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Camera Quality & Performance
As with any webcam, you simply cannot expect the
quality you would get from a point & shoot camera or even some cell
phone/smartphone cameras. Because the camera is essentially looking at a
live image and there is no flash, you will notice a significant amount of
"noise" in your images. With this said, let's show you some examples of
both its picture and video quality.
Picture Quality
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Any webcam, such as the ORBIT, is ideal for
quick sharing of pictures via the internet with friends and family. They
are not designed for high quality images. However, the ORBIT does
provide higher quality pictures when compared to a majority of other webcams
I've used. A higher resolution of 640x480 is supported as well.
Video Quality
Let's start with its most impressive feature,
face-tracking. While I have read a couple of articles on the web that
mainly had bad things to say about it, I tend to differ. This feature
does work well, provided you have adequate lighting and put the subject
directly in front of the lens for at least 5 or 10 seconds so that it can know
what to "focus" on. As long as you don't move out of focus too quickly,
it will continue to track any movements quite well actually. Below is a
sample video I took to demonstrate its face-tracking capabilities. I
personally don't like my picture and/or video plastered all over the web but
still wanted to demonstrate this cool feature, so I asked my cat if it was
alright. She agreed, so here's a sample. Don't be alarmed, that was a bit of humor
there by the way...forgive me. I'm usually always too serious in reviews and figured
this would be the perfect opportunity to try at least. Our reviewer Tom is best at it though.
Anyways, here's a very good demonstration...
Note: Macromedia flash player required
for playback of demonstration videos below. Click
here to download.
flash video clip
**click to play**
Again, this feature is great and works as
advertised, provided you setup the camera in the right environment. I've
also read that when used on a dark background, it wouldn't work well.
For example, darker colored walls are said to affect its face-tracking performance. Just
make sure the subject is in clear view of the lens for at least 5 seconds.
As long as there are no rapid movements, it will follow your every move
and keep your face in view. This feature works best though with the
camera pointed at yourself.
The reason being that most would probably be sitting on a chair and staring
at their computer screen. For example, when testing on myself, I could
rock back and forth on my chair and the ORBIT would keep me perfectly in the
picture. I found it would track your face better than any other object.
Quite eerie actually, but certainly very innovative. Yes, some have commented about its "jerky" movements, however,
I don't see this as a problem at all. Its main purpose is to keep you
focused on what you're doing and not on the camera. Needless to say, I
was very impressed, particularly when testing on myself.
The next demonstration I would like to show you
is its auto focus feature. It also works quite well. Below is a
sample video...
flash video clip
**click to play**
To test its auto focus feature, I simply took
the camera and focused it on an object and moved the camera closer to see how it would
react. The
camera does a good job of zooming in/out
as required to keep the object in clear view. Again, this works well on yourself
and I go back to the rocking motion on a chair as the prefect example.
Finally, we test its video conferencing
performance and software compatibility.
**click to enlarge**
The Quickcam ORBIT worked flawlessly with the
latest version of MSN Messenger. Video was smooth and I did not
experience any lag
on a fast 3.0/1.5 broadband connection.
**click to enlarge**
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As I have stated earlier, I personally refuse to
use MSN Messenger for many reasons. With that said, my final tests were
to check software compatibility with the excellent new
Trillian Pro 3.0
messenger. For those unfamiliar with Trillian, I've been using their
software for quite some time. It loads faster, and you have absolutely
no pop-ups or unnecessary extras that affect your system's performance. Trillian is an instant messenger
capable of connecting to all networks such as MSN, ICQ, Yahoo and AOL.
It can even connect to IRC networks with ease. Just one client for all
your messaging needs...that works for me. The Quickcam ORBIT worked exceptionally well with
the lastest "Pro" release of the popular Trillian messenger and video from
an MSN Messenger client came in clear and smooth. Getting the ORBIT to
work with Trillian Pro 3 was as simple as choosing the device in the
audio/video settings menu.
Overall, I was quite impressed with its
performance and feature set. It certainly exceeded my expectations.
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