Is this normal for a webcam?

I recently purcahsed a webcam, and the reception is sort of fuzzy. It's OK, y'know- but being a digital device, I would have expected the picture to be clear of that sort of thing. I've taken a photo on it to show you guys what I mean.

Any opinions appreciated (of the quality, not me! ).

You think that a $10 camera meant for streaming video over the Internet is going to give you good picture quality? Think again. :razz:

Yeah, this is pretty standard for webcams. The majority have really cheap CCDs and plastic lenses. Webcams producing less grainy/blocky images tend to be relatively expensive. Hence people often opt for digital cameras... unless they need something for conferencing/porn.

There's a good chance your camera doesn't even support 640x480, but something closer to half that value. Most logitech cameras, for example, shoot in some weird aspect ratio just above 320x240.

Well you're lucky you didn't turn into Mr. Blocks and Pixels.

It's hard to get a web cam that has one of those "super-high quality" images which you can transfer over the net. I mean, think about it for a second here:

A web cam transfers a digital picture of yourself that gets coverted into 0's and 1's, sends over the 'net, goes through a series of ports, gateways, security checks, firewalls, etc, gets coverted again into pixels that make up an image, and displays at another person's computer, all the while to have these actions taken place in a fraction of a second (something like that). Unless you have a T1 or T4 connection (is it T3 or T4?) and a several hundred dollar worth of web cam, you won't be able to send real-time images of yourself with awesome quality to your friends and families.

It's just the way how these things work. There's no way to go around that (except NASA and their hundred million bucks of equipment).

Originally Posted by Dryth

Yeah, this is pretty standard for webcams. The majority have really cheap CCDs and plastic lenses. Webcams producing less grainy/blocky images tend to be relatively expensive. Hence people often opt for digital cameras... unless they need something for conferencing/porn.

There's a good chance your camera doesn't even support 640x480, but something closer to half that value. Most logitech cameras, for example, shoot in some weird aspect ratio just above 320x240.

It's actually a 480 by 640, and I've managed to optimise the settings to improve the quality radically. I wasn't loking for crystal-clear and an amazing framerate, just no fuzz. With a built in mic and being under £20, I'm quite chuffed at this. New quality pic here...

Thanks for your opinions, guys!

Not looking to bad at all. In fact, for a webcam, I'd say it's probably one of the better quality pictures I've seen from one. Glad you got that all figured out.

Looks OK to me... I first thought you looked like David Beckham, but not much...