Head Standing Tiger Barb

I have another larger aquarium with a bunch of tiger barbs in it. I thought one of them was sick because it kept standing on it's head (pointing downward) and flaring its fins. After a little research, it appears the head standing is a mating display / aggressive behavior of some kind. I managed to get little video of the tiger barb in action.

New iGoogle Fishcam Gadget

I've created an iGoogle gadget of my fish cam video feed. It's still in the experimental stages, so I can't guarantee anything. Click the link below to add the gadget to your iGoogle page.

Jason's Fishcam iGoogle Gadget

Kind of like a PBS pledge drive... but for fish

Check out my new super-awesome donate button! (right side, orangey, says 'DONATE' on it) Ya, ya, I hate to beg for money but basically, I'm broke. I spent $30 on fishcam supplies today. Let's see... all the ad revenue generated by this site this month... minus $30 for supplies... comes to... -$30! Crap.

No more viewer stats?

Some of you have noticed that the viewer stat is gone from the corner of the fishcam video feed. Because of the popularity of my fishcam widget with Chumby owners, I had to switch to faster server software. The old server would start to hang after it got hit with more than 10 viewers. The new server can get fishcam images to many, many more people simultaneously. Unfortunately, the new server isn't capable of displaying the viewer count like the old server. I enjoyed the viewer count as well. It was a nice way of measuring the load on the server and popularity of my fishcam.

- UPDATE -

I've attempted to make my own "viewer stat" insert for the video feed. It seems to work, although it's not as pretty as the old one. Hopefully the little tool I coded is stable enough to run 24/7. I guess we'll see!

Full Screen Mode!

I've had a few requests for a larger fishcam... one that would fill the entire screen. Well, I finally got around to making that happen. The resolution won't get any better but at least it will fill the screen now!

Jason's Fishcam - Full Screen Mode

Check out Memming's Fishcam too!

I helped my good friend Memming hook up a fishcam yesterday. It's a saltwater aquarium and once he get's a few more fish it'll look nicer than mine! Check out the live version!

Welcome Chumby Users (although they'll never read this)!

I was wondering why I started getting a lot more traffic to my fishcam until I discovered that someone made a Chumby widget out of my video feed. A Chumby is a little LCD/squishy blob that accesses your wifi and cycles through a bunch of customized channels (ebay, news, stock tickets, etc.) So now those lucky Chumby owners can watch my fishcam on their LCD blobs all day long. At first I didn't know what to think about it since the widget bypasses my website and goes directly to the video feed. But after about 2 minutes of intense thought I've decided to embrace the Chumby widget. More people will probably see my site because of it.

The clown loach is just playing dead.

Everyone can stop emailing me to tell me that my striped clown loach is dead. Apparently, this type of fish likes to lay on it's side and take naps from time to time. It fooled me the first time too. I thought it was a goner, but as soon as I got near the aquarium, it shot off like a bullet and hid.

Ok, I think I have things working again. I managed to string a very long ethernet cable from my router to fishcam server. I haven't had any hiccups since then. I also added a little counter at the bottom of the image to let know how many other people are watching fishcam at the same time.

In other news... why is Netscape's fishcam ranked higher than mine again? Their site hasn't produced a live image of a fish in YEARS yet I'm still doing battle with them for the top spot on Goggle.

Sorry if my fishcam is down.

So much for a working fishcam! I apologize if my fishcam still isn't 100% operational yet. In my new house, I don't have a proper ethernet port near my Fishcam server and I'm having to rely on WiFi to get the server online. Needless to say, WiFi isn't as reliable as I had hoped. Now that it's payday I think I'm going to get a really long ethernet cable and connect to my router.

On the move!

You may have noticed that my interactive fish cam isn't very interactive lately. This is because I'm in the process of moving and all the fishcam gear is packed in a box somewhere. In the meantime, you'll have to make due with the little beta aquarium that is in my office. Don't expect anything to happen when you click the "gator" and "camera" links until I have is switched back to the old aquarium. I'm guessing it will be a few weeks before Jason's Fishcam is 100% operational again.

The diver is gone but the gator remains.

Some of you may have noticed the treasure chest and diver are gone as well as the other aquarium views. I decided to remove the diver because of a few reasons. First, part of it was rusting, which I can't imagine is too good for fish in a little aquarium. The second reason was because the diver was obstructing the view of half the tank. Basically, it was getting annoying. Not only that but I was constantly repositioning it because it would gradually work itself loose. But the good news is that the gator is still going strong!

Fishcam #1 down :(

You've probably noticed that fishcam #1 isn't working. I needed the webcam equipment for another project. Though I do have a new aquarium in my new office. If I get some down-time, maybe I'll set a webcam on that one instead. It only has a Betta in it at the moment.

