able to download a USB sniffer program like "Snoopy" and try to analyze the packets going to the camera when the motion commands are sent. A few years back I built my own USB controlled pan/tilt camera, and I used the HID driver and sent control commands to endpoint 0, but Logitech probably has something a little more customized. With a specialized driver it will be pretty difficult.

Probably, the driver itself provides some hooks for the actual application to send pan/tilt commands. You could do some analysis and try to see where the application communicates with the webcam driver, or if you ask Logitech you might get lucky and they'll tell you. I highly doubt that, though; Logitech has never been forthcoming about their equipment, making it tough to develop Linux drivers for a lot of their stuff over the years.

If you get that far, Java typically isn't the best way to get access to operating system drivers and stuff. I think there might be some Windows classes for USB access, but I haven't touched Windows Java for a while.

Reply to
Garrett Mace

PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.