# turn a web cam into an ir cam



## kwinchee (Nov 9, 2005)

Hay Youve probley all seen this befour but its good if you intend modding your laser or you have an ir pointer 

ok here goes i used an old logitech quick cam express
:'( :'( :'(
1. obviousley take your cam appart (un screw it)

2. have a look what your up agaenst 









3. take the button on the top out the pice of plastic with the button slides out and the cable connecting it to the pcb is easley removed










4. remove pcb fromits case 










5.un screw the screws on the pcb to releace the lense (where i have unclipted the larger cable as there is a ground next to it soulded in)









6. un screw the lense from the holster then pull the lense out of the cone thing it sits in










7.now i know this is a bad pic but it is important, notice the red tint this is a small pise of glass it filters ir we want to remove this and replace this with something that filters normal light








8. where going to have to remove the lense to get to the filter problem the lense is glued in so... imay not be for you but it was for me so this is wat i did i got a stanley knife and cut down the thred to the lense and into the lense but cearfulley as you dont want to crack your lense then stick a fine needle or screw driver and pry it out







the b*sted ir filter 








9. now your asking your self why did i have negitive well this will filter light and only let ir through you will need two pieces of negitive the pice of negitive must come from a coulor set and must be fully black so use the little pice at the start that is lose also knowen as the indexing piece you will need two squars the same size as the filter just to make sure all the light is filterd








10. ok if you can see this it is the black piece in between the lenses not much to it just put the 2 pieces of negitive and put them in hear in the little divert








11. now put the black bit back into the lense holder so the little hole goes first and the divert goes last then put the lense back in







12.put it all back togther put the lense holder back into the cone thing then screw it back into the thing that holds it back in place






13. screw it back onto the pcb now test it dont bother pluging the buton in if you are just using the windows generic drivers and see if it worked and you didnt screw your mod up (shine it at a light)

with my cam





what the cam is taking a pic of





pop the button back and put the case back on

now when i tested it i had a bit of truoble it was to dark so i bit of negitive form a photo that was not as dark and it seemed to work 
forgive the spelling mistakes im c..... rap at it if some one wats to or has the time edit my post and ill change it

hope you have phun with this mod


----------



## gandbag (Nov 15, 2005)

Cool!

I removed the IR filter on an old webcam of mine a couple years ago. It didn't occur to me that the resulting odd color balance was a result of highly increased IR sensitivity. 

I will experiment with this tomorow as it is getting a bit late. 

Thanks for the great idea!


----------



## NewBie (Nov 15, 2005)

Just for general information, this mod actually sees Near-IR.

Most web cams will see down to 1100nm with this mod. 

For those fortunate enough to have a web cam with a Sony Ex-HAD CCD inside, you'll end up being able to see down to 1300nm.

Here is a picture of a warm soldering iron using the mentioned Sony Ex-HAD CCD web cam:


----------



## NewBie (Nov 15, 2005)

NewBie said:


> Just for general information, this mod actually sees Near-IR.
> 
> Most web cams will see down to 1100nm with this mod.
> 
> ...



With a few more mods, you can cool the CCD array with a peltier, as well as many other things, and improve the sensitivity, and lower the noise floor.

Check out some of the Astronomy camera sites for more info.


----------



## gandbag (Nov 15, 2005)

Wow,

Great information. I will check some astronomy sites - good idea.

Are these mods good for examining the heat/IR signature of (possibly overdriven) LEDs? My guess is that the lower efficiency of many LEDs when being driven hard is connected with a higher heat/IR output.

Thanks for the tip.


----------



## gadget_lover (Nov 15, 2005)

gandbag said:


> Wow,
> 
> Great information. I will check some astronomy sites - good idea.
> 
> ...



It should work. I use an infrared thermometer to check for heat transfer and LED temp. It seems to work just fine. The problem, of course, is that you will have no way to calibrate it so all you'll know for sure is that point A is hotter than point B.

Daniel


----------



## gandbag (Nov 15, 2005)

I got a "Digigr8" (read: digi-great) USB video/still/webcam on sale at radioshack for $25.

It has only a 300,000 pixel CMOS sensor, but with a little modding, it is now a portable video and still IR camera.

Here is a proof of concept capture:





I am wearing a black t-shirt and navy-blue hat.


The image is very blurry because the optic is very tiny and difficult to focus. more on that later. 

fun fun fun!


----------



## was_jlh (Nov 15, 2005)

kwinchee, excellent post, thank you. bought a webcam at a yardsale for $5 last weekend, this may be its next life.


