Telescope 3.3.1

A small desktop update for the Browser camera page: it can now turn the screen black while it streams, and it's a lot nicer to use sideways.

New

Black screen. The new button on the page turns everything black while the camera keeps streaming. That saves battery and screen life on phones with an OLED screen. On Android it also goes full screen, so the status and navigation bars disappear too. Double tap to get the page back. A single tap only shows a hint with the connection status for a few seconds, so bumping the phone on its stand won't wake it. iPhones don't let web pages go full screen so there it opens a black video in the iPhone's own player instead, and closing the player brings the page back. This is an experimental workaround and I don't actually have an iPhone to test it on so please report any issues if you encounter them.

Changed

• The buttons on the page got icons. Holding the phone sideways moves them to a column on the right, next to the preview instead of under it.
• The header on the page is gone to give the preview more room. The status dot now sits in front of the status line.
• If the phone drops the page's hold on keeping the screen on (battery saver can do that), the page asks for it again.

Browser camera works best in Chrome from my experience. Firefox works too but might stream in JPEG instead of H.264 and the aspect ratio of the camera is sometimes wrong.

The phone app has no changes in this release.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Nightly

Telescope 3.3.1 nightly 535, built from 8413f1e.

Rolling pre-release, rebuilt from every push to master. Stable releases are the ones tagged v*.

File	What it is
Telescope-windows.zip	Windows. Extract and run TelescopeDesktop.exe, keeping it in its folder. Includes adb, UnityCapture and the phone app.
Telescope-linux.tar.gz	Linux. Extract and run ./start.sh, which installs the Python dependencies and launches. Includes the phone app.
Telescope.apk	Android app.
manifest.json	Version and checksums, read by the apps' update check.

Telescope 3.3.0

Telescope 3.3 can stream several cameras at once, stream from a browser when there's no Android phone at hand, and turn the camera off while the mic keeps going. Update both the desktop and the phone app.

New

Several cameras at once. While one stream runs, the + next to Stop starts another phone or browser, up to four. Each one gets its own virtual camera (Phone Camera 2 to 4 on Linux, Telescope #2 to #4 on Windows), and a row of tiles shows what's streaming where. Click a tile to change its settings. A phone gets the same virtual camera as last time when it's free, so for example OBS scenes keep pointing at the right one.

Browser camera. Stream from an iPhone, a tablet or another laptop, with nothing to install. Pick Browser camera in the phone picker, scan the code on its card and tap Start on the page. The browser's mic works too. The browser often warns that the connection isn't private, because Telescope makes its own certificate. Just tap Advanced (Show Details on iPhone) and go on to the page. If you would like to learn why that happens, see Browser camera for the details.

Mic only. The camera button under the preview turns the phone's camera off while keeping the mic streaming. During that, apps viewing the camera see the wait screen. Press it before Start to get Start mic only. With the mic on, Automatic streaming now only turns the camera off when apps stop using it, so a call that switched its camera off still hears you.

Changed

• The tray icon shows what's live: a red dot for the camera, a mic for the mic (crossed out when muted).
• A stream that stays gone for 10 seconds shows the wait screen instead of a frozen frame, and after 30 seconds a banner says which phone it can't reach.
• When battery or temperature stops a stream, the window says why and gives an option to Start anyway.
• Picking another phone in the picker mid-stream switches the stream to it.
• After reinstalling the phone app, pairing it again asks whether it's the same phone and keeps its old settings.
• The ? next to Add phone opens the setup checklist again.
• The Linux launcher always needed Python 3.11 or newer but now it clearly says that instead of just failing.

Fixed

A lot of bugs, mostly around streams starting, stopping and switching:

• When another app on the phone takes the camera the stream waits for it instead of failing.
• Changing Connect via mid-stream checks the phone answers that way before moving the stream.
• ISO, shutter, exposure and focus stay within what the lens can do, and a setting that didn't reach the phone gets sent again.
• On Light, the resolution list only offers sizes the phone's encoder takes.
• Updating: a logout during the first start no longer counts as a failed update. A rolled-back update notifies you about it, and a new version waits for the old one to let go of its port.
• A damaged config file no longer resets your settings silently. Telescope keeps a copy and shows you where to find it.
• Two users on one Linux machine can each run Telescope.
• A long computer name no longer breaks Add phone.
• Phone app: buttons grow with a larger font size and Remove no longer touches its neighbour in right-to-left languages.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.2.0

Telescope 3.2 makes your microphone behave better. The phone picks you up from across the desk now, and the Microphone card got a meter, mute, gain and a limiter.

