[mdlug] Best Linux rig for capturing frames from analog video?

[Aaron Kulkis]

David McMillan wrote:
>
>      I have a new side-project assignment from my bosses (for, you know, my copious amounts of spare time).  We have a high-res *analog* video camera (NTSC video for the composite input on a TV) left over from another project, and we're about to
> enter a serious build phase for the new project.  The bosses want me to connect this camera to a computer and capture periodic images that can be stitched together later into a time-lapse video of the construction.
>
>      Now, I've done time-lapse before, using images taken using a hacked Canon Powershot (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbDwl8Dh1kk), but I've never done analog-video framegrabbing with Linux before. So, here's where I'm looking for advice:
> 1:  video capture hardware.  Has to have a Composite (not component!) input.  Since I'll probably have to make do with whatever computer I find lying about unused, needs to use USB. Frame *rate* isn't vital, but image quality is
> 2:  capture software:  My current thought is that I can probably use motion, with motion-triggered capture, to avoid taking tons of useless photos at night and during lunch.  But I'm wide open to advice on this.
> 3:  "Stitching":  I did that YouTube video using mencoder, but it was a bit crude.
>

It's FAR less cost to buy a digital USB webcam than to buy an analog -> digital converter,
let alone trying to find non-Windows-only software to actually process the output from it.