I went ahead and bit the bullet and purchased a TrackerCam for $200. Very, very cool! Came with a Logitech Pro 3000 Camera (CCD vs. CMOS in the QuickCams... i.e. better picture... CCD is same technology in Digital Cameras and Camcorders). Now you can pan/tilt/zoom right from a browser! I'm giddy about technology. Give it a try.
And, it's only running on a measly Celeron 300 Mhz computer. Pretty cool!

And, since I had an extra camera, I've now installed the DungeonCam in my computer room. It's not that I'm a voyeur... au contraire... I'm willing to give up some privacies just to preach technology. Consider me an advocate of technology... my life is always a technological case study.

So, I now have two live webcams at home, and one at work. Coming next... the PottyCam! Just kidding. That would be something, though.

Oh, by the way... I only have one Comcast IP entering my house... Linksys Routers help make all of this happen with port forwarding. Basically I'm forwarding specific ports to specific computers, sitting on one IP address. Pretty neat. It amazes me sometimes.

I logged into it today... what a disappointment! The sun it reflecting in a god-awful way in the spare bedroom. I think I have the backlight turned on. I'll see if I can log in remotely and reconfigure the cam. It works great though, don't you think?

Yes, I reconfigured the cam. I set it up to auto levels... it was over driven this morning.

TrackerPad comes out of the box with 140 degrees of rotation freedom, and I'm not sure on the tilt. I reconfigured the rotation to stop at the window edges, as well as up/down. It's pretty sweet. All for $200! And the Camera itself is $99, so the TrackerPad is really only $100.

A few people (believe it or not) have purchased TrackerPads from the link on my homepage. I'm an affiliate, so I get 10% of the sale. I didn't accumulate $50, which is the minumum required for a check to be sent, but I convinced them to use the $35 I accumulated toward the TrackerPad. Since I already had the Logitech Camera (bought on eBay a few months ago), I didn't need the whole $200 setup. The TrackerPad itself costs $129. The gave it to me for $95.

So, you can access the Basement Cam via my homepage via a popup link, or you can
[Click here for the basement TrackerCam].

The above link will be a full browser window, where the cam links on my homepage are unresizable popup windows.

Check it out and pan/tilt/zoom to your heart's desire.

[ September 18, 2002: This message was modified by: Dino ]

It's down now because we're remodeling. Should be back up in a few days.

I purchased a Logitech Pro 4000 from ebay for $20 w/shipping, so now I'm back online.

See me picking my nose during the day here:
http://207.224.36.181:8080/remote6/

I'm looking for software that will FTP images to a server. There's tons out there. Not a big issue, just no time.

However, I did upgrade the family room computer. In doing so, I updated the TrackerCam software. It's pretty nice. It even lets me capture surveillance and even watch them online. As soon as I figure it out, I'll let everyone know how to watch surveillance footage.

In the meantime, here's the URL to the family room camera. It's running the new version, and the pop-up window cuts off some of the new features. The main feature is that the camera software now has a mini-BB that lets people capture an image and talk about it. Just click on the "chat" button when accessing the family room cam.

Here's the link:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8383/remote6/

However, I've been having issues with USB bandwidth, so I decided to put the trackerpod in the family room. It's not much, but at least now one can pan from the left to right and look out the window. There's also a little treat if you pan the camera all the way to the right.

http://mydigitalarchives.com:8383/remote6/

Anyway, here's an unused camera being implemented. It's pointing to yet another one of Josh's experiments: the perpetually dying/decaying reef tank. What once was a thriving, flourishing ecosystem that cost well over $5,000 to establish, is now a heap of sitting saltwater (no filtration, no aeration, nothing) that is worth -$500 (it's giong to take a biohazard team to come and clean this up).

It's funny to see the parallelisms between hobbies and owners.

Here's the cam:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8787/remote6/

[ October 15, 2003: This message was modified by: Dino the Greek Mystique ]

[Find out how to get your own Eco-sphere]

Check out the Eco-sphere Camera right now!

The Eco-sphere:

A screen-shot from the Eco-sphere Camera:

Too bad I didn't have a wide-angle lens for the camera, since there's so much activity going on in that little bubble of life. Be sure to read about the Eco-sphere in the above link.

1) Computer Room Cam now temporarily points inside my computer, instead of the ECO-sphere (I'm a little more exciting/interested in the PC at the moment).

Click here to access that camera:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8282/remote6/

2) Josh has gone salt-water crazy with a renewed interest in his saltwater aquarium. He now has a camera pointed at it 24/7 (thank you very much).

Click here to access the Aquarium Cam:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8181/remote6/

I need to update my camera page eventually. This is a work-in-progress:
http://dinofilias.com/cameras/4-cameras.htm

Recognize anything? Yaho.

[ December 30, 2003: This message was modified by: Steve ]

I can't believe you still have that Essex nylon scraper. You still got my GD&T book I willed to you? Scar.

Toi toi!

Computer Room Cam: For the moment, temporarily points inside my computer, instead of the ECO-sphere (I'm a little more exciting/interested in the PC at the moment).

Click here to access that camera:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8282/remote6/

Saltwater Aquarium Cam: Josh has gone salt-water crazy with a renewed interest in his saltwater aquarium. He now has a camera pointed at it 24/7 (thank you very much).

Click here to access that camera:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8181/remote6/

Front Yard Cam: Points out my spare bedroom into the front yard. Watch cars drive by.
This cam can be moved with the Trackerpad.

Click here to access the Poinciana Cam:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8888/remote6/
(For some reason, it's down right now)

Driveway Cam: Points out my family room looking at the driveway. Spy on my neighbor or look at Josh's mouse.
This cam can be moved with the Trackerpad.

Click here to access the Poinciana Cam:
http://mydigitalarchives.com:8383/remote6/

Here's a 4-camera view of all the WebCams. I decided to try using the tag <iframe> instead of using individual frames. Looks like it's working pretty good.
I need to update my camera page eventually. This is a work-in-progress:
http://dinofilias.com/cameras/4-cameras.htm

Too bad the Front Yard Cam is down. Whadaya expect out of an old Celeron 300A (acts as the webcam server)? At one point, that thing was overclocked to 450 Mhz. It's taken a beatin'. When it works, it does very well. I might just hose Windows 2000 on it and put on Windows XP.

[ January 14, 2004: This message was modified by: Dino the Liberator ]