I want to get the Friendly Names and USB port numbers for external USB video capture devices using Python on a Windows platform. I’m using OpenCV to capture video from a USB capture device. OpenCV refers to the USB ports as “-1” (the first working camera found), “0” (for me, this is the webcam), and “1”, “2”, etc. for external USB video capture devices (EasyCap, Hauppauge USB Live-2, etc.). Here is a one-line example of connecting to the webcam in OpenCV:
cap = cv2.VideoCapture(0)
I have three external video capture devices and a webcam. Here is my code that successfully shows the friendly name of just these devices (I’m not sure this will work for every USB video capture device):
import wmi
c = wmi.WMI()
wql = "Select * From Win32_USBControllerDevice"
for item in c.query(wql):
a = item.Dependent.PNPClass
b = item.Dependent.Name.upper()
if (a.upper() == 'MEDIA' or a.upper() == 'CAMERA') and 'AUDIO' not in b:
print(item.Dependent.Name)
Results are:
Integrated Webcam
Hauppauge USB-Live2
USB TV Tuner
USB Video Device
I can print all the device information if I replace the print statement with
print(item.Dependent)
and then I get the following results:
instance of Win32_PnPEntity
{
Caption = "Integrated Webcam";
ClassGuid = "{ca3e7ab9-b4c3-4ae6-8251-579ef933890f}";
CompatibleID = {"USB\\Class_0e&SubClass_03&Prot_00", "USB\\Class_0e&SubClass_03", "USB\\Class_0e"};
ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0;
ConfigManagerUserConfig = FALSE;
CreationClassName = "Win32_PnPEntity";
Description = "USB Video Device";
DeviceID = "USB\\VID_0BDA&PID_5686&MI_00\\6&153A3DF0&0&0000";
HardwareID = {"USB\\VID_0BDA&PID_5686&REV_5729&MI_00", "USB\\VID_0BDA&PID_5686&MI_00"};
Manufacturer = "Microsoft";
Name = "Integrated Webcam";
PNPClass = "Camera";
PNPDeviceID = "USB\\VID_0BDA&PID_5686&MI_00\\6&153A3DF0&0&0000";
Present = TRUE;
Service = "usbvideo";
Status = "OK";
SystemCreationClassName = "Win32_ComputerSystem";
SystemName = "MY-LAPTOP";
};
instance of Win32_PnPEntity
{
Caption = "Hauppauge USB-Live2";
ClassGuid = "{4d36e96c-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}";
CompatibleID = {"USB\\Class_ff&SubClass_ff&Prot_ff", "USB\\Class_ff&SubClass_ff", "USB\\Class_ff"};
ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0;
ConfigManagerUserConfig = FALSE;
CreationClassName = "Win32_PnPEntity";
Description = "Hauppauge USB-Live2";
DeviceID = "USB\\VID_2040&PID_C200&MI_01\\6&19EA708B&0&0001";
HardwareID = {"USB\\VID_2040&PID_C200&REV_4001&MI_01", "USB\\VID_2040&PID_C200&MI_01"};
Manufacturer = "Hauppauge";
Name = "Hauppauge USB-Live2";
PNPClass = "MEDIA";
PNPDeviceID = "USB\\VID_2040&PID_C200&MI_01\\6&19EA708B&0&0001";
Present = TRUE;
Service = "hcw10bda";
Status = "OK";
SystemCreationClassName = "Win32_ComputerSystem";
SystemName = "MY-LAPTOP";
};
instance of Win32_PnPEntity
{
Caption = "USB TV Tuner";
ClassGuid = "{4d36e96c-e325-11ce-bfc1-08002be10318}";
CompatibleID = {"USB\\Class_FF&SubClass_00&Prot_FF", "USB\\Class_FF&SubClass_00", "USB\\Class_FF"};
ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0;
ConfigManagerUserConfig = FALSE;
CreationClassName = "Win32_PnPEntity";
Description = "USB TV Tuner";
DeviceID = "USB\\VID_1B71&PID_3002\\300000000002";
HardwareID = {"USB\\VID_1B71&PID_3002&REV_0100", "USB\\VID_1B71&PID_3002"};
Manufacturer = "Active Development Co., Ltd.";
Name = "USB TV Tuner";
PNPClass = "MEDIA";
PNPDeviceID = "USB\\VID_1B71&PID_3002\\300000000002";
Present = TRUE;
Service = "X86BDA";
Status = "OK";
SystemCreationClassName = "Win32_ComputerSystem";
SystemName = "MY-LAPTOP";
};
instance of Win32_PnPEntity
{
Caption = "USB Video Device";
ClassGuid = "{ca3e7ab9-b4c3-4ae6-8251-579ef933890f}";
CompatibleID = {"USB\\Class_0e&SubClass_03&Prot_00", "USB\\Class_0e&SubClass_03", "USB\\Class_0e"};
ConfigManagerErrorCode = 0;
ConfigManagerUserConfig = FALSE;
CreationClassName = "Win32_PnPEntity";
Description = "USB Video Device";
DeviceID = "USB\\VID_1E4E&PID_701F&MI_00\\6&3543E1D5&0&0000";
HardwareID = {"USB\\VID_1E4E&PID_701F&REV_0100&MI_00", "USB\\VID_1E4E&PID_701F&MI_00"};
Manufacturer = "Microsoft";
Name = "USB Video Device";
PNPClass = "Camera";
PNPDeviceID = "USB\\VID_1E4E&PID_701F&MI_00\\6&3543E1D5&0&0000";
Present = TRUE;
Service = "usbvideo";
Status = "OK";
SystemCreationClassName = "Win32_ComputerSystem";
SystemName = "MY-LAPTOP";
};
There must be something in these results that indicate the port that the external devices are connected to, but I don’t see it. Suggestions on how I can associate the friendly name with a port number that OpenCV recognizes?
I found a better solution than my first one. My first solution was this:
I found a solution that works great. CV-camera-finder
can be found here: cv-camera-finder.
However, this solution requires Python 3.7 and the developer archived the project and isn't responding to requests to make it compatible with later versions of Python.
NEW SOLUTION
I just now found this solution that works with Python >= 3.6. It works great! cv2-enumerate-cameras