15 firewire cams @ 5fps each - NUTS ?!

[brenden]

we just picked up another potential new client. he wants 15 cameras capturing at 5 fps.

i'm thinking 15 iSights at 320x240 split over 2 firewire busses, for a total video flow right around 30fps per bus at 1/4 the size of a normal, full-frame video feed.

does this seem unreasonable?

we got one isight last night to test. it's working w/ something called "spook", but that creates a mpeg4 stream, not jpeg stills. will try camE and of course zoneminder over the next few days along w/ a second isight and a long extension cable. will report info/stats/success/failure here. i suspect it will work fine.

ieee1394 is apparently well supported on linux. the isight image is great, auto white, auto shutter, comes with audio for $150. only problem (vs fire-i cams) is no thru-port so we can't daisy chain the isights...

--brenden

[cordel]

I'd be interested in seeing how that works out. I have been meaning to try Firewire as I have a camcorder with a port but keep forgeting to try it out. Keep us posted.

Regards,
Cordel

[brenden]

does anyone on here have experience w/ firewire + zoneminder yet?

[jashmenn]

I've got Zoneminder to work with iSight over firewire via Corander's v4l export. The problem I haven't yet overcome is how to disable the isights auto-shutoff. When the iSight is idle for a period of time it seems to shutoff and send a black screen. Have you been able to overcome this?