Comment by brushfoot

Comment by brushfoot a day ago

35 replies

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> Is there a reason OP can't get themselves a $50 USB capture card and a $20 HDMI cable, and use OBS to capture the feed?

This is how I've used my Sony camera since COVID. It works great.

I wasn't sure at first if OP was trying to do something nonstandard, because you get video to your computer with a video cable. Plus a way for your computer to capture that, which for me is CamLink.

Honestly, I'm surprised there's a relevant manufacturer app at all. Not surprised that it costs money.

This is a bit like not having power in your home to charge your camera with and asking the manufacturer for a generator. They may have a solution, but the price will be bad.

SSLy a day ago

OP wants to just use the USB cable, which makes sense for me.

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  • mjevans a day ago

    USB 2.0, that bog standard version from 2000 that is assumed to be the lowest common denominator possible for any new hardware...

    Edit: 4am math correction...

    480Mbit/sec transfer; Uncompressed, that's ~333333 pixels per frame for 60FPS. Not even considering overhead, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_video_device_class 1.1 support from 2005 includes Motion JPEG (low compression, all patents probably expired given it was developed in the 90s) and MPEG2 (also sufficiently old, to be unencumbered now).

    However, if they'd use USB 3.0 ~ 5gbps, ideally over a USB-C port, the connection would be more modern, and easily able to handle even 4K video with now free from patents and well supported compression algorithms.

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  • brushfoot a day ago

    Why should the manufacturer raise the price of the camera for you and me just to implement something extra OP wants that they can already do through HDMI?

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    • dspillett a day ago

      It is already implemented, otherwise they wouldn't be able to enable it once the subscription is active.

      Why should the OP need to pay a subscription to enable a feature that is build into the camera, that is a standard feature on other cameras and imposes no ongoing costs to the manufacturer¹? This is an example of gouging, pure and simple.

      ----

      [1] unless they are forcing the user to use their hosted service for steaming the webcam output, in which case there is some bandwidth and perhaps other processing cost, but that is on them for having not just implemented a standard that enables local-only recording

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      • golli a day ago

        Also why does it have to be a subscription in the first place. If it is a non standard use that requires extra software you don't and you want to separate those costs from users that don't need it, then make it a one time payment at least.

        Subscriptions make sense when you have ongoing costs like significant load on servers that are needed for the service provided. But not for some piece of software you write once and are more or less done with (minus some small patches)

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        • wat10000 21 hours ago

          That’s the really egregious thing. I think a bunch of programmers should be able to see the merit in charging money for software. It’s a bit of a bitter pill in a product that we mentally categorize as “device” rather than “computer” but it’s at least somewhat sensible. Software costs money to make, that money has to come from customers, and getting it from the customers who use it makes sense.

          But requiring a subscription is such a blatant “fuck you, we want more profit without doing any work, and you’re going to provide it.”

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      • brushfoot a day ago

        > Why should the OP need to pay a subscription to enable a feature that is build into the camera

        Getting video into your computer through USB is _not_ built into the camera. Else why is OP downloading an app to do it?

        The app is part of the implementation, and it costs money. I have no problem with the manufacturer charging separately for that. The rest of us can use a video cable to get video into our computers.

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    • afandian a day ago

      They have already implemented it, otherwise it wouldn't work.

      Reply View 1 reply
      • brushfoot a day ago

        The app is part of the implementation. And they're apparently subsidizing the cost by charging separately for it.

        Drop the fee and that's now baked into the camera's base price.

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baxtr a day ago

OP expects the camera comes with some decent convenience at that price.

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  • brushfoot a day ago

    OP is using a camera as a webcam that's not sold as a webcam. That's fine, I do the same with mine, but it's also fine of the manufacturer to allow for that by simply providing A/V interfaces instead of trying to account for every use case.

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    • bhickey a day ago

      Canon advertises their cameras as webcams.

      Reply View 10 replies
      • brushfoot a day ago

        No, they don't. They advertise that the camera can "turn into" a webcam with the right software or through HDMI out.

        Reply View 9 replies