Experiences with Surface Book 2 (or laptops in general) webcams

Python
1

I’ve been using the rear camera of my Surface Book 2 for some opencv work.

I was wondering if this is an accepted workflow. How have your experiences been with regard to controlling laptop webcams? Are they generally usable or is it better to purchase a dedicated webcam that the community has had success with?

Right now, I am trying to manually set exposure and focus settings to help with background selection, but it is proving to be a little tricky.

2

while using DSHOW backend, try to .set(CAP_PROP_SETTINGS, 0) (arbitrary value). that’s supposed to pop up a dialog for the camera’s parameters.

if the camera suits you, nothing wrong with using it.

it’s always a good idea to calibrate its lens distortion. webcam optics are getting good and have hardly any noticeable distortion now, so maybe all you’ll need is to guesstimate the focal length.