New

Louder phone mic. The phone used to record the way a phone call does, tuned for a phone at your mouth, so from a desk away it came through very quiet. It now records the way the camera app does for video. Update the phone app to get this.

Level meter. The Microphone card shows how loud the mic is while it's on and streaming. A line holds the latest peak for a moment, and the dot at the end lights up when something gets too loud: yellow when the limiter catches it, red when it clips. Click the meter to clear them.

Mute. A Mute button in the card's header sends silence to other apps without disconnecting the mic, for when the call app can't mute or it's out of reach. It's in the tray menu too, as Mute microphone. Telescope always starts unmuted, so you can't end up muted without noticing.

Gain. Turn the mic up to +12 dB or down to -24 dB with the slider, or type an exact value in the box next to it. It's saved per phone. Advanced lets the slider go further, up to +24, +36 or +48 dB.

Limiter. Laughs, coughs and other sudden loud bits are held just under the top smoothly instead of crackling. It's on by default; switch it off under Microphone in Advanced.

Fixed

• Advanced no longer grows taller than the screen. The settings scroll, and Close stays where you can reach it.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.1.3

A small desktop update: the main window now makes it clearer what to do first.

Changed

• Until a phone is paired, every card except Connection is faded out and can't be clicked. Before, a fresh install showed Camera, Transforms, Stream output and the rest fully lit, even though none of their controls do anything without a phone. They light up as soon as you pair one.

The phone app has no changes in this release.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.1.2

Telescope 3.1.2 makes both apps safer to use. Update the phone app and the desktop together.

• Local only now really means local only. With it on, your camera can only be started over the USB cable, never over Wi-Fi.
• Windows: a safer camera driver. The driver now lives in Program Files, where other programs can't tamper with it. If you set it up with an older version, open Advanced and click Reinstall once. Your camera keeps working until you do.
• Linux: your settings stay yours. Other accounts on the same computer can't read your Telescope settings or your virtual mic's audio anymore.
• Pairing is harder to disrupt. While Add phone is open, other devices on your network can't jam it.

Also fixed: on Windows, a driver install that failed could still say "Installed".

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.1.1

Three fixes: automatic streaming on Windows, a "Can't keep up" note that showed up when nothing was wrong, and dropdowns that opened cut short. The Temperature and Tint sliders also stop sticking.

Changed

• The Temperature and Tint sliders no longer stick to set spots. Sticking helps where you often want one exact value, but white balance is a correction that depends on the room and the light, and there's no universal answer to which setting is right. Double-click still puts them back to 5500 K and 0.

Fixed

• With Stop streaming set to "When no app uses the camera, even if I started it", a stream you started yourself never stopped if no app had opened the camera since Telescope launched. It now stops after the wait, the same as it does once an app has used the camera.
• The "Can't keep up" note could pop up right after starting a stream, switching lenses or changing the resolution or FPS, while the phone was still getting its camera going. Telescope now waits until frames are coming in again, plus a couple of seconds, before it judges the connection. If the phone still isn't sending properly after 10 seconds, the note shows as before.
• The phone picker and other dropdowns could open showing only one item when the window sat near the top of the screen and a lower item was selected. They now move down to fit instead of getting cut short.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.1.0

Telescope 3.1 is about Light (H.264) keeping up with your connection. There's a new Dynamic bitrate that follows your Wi-Fi, Telescope tells you when the stream falls behind and what to try, and a batch of fixes on top of 3.0.

New

Dynamic bitrate. Drag the Light bitrate slider all the way right for Dynamic: the phone sends as much as your connection carries, and lowers it within a second or two when it can't keep up, before the video starts to lag. A short Wi-Fi hiccup doesn't count. It climbs back on its own and settles instead of bouncing. Update the phone app too, since an older one uses Auto instead.

