How to use your Android smartphone camera as webcam
By: Nirupam Manik, The Mobile Indian, Fresh Delhi
Last updated : March 24, two thousand seventeen 11:47 am
We know one can always pick up a smartphone but what if you want to go on a movie call on a laptop without compromising on the webcam quality?
We all have been in that situation where we dreamed to movie talk with our loved ones but the webcam on our laptops is just not good enough. We know one can always pick up a smartphone but what if you want to go on a movie call on a laptop without compromising on the webcam quality? There is a way where you can use your smartphone’s camera as a webcam on your laptop. Here is how you can do it.
Step 1: Download an app called ‘DroidCam’ from the Google Play Store. Also, download the web client of DroidCam from here.
Step Two: Droidcam can access your smartphone’s camera in three ways – via USB, Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi server.
>>Make sure both your smartphone and laptop are connected to the same Wi-Fi network.
>>Open the DroidCam on your smartphone and note down the ‘Wifi IP’ and DroidCam Port.
>>Open the DroidCam client on your computer. Click on the Wi-Fi sign (the very first of the three) and inject the Wifi IP and DroidCam Port there.
>>Choose Audio and Movie and hit Embark.
>>There are chances that your Wi-Fi is not rapid enough to transmit data over the internet. In that case, you can access your smartphone’s camera as a webcam via USB.
>>Very first download all USB drivers for your device on your laptop
>>The USB connection will take place via ADB so you need to enable ‘USB Debugging’ on your smartphone. For that, go to Settings > Developer Options > Enable USB Debugging.
>>Check if your device is connected via ADB by running the guideline ‘adb devices’ in Instruction Prompt.
>>Once done, go to the DroidCam web client again, navigate to the USB tab and hit Commence.
To enable Developer Options on your Android device, go to Settings > About Phone > Tap Build Number a bunch of times.
You might face some issues with the USB method. Make sure you have all the USB drivers installed on your laptop and go after the instructions cautiously. For detailed FAQ, visit here.
This option is only available on DroidCamX i.e. the paid version of app. To access your smartphone’s camera via Wi-Fi server. Just go to the Wi-Fi Server tab on the PC and hit Embark. Now on the smartphone app, go to the three dot menu > Connect to a server > Create a fresh by coming in the local IP address of your laptop and Embark.
To find the local IP address of your network, just open the Guideline Prompt > come in the directive ‘ipconfig’ and look for IPv4 Address.
Once you are done setting up, you will need to by hand switch the webcam source on the client you wish to do movie call on. Skype and Google Hangouts have a plain option in settings to fiddle with both movie and audio source.