Telescope
Use your phone as a webcam. Every lens, full manual control.
You'll also need an Android phone running Android 8 or newer. The desktop app installs the phone app for you, or you can download the APK yourself.
To your other apps, it's just a webcam
Your phone
Sends video and sound over USB or Wi‑Fi, encrypted
Your computer
Shows up as a webcam and a microphone
Your apps
Discord, Zoom, OBS, or anything else that uses a webcam
Set the camera from your desk
Pick the lens and set exposure, white balance and focus in the desktop app, live while it streams.
Set it up once, then forget about it
- Starts when you need it
- Streaming can start by itself when an app opens the camera, and stop once nothing's using it.
- Remembers each phone
- Save setups as presets, lens included, and switch between them in one click.
- Updates in one click
- Both apps tell you when there's a new version.
Setting it up
Free and open source, under the AGPL-3.0.
On Windows
Extract the zip and run TelescopeDesktop.exe. Leave it in its folder; the app needs the files next to it.
On Linux
Extract the tarball and run ./start.sh. Install v4l2loopback first, since the virtual camera runs on it:
sudo apt install v4l2loopback-dkmssudo dnf install v4l2loopbackThen follow the app
On first launch it walks you through the virtual camera, installing the phone app, and pairing. Once it streams, pick Telescope (Windows) or Phone Camera (Linux) as the camera in your other apps.
Stuck? Troubleshooting covers the common problems, and you can ask in Discussions.