Higher bitrates. The Light bitrate slider now goes up to 100 Mbps, up from 30. Auto still stays at most 30 Mbps, and some phones' encoders top out lower.

"Can't keep up" note. When frames keep arriving well under the target rate, the Mbps readout turns amber and a note suggests what to try, with a Switch to Light button on Heavy or Switch to Dynamic on Light. It goes away once the stream catches up, and it stays quiet when the phone's camera is what's slow (like in dim light) rather than the connection.

FPS dropdown. FPS is now a dropdown with 15, 24, 25, 30, 48 and 60. Rates the camera doesn't list are grayed out, so a phone that tops out at 30 can't be asked for 60. The graying needs the updated phone app.

Fixed

• The lens dot could go red while on the telephoto after sliding the zoom back and forth quickly.
• The FPS readout counted repeated frames the desktop sends to keep the webcam alive, so 30 fps from the phone could show as 42. It now counts frames from the phone.
• Light now sets the camera up as a video recording at the FPS you pick, which some phones need before they run 60. Some phone makers still hold other apps to 30; see troubleshooting in the docs.
• A size the phone can't encode on Light (4:3 4K is too much for most phones) now stops with a note to try a lower resolution or FPS, or Switch to Heavy. Before, it jumped to Heavy by itself, which at that size can need hundreds of Mbps.
• After Light failed on the phone, falling back to Heavy could fail too because the camera wasn't ready yet. It now waits and tries again.
• You can pick a resolution and FPS while stopped, and the phone starts at it. Before, after a size the phone couldn't do, it kept reopening at that size on every start.
• A setting change that doesn't reach the phone the first time is sent again for a few seconds instead of getting lost.
• When a stream drops, the desktop keeps checking why while it reconnects, so a size the phone can't do still gets its note instead of a silent stop.
• The readout could turn amber on a stream that was fine, when frames arrived in bursts.
• Updates: checking with no internet behind your Wi-Fi now says the check failed instead of "up to date", and a download cut short no longer breaks the desktop updater.
• Tooltips show sooner, wrap long lines, stay put while you hover them, and say less.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 3.0.0

Telescope 3.0 is the biggest update so far. Your phone can now be your computer's microphone too, Telescope can stream only while a call actually needs the camera, and from here on both apps update themselves.

Before you upgrade from 2.3

This one takes a couple of minutes by hand. After that, updates are one click.

• Uninstall the old phone app first. 3.0 is signed differently, so Android won't install it over 2.3. Uninstall Telescope on the phone, then install the new Telescope.apk.
• Pair your phone again. Pairing works differently now (see below), so old pairings don't carry over. Neither do the settings 2.3 kept per phone: camera, resolution and FPS, flip and zoom, and the battery and temperature alerts. The virtual camera size in Advanced carries over.
• Windows: Telescope now comes as a folder instead of a single exe. Extract the whole zip somewhere permanent and run TelescopeDesktop.exe from inside it. You can delete the old exe.
• Windows: the webcam is now called Telescope in other apps. If it still shows the old name, open Advanced and click Rename.

New

Your phone as a microphone. Turn on Microphone and the phone's mic shows up on your computer as "Telescope Microphone". On Windows this needs the free VB-Cable driver, and Telescope links you to it.

Automatic streaming. Telescope can start the stream by itself when Discord, OBS, Zoom or anything else opens the camera, or as soon as your phone is ready, and stop it once nothing has used the camera for a while. Your phone doesn't have to run the camera all day. You pick when it starts, when it stops and how long it waits, under Automatic streaming in the settings menu. Telescope can also open by itself when you sign in.

Wait for my computer. Turn this on in the phone app and your computer can start the stream even while the phone is locked or the app is closed. It's off by default, and a notification shows while it's waiting.

Wait screen. Apps now see a proper picture while nothing is streaming, instead of a frozen frame or black. Use the default one or pick your own image or GIF, and mirror it if it comes out backwards.

Updates. The desktop and phone apps check for updates at launch and let you install them in one click. If an update gets cut short or the new version won't start, Telescope goes back to the one that worked. With the phone plugged in, the desktop can update the phone app over USB.

