In addition to the sensors a webcam can be easily added to a node for streaming and capturing timelapses.

In this example we are using a USB webcam (Logitech C270) and a package called Motion. Motion streams by default on port 8081

Configure the hardware

All we need to do here is connect the USB webcam to the micro USB port on the Pi, we can then make sure it's identified with the following command, which should list out some information about any USB devices

lsusb

If using a Raspberry Pi camera (non-USB) you can enable it via 'raspi-config' and then selecting "Interfacing Options" > "Camera" > "Enabled"

Configure Motion

First we will install the package via apt

sudo apt-get install motion

Next we will update the configuration with the following lines (you can also use motion.conf):

• Enable the daemon (skip this step for Bookworm, was only necessary in previous versions)

sudo sed -i 's/daemon off/daemon on/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Set the framerate to 30 if desired (I skip this since they're still images)

sudo sed -i 's/framerate 2/framerate 30/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Allow streaming from non-localhost

sudo sed -i 's/stream_localhost on/stream_localhost off/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Allow control connections from non-localhost

sudo sed -i 's/webcontrol_localhost on/webcontrol_localhost off/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Set the width to 1280 and height to 720

sudo sed -i 's/width 320/width 1280/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

sudo sed -i 's/height 240/height 720/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Disable saving pictures to prevent storage from filling up

sudo sed -i 's/output_pictures off/output_pictures on/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Set motion threshold so that it never triggers

sudo sed -i 's/threshold 1500/threshold 2147483647/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

• Enable the daemon to start

sudo sed -i 's/start_motion_daemon=no/start_motion_daemon=yes/g' /etc/motion/motion.conf

There are many different configuration changes and tweaks that can be made for Motion, I won't attempt to cover them all here but this is a good reference - https://motion-project.github.io/motion_config.html#basic_setup_picam

Enable and start the daemon

sudo systemctl enable motion

sudo systemctl start motion

Now that the daemon is started we can browse to the IP on port 8080 and 8081 to view the output of the webcam.