DIY Wireless Laser Webcam

[@FarbulousCreations]

*Ready to get nerdy? Full instructions, including all terminal commands, can be found on my website:* www.farbulouscreations.com/videos/setting-up-webcam-to-work-wirelessly?

[@sadiegros964]

can i do this plus lightburn bridge on the same raspberry pi to have both wireless?

[@DanielChambers-y9c]

Can I use 1 raspberry pi 4 for the light burn bridge and camera wireless? Or would I need 2 raspberry pi?

[@Blueyedevil2702]

Awesome stuff man. First video that I've seen that takes this on.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Thanks a lot man! Hoped it wasn’t too dry but I figured it’d be useful to those who wanted to make their setups easier to use wirelessly! 😊

[@jonathanroman8280]

Hey ! Great video ...........I've been searching for information for this setup for a while now. I have a Raspberry Pi 4 and i don't see that flavor on the list and i was wondering would any of the other flavors work on the Pi 4?

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Jonathan! I imagine one of the older versions should work, doesn't hurt to try! Worse case scenario would be having to reinstall the Raspberry Pi OS on your SD card, so as long as you don't have anything important on the Pi it's worth a try! Good luck - I'd love to know if one of those older versions work for you!

[@jonathanroman8280]

Thank you 🙏🏽……I’ll give that a try and keep you posted

[@Jack-hl5tu]

you just saved me hours! thank you, sir

[@FarbulousCreations]

Glad to hear it! It's a pretty niche topic but I knew there'd be some people interested in pursuing it! 😊

[@gnafin]

can you use this if i am using light burn bridge for my net connection.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Glenn, I'm not familiar with Light Burn Bridge but it seems possible if you could install it directly on the bridge Pie itself. I'd love to hear if you try it!

[@brianyost5131]

Thanks for the great video. I cannot locate a Raspberry Pi 3 that is not really expensive though! Would other flavors of the Pi work? I see a 3A+ that seems to be available, but it just has 1 usb port, which probably wouldnt work as you need to connect a camera and keyboard\mouse for setting up. The B+ version seems to be the only "B" that is available and it is well over $100 for just the board. Any thoughts would be appreciated!

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Brian! Sorry for the slow reply! Yeah the untimely part of this video was not realizing that Raspberry Pi's were hard to source - I got lucky and had a spare sitting around from a few years ago. I think other flavors of Pi would work just fine as long as it has a USB A port for the camera. If you only have one, you could try using a USB-splitter temporarily while you fiddle with the mouse and keyboard, but then after setup you won't need it. Also check out a recent video by Linus Tech Tips - they went over some Raspberry Pi alternatives that are a lot cheaper at the moment! Good luck!

[@brucemccoy135]

After several dead ends on finding a wireless LightBurn camera solution, I was pleased to find this video. Very detailed explanations and good quality video and audio.. With no experience in programming languages, it was like typing in Chinese to me, but I followed step by step and finally got the video to appear in OBS. But, as some have mentioned, I am experiencing 2 problems - Cam2ip is not autostarting on reboot of the Pi (even after I corrected the path) and a virtual camera option not appearing in the LightBurn Camera Control window. Any new suggestions surfaced over the past several months?

[@brucemccoy135]

Well, not surprisingly, the failure to load on rebooting was due to a missing "/". So much for my proofreading skills. Now just need to get LightBurn to detect the virtual camera.

[@bertwolf33]

@@brucemccoy135 Have you had any luck with LB seeing the camera? I'm stuck at the same place

[@brucemccoy135]

@@bertwolf33 I did not with our Windows laptop. I also have a LightBurn on a MacBook Air and I did recognize the presence of virtual camera, but the display image was just black. At that point, I gave up. Sorry I can not help.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Bruce! Super sorry for my late reply here. Looks like you weren't able to get the virtual camera to show more than just black inside of Lightburn?

[@Kode-bu1og]

I can’t seem to get this to open on it’s own after following all of your instructions. I’ve redone it multiple times. Am I missing some step here??

[@Kode-bu1og]

Also are you controlling your laser and wireless camera on the same raspberry pi?? That’s my biggest question

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey there, no I just use the Pi for making the camera wireless. I use my Macbook for controlling my laser with Lightburn.

[@Thelilichannel6907]

Thank you Ron for the lesson! I would have used your first name when responding to what you commented to me but I thought I remembered your name wrong. I didn't! Ha!

[@FarbulousCreations]

No worries, Lili! Take care!! :)

[@homiethefish]

I was looking for this solution. Thanks! I'm wondering if the two computer that I use for Lightburn on could share the IP camera stream? Do you know if the ThunderCam has any auto shut off features? It would be an awfully expensive replacement for a $25 camera that is mounted in the unit. Or I'll need to place the RPi power switch some place easy for turning on and off.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Joel! Sorry for the slow reply here! I don't see why two computers couldn't share the same IP camera stream! Great idea! I don't think the ThunderCam has any auto shutoff features, but putting the Pi on a smart switch is an easy enough approach to turn it on and off. That's what I'll likely do at some point, but I don't use the camera super often so I haven't been motivated to just yet. 😉

[@homiethefish]

​@@FarbulousCreations The video is kinda old, we are all busy. I trying to get enough stuff added to my etsy store for this Christmas season. So no time to setup the pi anyway. Thanks for the info.

