The delay! Or: A document camera named William.
Wall of Shame entry #...eh, lost count.
As some of you might remember, I work for an educational institution. We are under-going some major construction, and renovations, which means, fortunately, some new technology as well.
We provided the new large instructional building with laptops, smart projectors (no, not SMART, but smart...Epson actually), and small form factor document cameras. Some nice tech, but of course they scrimped on the specs for the laptops and doc cams, despite my objections.
Fast forward to the classrooms being in use: ONE instructor begins complaining about the very poor quality of the document cameras (not really THAT bad, but it combination of things). So we go about troubleshooting her complaints.
Complaint 1: The delay from the camera to the projected image is insanely long, VERY distracting. Complaint 2: The words on the paper are hardly legible using this camera, can we get one with zoom? Complaint 3: I can't get my whole paper to fit on the screen at once. (Yeah, ok, didn't you just complain you can't zoom?)
So down to troubleshooting:
1. Yeah, you're right, that delay is MADDENING, WTF?!? Well, due to the requirement that ALL video MUST go through the computer so it CAN be recorded, if they WANT to, that's causing the poor little laptop some major video distress (TOLD you we wanted better equipment).
2. There's this zoom button right here...even says "ZOOM". Seems to work, even auto-focuses. If you felt qualified at all you might...I dunno...try flipping the switch to "On".
3. Ah, the arm wasn't fully extended, NOW it all fits on the screen.
What to do about #1? Well, we need more hoss. Let's try desktops. Yep, issue fixed. So we deploy desktops to replace the laptops, like I wanted in the first place. All done!
Complaint: It's not CLEAR! The image is blurry!
Ugh...oooook, well, that camera can't get clearer, so lets try a few different models. Here's the best one. Give us your feedback, please.
Couple months go by, no feedback. So we take that as all is well and we order one to keep and replace the low end model for that instructor's main classroom.
Complaint: There's delay! I can't stand the delay!
Ok, maybe the better camera...uh, what delay? Ma'am, please show us what you mean about "delay".
> Complaint Teacher (CT): See when I write like this: (proceeds to write like a damn maniac, faster than anyone I've EVER witnessed). There's delay still.
> Me: Yeah, well, ok. I can't do anything about that. Try to slow down your writing a bit. See, there's no delay when I write. (normal writing produces normal display, albeit you CAN see a few milliseconds delay, just because it has to go through the computer first).
> CT: But last cam-era worked much better when computer put in. (she's not from the US, so when she gets flustered, we get slightly broken English, and a MUCH thicker accent)
> Me: But that one wasn't clear enough for you? Plus this one has better zoom, and sees the text on those printed pages you needed.
> CT: Ah, well, when you put in new computer, that mostly went away.
...Thanks for letting us know. But....
> Me: what about the fuzzy picture?
> CT: Well, that was not as bad.
Ugh, fine. So we go about digging up the other camera we put in the store room. Before I can have one of my techs put it back, she apparently has a conversation with my VP about how horrible the document camera is. Keep in mind, I keep him in the loop on this the whole way, so he know what lengths we went through to please this ONE person. He talks with me, and we decide we'll hold off on putting the old one back in, while he has a meeting with CT and her supervisor about living with it, because we've tried literally EVERYTHING we possibly can while still fulfilling the project requirements.
TL;DR: low-end document camera isn't good enough for an instructor...but neither is the high-end one.