[Lancaster] Re: Help -- Video importing/processing software

[Ken Hough]

Since posting my previous plea for help on the topic above, I've managed 
to discover some bits of info' which might be of use to others.

Firstly, I found driver software for the Philips SPC 900NC webcam (also 
OK for the old ToUcams) which I now have:

<http://www.smcc.demon.nl/webcam/>

Unless you wish to patch your kernel, use the pwc package and not the 
pwcx package.

Note the politics, resulting in a discontiuation of support for these 
packages. Very sad!

Secondly, I discovered 'camstream' (<http://www.smcc.demon.nl/camstream/>)
This allows the user to grab snapshots at specified intervals and to 
dump these to file as PNG, PPM, BMP or JPEG. This app is still a bit 
rough around the edges, but has promise and does pretty much what it 
claims to do. It also recognises some of the functions relating 
specifically to Philips webcams.

Thirdly, I have installed 'AstroStack3' which is similar in function to 
the well known Microsoft app 'Registax' which can process/stack multiple 
images as needed for astro work.

AstroStack3 has been written in JAVA and so can run on most platforms. 
The only downside is that AstroStack3 is not freeware, so I had to pay 
for the full version (OUCH!), but not too much. I can now do what I 
wanted to do entirely under Linux.

A free, but limited version of AstroStack (AstroStack3LE) can be 
obtained from: <http://www.astrostack.com/>

Where there's a will...........

Ken Hough