The Raspberry Pi is a very affordable computer that I am still figuring out useful ways to integrate into my professional work. Just as an example, it could sit inconspicuously in the corner at an install and be sending out OSC messages to multiple computers.
Recently I utilized the RPi Camera Board to be able to watch an interactive installation I was working on from home. Of course you could just set up a screen sharing client on a computer that is running your installation, but sometimes you may just want to take a quick glance just to make sure it's still running, see if any dialog boxes popped up, or even something as silly as a cursor is visible onscreen.
For this kind of setup there is a very useful git repo called RPi Cam Web Interface that allows you to do just this. This app let's you go straight to a url to view streaming video from you RPi camera. There is a really quick setup guide on the Elinux wiki.
Once I got the RPi Cam Web Interface streaming live and double checked that I could view it at a local IP in my web browser, it was time to figure out how to view the camera feed outside the network. This I will discuss in my next post but for now let me just run down a broad list of steps it takes to get a camera feed live stream setup on a RaspberryPi2.
###How to set this up:
First off, you need to purchase an RPi2, RPi Cam Board, and don't forget an SD Card which will store the RPi operating system.
Next you'll want to choose and image an operating system. In my case I used Raspbian Wheezy. Here is a great setup guide.
Setting up the Camera Board is pretty straightforward but here is a great tutorial. Once you have the camera connected turn on your RPi2 and type the following line into the terminal:
raspistill -o cam.jpg
If all goes well you will end up taking a still shot with your camera!
- Now that you have your RPi2 setup and taking pictures it's time to install the RPi Cam Web Interface (here is a great setup guide) so that you can view it in a web browser at a local IP address, meaning you can only view the camera feed if you're on the same network as the Pi.