High compression CODECS for Logitech 4000 "web cams"

jdupre wrote on 6/25/2004, 10:21 PM
In short, how do I use alternate CODECs to encode video with a "web-cam"?

I got a Logitech 4000 USB camera and was hoping to use it to capture video with Vegas. When I run the Vegas capture program, I am limited to using the "RGB 24" (uncompressed) CODEC, the "I420" CODEC and the "IYUV" CODEC. All of these are dropping frames, most likely due to the HUGE amount of data trying to be recorded. Uncompressed 640x460 video is about 1.3GB per minute. The I420 and IYUV CODECs cut that down to 820MB per minute, but that is STILL WAY TOO MUCH.

My Canopus analog to DV converter encodes analog video to 720x480x24 bit DV video with the "DV CODEC" at a rate of 21MB per minute. Logitech's software for the QuickCam 4000 uses the Indeo 5 CODEC and achieves a similar rate of compression, about 25 MB per minute.

How do I set up the Vegas capture program to use these much higher compression CODECs with the Logitech camera??? Why is it limited to such low compression CODECS with the Logitech camera?

Comments

farss wrote on 6/25/2004, 11:25 PM
Codecs that give higher compression usely mean more CPU horsepower. So for these kinds of things its oftenly finding a balance between how much CPU speed is on hand versus disk write speed and available space.
The DV codecs inside cameras and your A/D converter use purpose designed hardware to achieve the quality and compactness of DV25. Doing it in software means you're resitricted by CPU speed.
I think you can use any installed codec in Vegas by unticking Ignore 3rd Party Codecs in Options.
jdupre wrote on 6/26/2004, 9:03 AM
The "Ignore 3rd Party Codecs" option is only in Vegas. It appears to have no affect on the capture application (vidcap40.exe).

The Indeo 5 codec that the Logitech software uses works quite well, but I do not have access to that codec within vidcap40.exe.

(I can't use the Logitech capture program due to it's inflexibility of choosing where the recorded files go, and that it first creates a temporary file, then copies the temporary file when recording is done. Very stupid...)