Fishcam Forum Added

I've added a Fishcam Forum. Now you'll be able to ask questions and get responses from me or discuss things amongst yourselves.

The people at Earthcam.com have good taste

My fish cam has made the list of "25 Most Interesting Webcams of 2006". Maybe they should call it the "25 Most Interesting Webcam that Aren't Offensive" or "The 25 Webcams on the Internet that Actually Work". All kidding aside, I'm glad to get some kind of recognition for putting this interactive system together. I just hope it never gets too popular. I don't have any kind of flood control on it and no single person has exclusive control over the movements (except for me of course).

I might have to get me servos soon. They are starting to wear out from all the action. It's not they are getting loose... they are just starting to make a lot of noise... and it's starting to bug me.

In other news, my crab escaped a few days ago. I walked into the kitchen and there he was peeking outside, through the crack under the kitchen door. He must have had quite an adventure because he was covered in hair and dust-bunnies. I threw him back in the tank and all was well again.

Mission Accomplished: Jason's Fishcam is #1!

I checked my ranking in Google today and was happy to see that this website has reached the top of the results! It's been a long road and honestly I didn't think I'd ever get the number one spot. I remember how happy I was when I finally cracked into the top ten which was full of mostly non-functioning fishcams. It's a mystery to me how a dead link can be ranked so high for so long. One by one, I knocked off the challengers thanks to my diligence in keeping my webcams up and running. As a side note, the server meltdown that took away the beloved interactivity has been replaced and all is working 100% again. Lastly, I'd like to thank my lab mates, Memming and Alex. I'm not sure I would have reached #1 without them.

Fish Cam Server Meltdown

In an effort to help my fish cam server run cooler, I installed a case fan. I must have been operating at the maximum output of the power supply because the addition of that little fan smoked my system. So if fishcam was down yesterday, that was the reason. Instead of trying to fix that machine I moved all the software to a different computer. The transplant went better than I thoughT, althouth I still need to do a little work before I get the servos operational again.

Divin' for Treasure

There's been another addition to fishcam #2 in the form of a diver with a treasure chest. By clicking the links under the video stream, you'll be able to open and close the treasure chest. Since robo-gator turned out to be a big hit, I thought it was time to add another device. I'm about out of room in that tank for animatronics. I might be able to squeeze one more thing in there, but it'll have to be small. Let me know if you have any ideas.

The gator has been operational for over a month now and I'm happy to report that no fish have died because of it. Although it wasn't my intent, controlling the gator became a "fishing game" of sorts with people trying to catch my fish by closing the chompers on unsuspecting swimmers-by. It is possible to catch them as I've seen it happen a few times now.

As a side note, fishtank #1 will be down for a while. I'm trying to think of something creative to do with it. In the meantime, have fun with the new diver!

Jason's Fishcam has gone Interactive!

Today is a big day in the history of my aquarium webcam, as I'm happy to announce that viewers can finally interact with my fish! Check out fish cam #2... under the little preview image there are links that, when clicked, allow you to move the camera position and control the gator. (Don't everyone click it at once now, haha, I'm not sure if my server can handle the load.) The alligator is in the right-hand view, so you may need to click "Right" before you play with the gator. I don't think my fish like the new "robo-gator" because they all seem to be congregating on the opposite side of the tank.
I'll be improving the interface as soon as learn more about javascript. A hyperlink is about all I'm capable of at the moment. Anyway, have fun playing with my fishcam!

Beer Belly Betta

I added a little algae eating fish to the aquarium containing the Betta. Since that tank just got cleaned last week, there really isn't any algae for the little guy to munch on, so I threw in one of those compressed algae wafers. The Betta to it upon himself to eat the entire thing himself! Now he very prominent bulge on his belly. At first I freaked, thinking it was some kind of disease, but then I noticed the wafer was gone and did the math. What a pig!

Fishcam #3... SALTWATER!!!

I've added another aquarium to my line-up of super exciting remote fish watching portals. Fishcam #3 is located in my neural engineering lab at the University of Florida. My fellow grad student and office-mate, Alex, is the official keeper of the aquarium. So if you see dead things floating in there, I've got nothing to do with it.
You won't be seeing much action in this tank since in was just setup yesterday. I'm not that familiar with saltwater aquariums and I'm not sure how long the setup process takes. Maybe you'll see fish in a few weeks.
Unlike my other two fishcams, these one isn't streaming video. The fishcam server in my lab is behind a firewall and a proxy server of which I have no control. Until I can bride our network management guy to open up a port for my server, it'll be just one new image a minute.