----------



## kwinchee (Nov 16, 2005)

this is probley one of my favirioute "mods" ive done recentley as i own three 400mw cni ir pointers and im constentley fussing about protecting my eyes so much so i got sucked in and bought a $200 pear of ir filtering glases mind you thay do the trick


----------



## Lunarmodule (Nov 16, 2005)

Now THAT falls into the unexpectedly COOL column! Great idea! I never would have thought the resolution was THAT good in IR. I know about the Sony Super HAD sensor, could you tell me which brand of webcam features that awesome piece. That soldering iron pic is fantastic. I own a Raytheon RI-2000 A2 infrared cam that has a 160x120 resolution and 700nm to 1400nm range and the soldering iron pic rivals it in terms of detailed rendering. Gotta find a SuperHAD webcam now...
:thinking:
:goodjob:


----------



## jtice (Nov 16, 2005)

Yea, lets have a list of the ones that use that Sony sencor please! 

Very cool stuff guys.

~John


----------



## NewBie (Nov 24, 2005)

EXview HAD CCD:
EXview HAD CCD is a trademark of Sony Corporation. EXview HAD CCD is a CCD that drastically improves light efficiency by including near infrared light region as a basic structure of HAD (Hole-Accumulation Diode) sensor.

One example:
Description
The ICX255AL is an interline CCD solid-state image sensor suitable for CCIR B/W video cameras with a diagonal 6mm (Type 1/3) system. Compared with the current product ICX055BL, basic characteristics such as sensitivity, smear, dynamic range and S/N are improved drastically from visible light region to near infrared light region through the adoption of EXview HAD CCDTM technology.

Sensitivity in near infrared light region:
(+8dB compared with the ICX055BL, λ = 945nm)
Low smear (–20dB compared with the ICX055BL)
High D range (+3dB compared with the ICX055BL)

Many other choices here too:
http://www.sony.net/Products/SC-HP/pro/image_senser/bw_video.html


----------



## NewBie (Nov 24, 2005)

Plants also look different in Near-IR:


----------



## gandbag (Nov 29, 2005)

I've managed to get some better results:




As you can see in the above pic, some of the pine trees reflect IR (the lighter ones) and some absorb it. 








Above is a shot of an Old Navy store. Notice some of the flourescent lights are actually emitting IR light. flourescent bulbs do not normally emit any IR light. The large mercury-vapor lamps (look like pine cones) don't really seem to put out much IR either, but the tiny incandescent lights (you can see rows of them hanging down along the middle of the pic) do put out a lot and are illuminating the brightly lit areas in the picture.



If anyone is interested in instructions to modify the $25 radioshack digital usb still/video camera into an IR camera let me know.


----------



## HarryN (Dec 1, 2005)

Neat - Dumb question - If you just take out the red filter completely, and let the camera see both visible and near IR, would that make the camera able to "see" both under "normal lighting" and sort of a "night vision" ?


----------



## NewBie (Dec 3, 2005)

Visible and Near-IR light have different focus spots. Without the filter, you end up with the "fuzzies".


----------



## gandbag (Dec 3, 2005)

Harry,

When you have no filters over the CCD, you get a mix of regular colors and IR. Some things look normal, others have a lighter color due to the amout of infrared light bouncing off of them. It is fuzzy though. About as fuzzy as my above pics, as that lens was still not focused on the CCD properly.

Also, there isn't much near-infrared light when it is dark out, so it won't function as night vision. You would need an infrared light source to be able to "see in the dark". 

Some security cameras do have this feature though. They contain a cadmium sulfide photoresistor that changes resistance when exposed to light. By measuring the voltage across this photoresistor, the camera can tell when it is daytime, and when to switch to IR mode at night. These types of security cameras also usually have one or more rings of infrared emitting LEDs that activate at night. 

The relatively small and weak 5mm LEDs used for this purpose do not have much throw and do not generally illuminate very far. 

If you are interested in infrared photography, you should check out flickr.com. search for infrared or IR. here is a search I just pulled up:
http://flickr.com/photos/tags/infrared/


----------



## NewBie (Dec 3, 2005)

A usergroup devoted to such things:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/QCUIAG/


----------



## PhotonWrangler (Dec 4, 2005)

I've worked with an older Panasonic IR camera that had no IR filter and over 600 IR LEDs (!) mounted around the lens. The camera produced a kind of weird looking defocused picture, probably because of a different focal point for the IR wavelengths.


----------



## Learjet (Dec 5, 2005)

Here's me foot, normal light on the left, IR on the right. I can also see women's underclothes, if any, through normal clothing. :naughty: Oops, did I say that?  

I use a Mintron surveillance camera and Hoya IR filter.


----------



## was_jlh (Dec 5, 2005)

gandbag, thanks for the pm


----------



## PhotonWrangler (Dec 5, 2005)

Interesting how the blood vessels are more evident in the IR version of the photo.


----------

