In Search of an iSight Mount
I have an iSight camera and I do find it useful (does not necessarily translate to "worth every penny"), but my biggest gripe is that none of the three mounting stands that come with it work for me. At least not as I would like them to.
Since I do not use a (external) monitor, two of the stands are out. In any case, they use adhesives, and sticking them somewhere (like on a cinema display, for example) would mean mean restricting the degrees of freedom of the camera, which may or may not be big deal to you.
I do have a PowerBook, but I was dismayed to see that if I tighten the rubber thumbwheel amply (in order to secure the camera), it leaves imprints on the PowerBook. Although it did not appear that these would be permanent, I did not feel happy about it. Moreover, it is an extra step to unmount the camera if you need to carry the PowerBook.
I looked at some of the offerings from accessory makers like Kaidan and MacMice. The "SightFlex" from MacMice looks interesting, but it hasn't begun shipping at the time of this writing. Their reputation is nothing to feel good about as well!
I attempted to create a stand of my own in the following manner: I took a thin cylindrical glass vase (bought from IKEA for $3.99) with a bigger circular disc as the base. I took a cylindrical stick of balsa wood (bought for $0.50) and painted it silver using metallic automobile touch-up paint (can't remember how much I got it for - long time ago). The stick was thinner than the vase, so if you insert it in the vase, you need to secure it somehow. I filled the empty space with glass "stones" that you can find at IKEA (worth about $0.50). Then I took one of the iSight stands attached it to the balsa wood stick, using a pointed screw. The screw went through the hole in the stand and went further into the wood, with a washer preventing it from going all the way. Click on the picture to see a bigger version. Click here to see a close up of the stick-stand attachment.
Although this "solution" turned out to be reasonable (I could vary the height by varying the number of "marbles", for example), I thought it did look a bit funny.
I noticed that Kaidan were selling a tripod adapter ($25) for the iSight that lets you use any tripod with it. You do need to buy the tripod additionally. I checked out a number of small sized tripod available at Fry's electronics, but almost all of them looked hideous. The ones that looked relatively nice were too expensive.
I was strolling in Valley Fair the other day and went into the Apple Store to look at, well, nothing. I saw the Canon mini-tripod they sell for $24.95, and it looked pretty decent. I felt fairly certain that I should be able to attach the iSight's plastic mounting stand to this tripod without the need for an additional adapter. It does appear though that Kaidan is selling the same (or similar) mini-tripod for $9.95! Oh well.
Here is the final situation. The attachment is very secure, there are as many degrees of freedom as I would like, the color of the tripod more or less matches the iSight, and there is no fooling around with adhesive. In fact, I peeled off the layer of adhesive from the bottom disc of the plastic stand. You can click on the picture to zoom in.
The conclusion of the story is that it seems feasible to attach the iSight's plastic mounting stand to almost any tripod, without the need for an additional mounting adapter.