title: Webcam DirectShow Properties Page in Python
body: <p>I'm working on a windows Python 2.7 application that needs to communicate with many different USB webcams.  I have been using OpenCV, but for some scientific webcams, the default frame rate, capture format, etc. aren't detected and I get only a blank image.  An external program that can open DirectShow properties pages can fix this in my program, but I'd like to have this feature in my application.</p>
  
  <p>I have tried one available Python library to do this: VideoCapture (http://videocapture.sourceforge.net/).  While this opens property pages, it doesn't allow changing any device settings ("Error Connecting... This format is not currently available", but AMCAP works).  I'm wondering if the underlying code is too out of date.</p>
  
  <p>Playing with the C++ code in VideoCapture or videoInput (http://www.muonics.net/school/spring05/videoInput/) isn't very helpful since they both rely on old libraries spread across numerous old, specific DirectX/WindowsSDK packages.  Unfortunately, I don't have the knowledge or time to start from scratch or to figure out what's wrong with VideoCapture.</p>
  
  <p>Is there another already assembled Python package out there that can do this?  I've been searching for a while now with little luck.  I looked a little at libvlc python bindings (since VLC can access the property pages) and DirectPython, but it isn't clear to me that these have what I'm looking for.</p>
  
  <p>Thanks!</p>