wex is a shell script which configures external USB camera as a webcamera or for video recording on a Linux system. The script was tested on Fedora 31 and higher.
Before you run the script first time, check that following packages are installed on your system:
ffmpeg gphoto2 v4l2loopback
v4l2loopback, which source code is available at GitHub, is not a standard part of Fedora distribution.
v4l2loopback package can be installed either from RPMfusion repository or from COPR reporistory.
The script runs with various parameters:
wex [-h|--help] [-a|--activate] [-c|--camera <name>] [-d|--device <number>] [-i|--info] [-r|--reset] [-s|--stop]
The parameters mean:
-h, --help display help message -a, --activate activate external USB camera using v4l2loopback device -c, --camera <name> external camera name -d, --device <number> video device number -i, --info video devices and external USB camera information -r, --reset reset v4l2loopback devices -s, --stop stop gvfs-gphoto2-volume-monitor service and gvfsd-gphoto2 daemon
The script uses restricted commands which need administrative rights. Therefore, such commands are run with sudo,
and the user is prompted for their password.
Since Fedora 35, a conflict with gvfs-gphoto2-volume-monitor service and gvfsd-gphoto2 daemon has prevented to transmit data from a camera to my laptop with the following error message:
pipe:: Invalid data found when processing input
It is fixed by stopping the service and the daemon with a usage of -s or --stop parameter.
The script has been developed to cofigure the external camera for videoconferencing (BlueJeans, Google Meet). Video live streaming can be checked with Open Broadcaster Software (OSB). There is possible to select an internal or external camera.
The script is prepared for a connection of Canon EOS 6d Mark II DSLR camera via USB 2.0.
There is assigned /dev/video10 device by default.
The assigned device is labeled with the camera name to make the device identification easier.
You can modify both values either by --camera and/or --device parameters
or by changing CAMERA and/or DEVICE variables in the script. If the video device has already been set
and should be changed, reset v4l2loopback devices by running wex with --reset parameter.
USB 2.0 throughput limits the resolution to 1024x576px and 25fps on Canon EOS 6D Mark II camera.
The script supports neither cameras connected with HDMI cable directly nor through HDMI to USB convertors which would enable Full HD 1080p resolution on USB 3.0 interface.
The script was tested with only one external connected camera.