> Back to display reading, the Connectix Quickcam costs less than $100
    > and has a PIC as the interface to a PC parallel port.

    What do you know of this device?  Is it easy to process information
    from it?  Could a small micro such as a PIC do piece-wise data
    procesing based upon a snapped picture?

The interface protocol is proprietary.  Although claims say that connetix
has loosened up recently, giving specs to anyone who signs up for their
developer program and signs a non-disclosure agreement, I don't know how
much is really happening there.  I submitted an application for the
developer program, and haven't heard ANYTHING back in about a month (nor
to the email I sent two weeks ago asking what was up.)

Meanwhile, there are gnu-types trying to reverse-engineer the protocol
so that code can be distributed in source form and such without violating
the non-disclosure agreement.  I believe there's already a Linux driver,
for example.  A webcrawler search for "QuickCam" will turn up all sorts
of interesting stuff (including Connetix themselves.)

BillW