Greenhouse Cameras

 I set up two video cameras, one that I had which was very old and cheap, and another that I bought off eBay for $2.50. The eBay camera was originally a HP webcam for a DV5 computer. Using some information from a friend I learned that the web-cameras in these computers are just USB-connected cameras with strange connectors and pin-outs. Using a voltmeter one can find the GND and VCC wires, while the data wires are usually a twisted pair. As long as you splice the wire into a spare USB with the GND and VCC correctly matched you can guess which color wire is what data line. Once figured out you have a $2.50 video camera and whatever a spare USB connector cost (I had plenty lying around from years of hoarding broken wires). To my surprise Windows 7 immediately recognized the device and installed the necessary drivers. Even more to my surprise Windows XP recognized and installed drivers for the spliced up webcam. 

    I used the cameras to take pictures of the plant growth and had it set to take pictures whenever it detected motion. I was noticing that the fish weren't as friendly when I visited in December and that the plants were malnourished so I assumed that the fish weren't being fed enough so I wanted to ensure that someone was feeding the fish while I was away, which is why I used the motion detection temporarily until I made an auto-feeder. I'm very grateful that I have family who can take care of some things while I was gone so I was reluctant to "spy" in order to see if my fish were being fed but I wanted to ensure that the poor health of my plants was not caused by any other variable because there are lots of variables in an aquaponics system that can cause poor plant health. One problem with the auto-detect was that running the software at all times ate up a lot of processing. I also would get some false alert pictures and videos caused by high winds shaking everything around in the inside of the greenhouse. 

    An extra goal was to have a webcam set to record once the food was released into the tank from an Auto-Feeder (In Progress). I'm sure the goldfish would get used to the sound of the motor so that if the camera turned on right when the food was released I could watch the fish eat which isn't really necessary in any way but I thought that it would be cool. One camera underwater and one above, probably in a case like the one I used above.