UFO sighting in Jason's Fishcam?

No, that's not an alien pod in my aquarium. A friend gave me a couple lilly bulbs for my fish tank. So mark your calendars everyone, they're supposed to sprout in 20 days. My friend also gave me an automatic fish feeder. The plan is to add a button to this fish cam page and allow visitors to feed my fish. Don't hold your breath waiting for that though. I'm about six projects deep at the moments.

My fishcam is top ten material!

The critics have spoken... and they like my fish! The nice people at Earthcam have listed my fishcam as one of their Top Ten Cams. Which is really saying something since there are a ton of webcams in their index. I'm #3 on the top ten list, right between the "Peregrine Nest Cam" and the "Sea of Galilee" cam.

Can anyone speak Estonian?

kas te räägite inglise keelt?

I noticed I was getting a ton of hits on fishcam today. It turns out that the Estonian news outlet of "Eesti Päevaleht Online" has put a link to my website in one of its articles. Is there anyone out there who can translate it or even tell me what the article is about? Here's the link: http://www.epl.ee/artikkel_319800.html
Just post any information you have as a comment.
Thanks!

Bigger Aquarium on the Way!

I got a bigger aquarium for my birthday (thanks Beth)! I'm in the middle of setting it up which will take a few days. I'm using the plants out of my fishcam tank in case you're wondering where they went. My plan is to put a lot more plants in this bigger tank. So, hopefully in a few days "new and improved" fishcam will be up and running.

Behind the scenes tour of Jason's Fishcam

'Anonymous from the UK' asked about my fishcam setup. I plan on describing it in more detail on my projects page soon but for now, I'll just give you a quick summary of the hardware and software I use for this streaming video.
First the hardware: Everything is run from a computer I have in my living room. This computer (2.9 GHz Celeron) is also hooked to my enterainment system and functions as a PVR, file server, print server, MP3 player, DVD player and game machine. It's been a good little work-horse. The two cameras I have looking at my aquaruim work in slightly different ways. One is a traditional USB webcam (old Intel model) that plugs into my computer through a long USB cable. The other is a little camera that has an RCA style output (puchased from Supercircuits). I have it plugged into a PCI video capture card (ATI TV Wonder VE.... it's a piece of crap, don't buy one). One camera is help in place by a tripod and the other is stuck to the top of a soup can (cream of mushroom, I believe). The fishtank itself is only 3 gallons (11 liters). The aquarium light is set on an automatic timer I bought from a hardware store.
Now for the software: Since I have a dynamic IP address, I'm registered with No-IP and use their DNS update client tool to keep my IP linked to a static domain. The video streaming is taken care of with WebcamXP. It's the nicest video streaming tool I've used so far, plenty of options and ways to customize it. I've had a few incarnation of "Fishcam" and this one is by far the nicest. I'm using a blog template and free weblogs tools from Blogger to manage the updating and user comments. I would have to say that it's made keeping a webpage fun again.
Ok, I hope I've given enough information for any other budding fishcam'ers to get started.
A few last tips:
1. If you can, try to find a webcam that uses a CCD image sensor. Most cameras now have a CMOS sensor which are cheaper but the colors appear washed out. Also a CMOS camera can't handle low light conditions well either. You'll probably have to go on ebay to get one. I use an Intel CS330 webcam which I highly recommend.
2. Find an automatic timer for the aquarium light. It's light only so many hours of the day, no one wants to watch a dark tank!
3. Make sure the camera is anchored well. One bump of the webcam and "Jason's Fishcam" turns into "The Streaming Video of the Wall Beside Jason's Fishcam."
4. Make sure your fish have some color to them!
5. If your webcam server is stuck behind a firewall or proxy server, check out this post on how to get around that problem.

My 1000th visitor!

Congratulations 218.102.143.75 from Vancouver, Canada! You are the 1000th visitor to Jason's Fishcam! Sorry, there aren't any prizes associated with being #1000, just the novelty of it. I'm really surprised how fast I racked up that many hits. Now if I could just increase my ranking in google... I'm not even in the top 1000 search results for the keyword "fishcam".

What's better than one camera?

Two cameras, of course! I found another webcam in my big "box 'o computer goodies" and hooked it up last night instead of studying for my anatomy exam. So now you have two views of my wonderful aquarium. After my exam on wednesday, I may put the night-vision thing back up again. I'm starting to get some hits from europe... I'm guessing all they are seeing is darkness since the aquarium light is off at that particular time.

Ta Da!

Now you can finally see that my Betta is blue! This camera is tiny... I got it from one of those places that sells stuff for law enforcement. Happy viewing!

Color camera

I ordered a color camera yesterday. This B&W is tough to watch!