Have you ever wanted to take pictures of a sprouting seedling, or watch an artist painting in slow motion, or document what went on in a teaching environment all day? Well this can be achieved with a webcam and free software.

If you are using a PC...

• download Microsoft's Webcam Timershot. (Doesn't work with Vista)
  Timershot will save all the photos into a folder of your choosing.
  To incorporate the the images into a video drop the pictures into movie maker or PhotoStory 3 and see photographs come alive.
• Visit http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/Downloads/powertoys/Xppowertoys.mspx to download Timershot.

If you are using a Mac...

• try Gawker it will take pictures in intervals with the built in iSight camera and when it's done Gawker will put all the pictures in to a Quicktime movie. Gawker will also allow the use of multiple webcams.
• Visit http://gawker.sourceforge.net/Gawker.html to find out more and/or to download Gawker.
  Example