Webcam streaming library's available for windows,linux,mac(three of them) platform

[syclopse]

Hello,
Can anybody tell me,
wheather any library available for getting the live streaming from the usb webcam
and this library should work on 3 platform(windows,linux,mac).


is any library is available that will satisfy above conditions.?

[high_flyer]

This is a device driver specific issue.
If the manufacturer of your web cam released it with drivers for the platforms you listed, then usually some user libs are also supplier.
There is no general purpose such library since its hardware specific.

[syclopse]

ya, that's true.
but my question is suppose drivers are available for 3 of the platform,
then any library is useful that can work on 3 of the platform,
and provide video streaming,and other webcam functions.?

[high_flyer]

You can't decouple the lib from the driver, since there is no standard for it, which all the camera manufacturers follow.
Any lib you have will have to interface with the driver.
Therefore only manufacturers that ship their camera with driver and an interface lib for developers can be accessed by user applications.
But there is not general such lib - AFAIK.

[marcvanriet]

Hi,

I've seen that the OpenCV library is mentioned a lot when people ask about using webcams. It's cross-platform.

Best regards,
Marc

[high_flyer]

OpneCV is a computer vision lib.
It is not responsible for data acquisition.
You have to feed it the data you want to work on.

[syclopse]

Open CV is one of the option,

but what I want is the library using which I can write the code that will run on 3(Windows,MAC,Linux) of the platform.

[high_flyer]

OpenCV as number of other libs which are cross platform are libs which allow you to work with image data.
They do NOT do image acquisition, certainly not in cross platform way.

There is no lib that can acquire image data from any camera in a cross platform way, since there is no standard for writing camera drivers, and or, camera hardware.

[stampede]

OpenCV has the highgui module, which can be used to perform simple camera image acquisition on multiple platforms. For windows it uses vfw, and v4l for linux/unix. I don't know about mac. Here's the link : highgui
It's very simple, I'm not even sure if it allows to change the capture resolution.

[high_flyer]

Ok, but this will only work with cameras which support these drivers.
Its not general, but agreed, it will allow you to work with at least some cameras.
I just found this link which sounds interesting as well, again, as long as you are comfortable with the limitation of using cameras that only support vfw and v4l, or in general the list of camera/ camrea types it lists.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrating_Vision_Toolkit

[stampede]

Yes, it's very simple and limited solution, I'm not even sure if this will work with firewire devices. But if OP want's only to capture from webcam, maybe highgui or library from your link will fit he's needs. I guess if he's using C++, the IVT is better than C-style highgui interface.