Using the power of the Pi's OTG port, you can build a true USB webcam-not some hacked-together IP camera that requires extra software to work, requires a flaky ffmpeg stream over the network, or only works with a specific app.

Go check out the video for a ton more detail than I could cover here. I go beyond the content of this post with demos, an assembly guide, and more, in my video Raspberry Pi Zero is a PRO HQ webcam for less than $100!. That particular Dell laptop is the infamous XPS model with a 'nose cam'-a camera placed in the most unfortunate location: under the screen, so it looks straight up your nostrils at a low angle:ĭell fixed the camera position in newer XPS laptops, but most laptops still have a pretty poor excuse for a camera in their thin display bezel-there's just not enough room in there for a good sensor and lens.

The Raspberry Pi and its HQ camera make a surprisingly potent webcam, and if you want to cover the basics, and rival the image quality of all but the highest-end dedicated webcams, you can do it for under $100.Ībove is a single frame from a recording I did with the HQ Camera on my Raspberry Pi Zero W connected as a standard USB webcam using the Camera app on Windows 10 on my Dell laptop. There are many Raspberry Pi projects where I spend a few hours (or dozens of hours) building something with a Pi, and realize at the end that not only could I have purchased an off-the-shelf product to do the same thing for half the component cost, but it would work better too.

Pi zero w camera setup