[@FaerixStrae]

Hi there. I just followed your guide to the T multiple times, but for some reason it will not auto start the camera. I tried typing in all the commands manually and even tried it once only copying and pasting everything. No luck. Any suggestions?

[@FaerixStrae]

I figured it out. Instead of ExecStart=/home/pi/Desktop/cam2ip I had to make it ExecStart=/home/"username"/Desktop/cam2ip Figured I'd leave the question in case anyone else has the same issue. Just replace "username" with your username.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Ah, thanks for the heads up! Yeah I didn't set a custom username in my example so it just defaulted to "pi" I guess! Thanks and glad you were able to figure it out!

[@pseebald1]

How did you setup your thunder with wifi? Thanks!

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Patrick, it's a little hard to explain concisely since it's different for each wifi router out there, but maybe I'll try to do a video on it at some point! Thanks for the interest!

[@peterb7401]

You made this easy enough for even me to understand.. thank you. Aside from the shortage of RBPI’s without getting stuck for 3x normal value, I want t have not only my camera on wifi but the diode laser as well. Would I be needing two Raspberry Pi modules or is it possible to use like RBPi 4 B to handle both?

[@FarbulousCreations]

Glad to hear, Peter! I unfortunately don't have much experience with diode lasers and how they interface with wifi/ethernet. That said, you can probably get away with a single Raspberry Pi, provided you figure out how to control the laser remotely. Maybe SSH or such? Good luck!

[@peterb7401]

@@FarbulousCreations 99.9% there. got the camera to work with cam2ip just as you described (told you your step by step was easy to follow). however, now although it shows in OBS studio without issues, it only shows as a blank rectangle in Lightburn. I've checked all that I know to check, I'm sure it is a simple fix but I am out of ideas. I checked (windows10) camera, Lightburn shows under desktop apps as it should... ??? any ideas?

[@RandyWalkerSr]

Hoping you can help. Followed all your steps to set up the wireless camera. When I reboot the pi to see if the camera is starting I can see the camera start but then shuts down. I have tried several times to follow your steps and still end up with the same result. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Randy, I'm not sure I'll be of much help without "being there" but do you have it connected to a display when it shuts down? Is it the pi, camera, or application that's shutting down?

[@RandyWalkerSr]

Pi camera is shutting down just before the operating system fully loads. I can see the camera light come on then off. I can not watch the stream mpeg unless I start it. My syntax looks correct but I still cannot get the camera to startup on reboot.

[@thomasurios5680]

@@RandyWalkerSr got the same problem and solve it by changing the name of the Rasp Pi. My Pi name is not "Pi", but "toto". So in the script : ExecStart=/home/pi/Desktop/.................. --> ExecStart=/home/toto/Desktop/.............

[@tomekk6674]

A little expensive way to go wireless expensive cam, but works ;) Why do not try pretty good resolution straight from ip cam ? try to unFade an image in lightburn. It will be much better contrast, so You can see much more the edges. Good job with this video.

[@FarbulousCreations]

Hey Tomek! Yeah a little expensive but I love somewhat technically involved solutions. They're my version of sudoku, lol. I'll have to look into the unfade setting you're talking about. Thanks!

[@vickynguyen9499]

Could you use this device to plug the ethernet cable of the laser machine in there too? I saw an ethernet connection on the device. 😂

[@FarbulousCreations]

The ethernet connection comes in handy if you want to control the laser via ethernet instead of USB, but in that case you'd be plugging it directly into the computer with Lightburn on it, OR, more ideally, to a "network switch" whereby you can find its local IP address and control your laser wirelessly from your laptop or such. I might do a video on that topic at some point. 🤓

[@krystalmarie9128]

Wondering if anyone else is experiencing issues with lightburn not finding the virtual camera. Can confirm its working with other applications.... but not lightburn....odd...

[@FarbulousCreations]

I vaguely recall running into that problem briefly, but then it just worked the next time I tired. Maybe try restarting Lightburn and activating the virtual camera before starting Lightburn? So sorry I can't be of more assistance!

[@rfcreative1653]

Did you get it working? I have the same issue with LB not listing the OBS virtual camera while other apps are seeing it.

[@coreymaxim4198]

I’m having trouble getting the pi to start the service upon reboot. Has everybody entered the text as shown or found anything in the included code that might have been a typo? I’ll keep trying until I get it! Thanks for posting this atleast I have some sort of direction!

[@TheIrishCreamy]

Ditto. Everything looks perfect, but I can't get it in Lightburn 🤔

[@RoamGaming]

rasberry pi's are not cheap anymore. a rasberry pi 3 now goes for about $200 and pi 4s are going for $250-300.

[@Blueyedevil2702]

I assume one can go for a Banana Pi Zero and do this. About 39usd

[@FarbulousCreations]

Oof, I’ve been out of the Pi game for a bit, didn’t realize they’d gotten so expensive! Hopefully once the chip shortages are over and scalpers can’t make a profit the price comes back down. Blueyedevil is right though; this could likely be done on a Pi Zero as well!

[@PastorJohnBrown]

I hope you are still monitoring these posts: I have followed you 'til about 8:28 minutes in when you are at ./cam2ip to see if it is activated and running, and I get an error. The error is "john@Laserpi:~/Desktop $ ./cam2ip camera: inappropriate ioctl for device. I would very much appreciate your help.