Slashdot Mirror
USB/Firewire "Branching" -- Is it Possible?
Shaze asks: "I have been doing a lot of overseas web conferencing lately and have been playing around with my two webcams. I was suddenly intrigued by the idea of being able to 'span' or 'branch' both webcams together to create one device pulling signals from both. I did some quick research on the topic to no avail, however many of my colleagues believe this to be possible. Some even going so far as to say they have seen software or drivers that will turn your webcams into one Twain device. Aside from my own meanderings, I can't seem to find any information on anyone or anything even suggesting this is possible. What do you say Slashdot readers: Is this a new application waiting to be marketed or am I just seeing double?"
At my current job, we use dual FireWire cameras to capture simultaneous images in order to get two concurrent views of moving objects.
Hooking two cameras to a computer is standard practise in computer vision (not what my current employer does, just another example). It's a really good way to get binocular views of a scene for passive stereo systems.
Besides, you don't need goofy red/blue glasses to look at stereo pairs of images. Just cross your eyes, for goodness sakes!
The intel Open Source Computer Vision Library They have tools to process stereo usb cameras in real time