Presets. Save your camera, zoom and output settings as a preset and switch between them in one click, even mid-stream. Each phone keeps its own.

Better zoom. Zoom now happens on the phone's sensor, not by cropping on the computer, so the picture stays sharper. On phones with several lenses, Auto switches to the telephoto when your framing fits in it. Dots on the zoom slider show where each lens takes over, and a small dot next to the zoom value shows which lens you're on.

Pan and zoom in the preview. Scroll over the preview to zoom, drag to pan, and click anywhere to focus there.

Light and Heavy formats. Light (H.264) is the new default: it sends a fraction of the data, so it keeps up even on slower Wi-Fi, and looks the same unless there's fast motion. Heavy (the old MJPEG stream) is sharper in fast motion, but needs USB or strong Wi-Fi.

Encrypted connection. Everything between the phone and the computer is now encrypted, and locked to the computer you paired with.

Easier to set up and use

• A setup checklist walks you through the virtual camera, the phone app and pairing on first launch.
• Pair over Wi-Fi by scanning a QR code, or just plug the phone in over USB. One phone can pair with several computers.
• Telescope picks USB or Wi-Fi by itself and tells you which one it's using. If a cable is plugged in but not being used, it tells you why.
• If the stream drops, Telescope keeps looking for the phone over every route, so pulling the cable carries on over Wi-Fi.
• When something stops a stream from starting, a banner in the window says what's wrong and gives you a button to fix it.
• The phone app asks for permissions in one setup card instead of a pile of prompts at launch, and it's trimmed down to what the computer doesn't already control.
• Telescope can stop the stream when the phone's battery runs low or it gets too hot. Each alert has its own switch for the notification and for stopping.
• On Linux, the virtual camera asks for your password once, not every time. Telescope also shows up in the app menu.
• Copy diagnostics on both apps gives you a report to paste into a bug report, without your addresses or pairing codes.

Fixed

• Much lower delay, and 4K on Heavy (MJPEG) now keeps up.
• The phone showing as unreachable even though it worked over USB (#13).
• Terminal windows popping up over and over on Windows (#26).
• Screen flashing in some apps when they opened the camera on Windows.
• The Windows app starting slowly.
• One bad value in the settings file stopping Telescope from starting at all.
• The phone app getting stuck in a half-stopped stream after another app took the camera.
• Switching lens in manual exposure quietly changing ISO and shutter speed.
• On Linux, start.sh only goes online when dependencies change, and a failed install no longer stops Telescope from opening.
• Both apps now recover by themselves from stuck states, like a phone stuck starting or a camera failing mid-stream, instead of needing a restart.
• Lots of smaller fixes around connecting, pairing and saving settings.

Found something broken? Open an issue and paste your Copy diagnostics report into it.

Telescope 2.3

New

• Rebuilt the desktop UI around a three-column layout with a shared app icon and less redundant chrome; window now survives resizing and narrowing.
• Start and stop the phone's camera directly from the desktop, with resolution and FPS driven from the phone's actual supported sizes and a live throughput/status readout.
• Auto-pair USB devices over adb, with a real pairing-status indicator, retryable USB pairing, and QR pairing over USB when there's no usable LAN path.
• Added a "Copy Diagnostics" action for support requests (app/device info only, never the pairing token or config).
• All phone communication is now authenticated with a per-device token instead of being open on the network; the token is also excluded from Android backups/transfers.

Fixed

• Preview no longer squishes or stretches on resize/rotation, and closes automatically when the phone's screen turns off without a lock screen.
• Low battery is now detected even when a weak charger can't keep up.
• Fixed several pairing/reconnect races: double-start, stale queued controls, a paired device losing its selection after restart, and controls not resending after a mid-stream reconnect.
• Fixed a packaging conflict between OpenCV and PyQt6 on desktop, and the tray icon not fully quitting the app after a hide/show cycle.
• Config is now backed up before being reset on corruption, and failed saves surface a notification instead of failing silently.

Other

• Relicensed from CC BY-NC 4.0 to AGPL-3.0.
• Plugins now go through a public, typed HostServices API instead of reaching into private desktop internals.
• Quick Start guide and README rewritten for clarity, including corrected Linux adb dependencies.