Images saved fine, but webcam stream completely black

Question

Hello. I'm using the Ubuntu Breezy standard version of motion, which is 3.2.3. Everything appears to work fine with the default config (which does not save images, but only provides the stream), however the image is completely dark. I can view the webcam stream in local and remote browsers, and it is clear that the browser is not caching the image, as the time increments in the bottom right-hand corner of the image.

Sometimes when I start viewing the stream I see a short burst of images from the camera. Then it's gone, and I can't seem to reproduce it consistently.

- I've checked the privileges on the /dev/video0 device. - I've tried different browsers - I've tried different machines with the same webcam driver (scpa5xx) but a different kernel - the result is the same.

I'm pretty sure I've simply missed a config somewhere... Many thanks for your help. J.

-- JamesValentine - 07 Feb 2006

james@garnet:/home/james# cat /etc/motion/motion.conf
# Minimal motion example config file provided by the
# Debian motion package - for basic webcam operation.
#
# You most certainly want to investigate
# /usr/share/doc/motion/examples/motion-dist.conf.gz
# for further configuration options. Also, refer to the
# motion man page and /usr/share/doc/motion/motion_guide.html
# for detailed information on configuration options.

daemon off
quiet on

# You may very well need to change this (check with 'dmesg'
# after plugging in your webcam)
videodevice /dev/video0

# Image size in pixels (valid range is camera dependent)
width 320
height 240

framerate 25
quality 85
auto_brightness off

# Initial brightness, contrast, hue (NTSC), and saturation
# 0 = disabled (valid range 0-255)
brightness 0
contrast 0
saturation 0
hue 0

# Encode movies in real-time (install ffmpeg before enabling)
ffmpeg_cap_new off

# Target base directory for pictures and films
# You should probably change this (create dir beforehand)
target_dir /tmp

# Define a port number (e.g. 8000) to enable the mini-http server
# 0 = disabled
webcam_port 8001

# Set to 'off' to allow anybody (not just localhost) to view the
# webcam via the mini-http server (http://hostname:port)
webcam_localhost off

webcam_quality 50
webcam_maxrate 8

output_normal no

Environment

Motion version:	3.2.3
ffmpeg version:
Libraries:	ffmpeg, mysql, postgresql
Server OS:	Linux garnet 2.6.14vanilla #1 PREEMPT i686 GNU/Linux

-- JamesValentine - 07 Feb 2006

Follow Up

Please try to use a newwe version of motion ( ubuntu as debian is out of date ).

So you can use the latest stable version or latest daily snap

-- AngelCarpintero - 10 Feb 2006

Answer