Longer exposures with web cam

[D Wright]

Is it possible to change the drivers or software that control the shutter speed on a web cam. I have a Microsoft Lifecam studio which has 1080p resolution and I am having very pleasing results with it. I have removed the lens and am waiting for an IR cut filter to arrive. I have noticed that the maximum shutter speed is 1 second and I would love to raise this to 10 seconds. It would be for single exposures not video. Any help would be great.

[ronin]

Not at all sure but I suspect the answer is that you cannot. People used to reflash the Philips webcam to accomplish this and it was a popular webcam because of it, I think even these days it will sell a t a good price.

The presumption is therefore that any other webcam to which the same could be done woud be talked of and people would be off doing the change. I have heard of nothing.

The problem is likely that there is software on the board of the webcam and then you would need new executable code and then need to download it to the webcam processor/board. As it is a MS product there may be an SDK for the development and download but I suspect the chances are low.

A couple of hours on google may I suppose turn up something, as someone may have managed something. But other then the astrophotography field I cannot really think of another area that would require changes.

[D Wright]

Thanks for that. I have trawled google and not found anything so I don't think it can be done which is a shame as it is a good web cam. Never mind I will just use it for lunar and planetary.

[ronin]

I searched a bit, thought i might have stumbled on something whe I found this: http://dslrmodifications.com/lifecam/lifecam1.html

But not long exposure relevant, just how to modify it for the webcam video aspect, still a useful set of instructions. Thoughts were that if it were not in something like this then it cannot be done, or at least not a common modification.

Seems a few mentions over on CN but they never lead anywhere.

Suspect there are one or two where it could be done but equally suspect that the availability of the ZWO line has meant it is not really worth the bother these days. People will just go buy a ZWO item, or an Altair.

[D Wright]

Thanks for that. I used this to work out how the web cam came apart. I will save up and get a decent web cam sometime.

[MartinB]

I'm not sure but have a look at k3ccd tools https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.pk3.org/k3ccdtools/&ved=0ahUKEwjRzaeA1dPVAhUTOsAKHewmApIQFggmMAA&usg=AFQjCNG7Ktk0QqGN-sPtI7Mo84TfBAfqYQ