Comment 97 for bug 290506

Maybe it's beginner's luck, but I had, seemingly, the exact same problem on a Dell Inspiron 1525 with the integrated webcam.
After hours of research, I decided switch to try to deactivate compiz and guess what? It works!
So here is step by step what I did:

1- System-->Preferences --> Appearance --> Effects --> "None" (to deactivate compiz)
2- Open Cheese and try any other webcam app. (I still have problems with Skype)
3- Jump and shout your joy (hopefully)
4- Reactivate Compiz (just select "Customized")
5- You can try again cheese to make sure it's still working, reboot and check again.

It did it for me.
Good luck