Kitchen

Living Room

View from the Christmas Tree

Name State Description  Control  Angel OFF Christmas special! Angel on top of the Christmas tree On   Off Garland OFF Christmas special! The garland lights over the Livingroom window. You can't see them yet -- more cameras coming soon. On   Off Teapot ON Illuminated teapot in Kitchen area. Christmas special! This also now controls the colored Christmas lights around the ceiling in the kitchen. On   Off Dining Accent OFF Accent lights around the dining room. You can see the purple lights on the livingroom cam On   Off Livingroom Light ON The lamp that lights the livingroom at night. If the picture is black, turn this on. On   Off Kitchen sink ON Accent lights over the kitchen sink. Can be seen on the kitchen cam. On   Off Remember that the cameras update every 20 seconds or so therefore you won't see the lights change immediately.

A camera in our living room and kitchen, a capture board, a DSL connection, a little software and what do you get? A family's home on the Web! Welcome to our living room. We are usually around in the evening (Pacific Standard Time). Send us email and enjoy relaxing at our house. A pictorial description of how the hardware is put together is on the How It Is Done page. I've started leaving a light on at night so the people on the other side of the planet have something to look at besides black. I also collect one image an hour for the last 24 hours . Our web-enabled music system (using the AudioTron from TurtleBeach ) shows what's now playing in the livingroom: State: Playing   Length: 30/191 sec Title: Silent Night - (1) Artist: The Ware - Paterson Duo Album: An Angel's Noel and what is playing in the master bedroom: State: Inactive Title: Artist: Album: Our living room has been Christmas Cam for a bunch of years. You can check out: ChristmasCam 1995 ChristmasCam 1996 ChristmasCam 1997 ChristmasCam 1998 ChristmasCam 1999 ChristmasCam 2000 ChristmasCam 2001 ChristmasCam 2002 ChristmasCam 2003 If you don't believe in Santa Claus, in 1995 we caught Santa Claus putting presents around the tree and drinking the milk left out for him (RealMedia video). We didn't ever catch him again -- we think you can only fool the Santa guy once. Family pics: Halloween party 2001 Paris 2002

December 25, 2004 Christmas morning, we’ll have a chat room open so you can come and share the present opening. We have the family arriving at 9am PST for the festivities. Come and join us. Comments(0) December 24, 2004 Today is cooking for Wagilia – the traditional Polish Christmas Eve dinner. The babka is in the bread maker, the cabbage leaves are cooked for the golabki and thier stuffing is mixed. Mushrooms are being chopped for the mushroom soup. Dinner is at sundown Christmas Eve. Comments(3) December 23, 2004 I was trying to get a streaming camera working but I decided to settle on a known technology and we now have a view from the tree. It’s updated every 10 seconds. Additionally, you can now control the angel on the top of the tree. Merry Christmas and be sure to stop by Christmas morning. Comments(0) December 21, 2004 It’s Tuesday and we are all in the kitchen wrapping presents. Once a good number are wrapped, we’ll start cooking for Wagellia (Christmas eve dinner). Comments(1) December 15, 2004 The Christmas tree has been decorated for one day and the lights are out and ornaments are on the floor. Guess who was involved. Yes, the kitten. She chewed through the light wires – we feared for her health until she attacked our feet. And many an oranament has met an untimely demise. Comments(7) December 11, 2004 I’m looking to put up the Christmas Tree this weekend. That and get the Christmas cards out. They day is getting close. Comments(4) December 1, 2004 Someone asked what the glowing rectangle in the Livingroom was. It’s a Nativity scene that has a small string of white lights illuminating it. Some of that “true meaning of Christmas” stuff. Comments(0) November 27, 2004 I put some Christmas lights in the kitchen. They are on the ceiling and are run from the teapot switch. Comments(0) November 27, 2004 Merry Christmas. I am spending the rest of this weekend moving cameras and getting the Christmas lights up on the house. The tree is probably a week or so away. Stay tuned. Comments(0) November 12, 2004 This year Thanksgiving will be at Grandma’s house (my mom). So that means I can set up for Christmas early . So what should I do for the 10th anniversary of ChristmasCam? Comments(6) Old Notes

NOTE TO THE CRIMINALLY INCLINED: our house has an alarm (door and window sensors and motion detectors) and we live in a small town whose cops actually show up in five minutes. So, save us both a lot of trouble, and don't even bother.

YM: MisterBlue

Pointers to some camera technology:

• Axis Technology -- a great direct to web cam. I have an Axis 2100
• About.Com:Internet Conferencing -- excellent information on how to put up a web cam, the types of hardware that's out there and the software to use.
• WebCam32 -- commercial-ware that makes your own home cam possible
• SpyCam An image capture and upload program for building your own web cam (shareware)

Friends links -- people I've met on the web.

• Songbird's Webcam -- a nice lady who has had a cam possibly longer than I have.
• Tim's website -- making his mark on the web

If you are a Webcam-aholic, here are other Cam pages (list updated February 7, 2003) :

• The Wired Home -- not exactly a cam (although he has several). This fellow also records when the toilet was flushed, when the cat uses the litter box, what was thrown away in the trash bin and many, many more measurements of a home in the Netherlands.
• Drive Me Insane! -- another person with cams and a remote controlled house. The "drive me insane" part is that YOU control the lights in his house.
• Webcams in Freudenstadt, Switzerland -- good city cams from far away, exotic Switzerland.
• World Webcam Monitor -- excellent collection of interesting cams of places, phenomena, space, weird, ...
• 123cam.com -- despite a slightly irritating UI, a gigantic collection of cams
• Franck's Top WebCams - but a lot of annoying ad popups
• AltaVista's Cammunity -- good collection
• CamVille -- more adult and people oriented
• WebCam World
• Tommy's List of Live Cam Worldwide -- with a lot of links to other fun stuff
• Helmut Halfmann's Realtime Camera Paradise (in German but even an American can figure it out)