[TriLUG] tcpdumping a wifi connection

[Brian via TriLUG]

Hi Group,

Is there a relatively painless way to capture the traffic between camera 
and app? Do typical approaches like arp-poisoning work on wifi?

Not so long ago, I picked up some Chinese wifi-enabled pinhole cameras. 
("HD waterproof" turned out to be 640x480 and a PCB with shrink-tube 
around it...caveat emptor...fortunately my only real requirement was 
"cheap")

As is often the case with brandless electronics, documentation ranges 
from a joke (indecipherable engrish) to completely nonexistent.

Out of the box, it only works by way of a specific smartphone app.  I 
doubt it's doing anything proprietary underneath, but I don't know how 
to sniff it since it serves as the access point itself (and, so far, 
does not associate with other WAPs as it claims it can).  If I can 
figure out what codec it speaks, I could do something useful with it...

Thanks!
-Brian