Security Camera Thread - Home Solution Write Up

[MikeyCNY]

IMO your concerns are justified. Network range is a definite concern for wireless cameras and replacing batteries will be a pain. Some wireless battery cams are not too bad, triggering on only movement, but if you have a lot of people moving they'll trigger a lot more.

For a setup like this you will want to bite the bullet and get a wired install going. It will be far more reliable and less of a pain.

The outdoor ranges are (barely) close enough for PoE cabling, but you'd probably want to bury the wires..

Any experience with Lorex - 4K Security Systems, Wireless, Wire-Free & Wi-Fi Security Cameras for Sale ? I did a search and the only mention in this thread was for the wireless cameras. This package especially seems like a good deal. 4K is probably a little over kill for a gun club though..

 

[Blimey]

The outdoor ranges are (barely) close enough for PoE cabling, but you'd probably want to bury the wires..

Any experience with Lorex - 4K Security Systems, Wireless, Wire-Free & Wi-Fi Security Cameras for Sale ? I did a search and the only mention in this thread was for the wireless cameras. This package especially seems like a good deal. 4K is probably a little over kill for a gun club though..

I don’t have enough experience in this to speak much further to it

With line of sight you could extend a network with something like this: https://www.amazon.com/EZ-Bridge-Lite-EZBR-0214-Outdoor-Wireless-System/dp/B002K683V0

Not sure how it would work with a few cameras. Then have a POE switch with the cameras off it at the far location.

 

[phatfarmerbob]

Here’s what I got... I hate it ,looks horrible

 

[FrankenCub]

I plan on getting some new signs for our driveway too. Even looking horrible, I want anyone who enters our property to absolutely know they are being recorded!

 

[phatfarmerbob]

I plan on getting some new signs for our driveway too. Even looking horrible, I want anyone who enters our property to absolutely know they are being recorded!

yea my thoughts too. But I also don’t want to come home everyday and think to myself “fuck that looks like shit”

 

[FrankenCub]

yea my thoughts too. But I also don’t want to come home everyday and think to myself “fuck that looks like shit”

My driveway is like 138yds long so I wont be seeing the sign from where I'm at lol. But yeah, seeing it as you drive in kinda sucks knowing we have to go to these measures.

 

[Bob]

@NYGuns, Any input on doorbell cams?

I was gifted a Ring last week. I like the functionality of the Ring app, but unless I'm missing something, RTSP isn't available for BI integration. I'm thinking about dumping it and picking up something that'll integrate into the BI setup, but I don't know what is out there with the Ring push functionality and the ability to integrate into BI.

This is an area where I'd be willing to go with a wifi cam, because the door is also covered by a POE turret cam (albeit a different angle)

 

[NYGuns]

@NYGuns, Any input on doorbell cams?

I was gifted a Ring last week. I like the functionality of the Ring app, but unless I'm missing something, RTSP isn't available for BI integration. I'm thinking about dumping it and picking up something that'll integrate into the BI setup, but I don't know what is out there with the Ring push functionality and the ability to integrate into BI.

This is an area where I'd be willing to go with a wifi cam, because the door is also covered by a POE turret cam (albeit a different angle)

Dump it, Ring is proprietary. Remind me what cameras and system you have? Blue iris and what?

 

[Bob]

Dump it, Ring is proprietary. Remind me what cameras and system you have? Blue iris and what?

Right now, I'm Blue Iris and Hikvision POE turret cams.

 

[NYGuns]

Right now, I'm Blue Iris and Hikvision POE turret cams.

I would go with Hikvision's bell - Wi-Fi Video Doorbell Camera W/ 2 Way Audio, ONVIF Compliant, PIR Motion Sensor, Night Vision, 16GB SD Card Pre-Installed, Includes 3 Face Plates | IP Cam Talk

It also has an rtsp feed that you can record on Blue Iris.

 

[1075tech]

Admittedly, I haven't read all the posts in this thread.

I have some Samsung "wireless" cameras that I bought from Sam's club many years ago. They work decent and the night vision is decent.

Here's my problem. I cannot reset the password for the DVR. And I can't access the recording. I would much rather have a remote DVR for the actual recording.

Is there anyway I can use the receiving DVR and and then have the ability to record it somewhere else? Being able to view it live or a recording from my phone would be awesome.

Is that even a possibility or should I just ditch the whole thing and start over?

 

[NYGuns]

Admittedly, I haven't read all the posts in this thread.

I have some Samsung "wireless" cameras that I bought from Sam's club many years ago. They work decent and the night vision is decent.

Here's my problem. I cannot reset the password for the DVR. And I can't access the recording. I would much rather have a remote DVR for the actual recording.

Is there anyway I can use the receiving DVR and and then have the ability to record it somewhere else? Being able to view it live or a recording from my phone would be awesome.

Is that even a possibility or should I just ditch the whole thing and start over?

Blue Iris can do this. You can record cameras from an NVR.

 

[NYGuns]

I updated the first post a bit to reflect some newer hardware, etc. Right now I am recommending to everyone who wants to build a good system, to use this "Build a System" link. 4MP cameras (your choice of dome, turret or bullet), either an NVR or Blue Iris, wiring, etc.

 

[SonOfSun]

I host my cameras using Zoneminder on a virtualized instance on one of my local ESXI servers. I have the VM on a dedicated drive as I didn't want the utilization over iSCSI to my NAS.

I really like how ZM works with basically any RTSP camera. I have 8 cameras total currently, thinking about adding two more. I'd say hikvision cameras have been my favorite ones for the money.

 

[NYGuns]

I host my cameras using Zoneminder on a virtualized instance on one of my local ESXI servers. I have the VM on a dedicated drive as I didn't want the utilization over iSCSI to my NAS.

I really like how ZM works with basically any RTSP camera. I have 8 cameras total currently, thinking about adding two more. I'd say hikvision cameras have been my favorite ones for the money.

Have you tried Blue Iris yet? It's like ZM but on steroids.

 

[Blimey]

I just ordered one of the hikvision 4MP cameras that claims to have outrageous color images at night. It doesn't even have an IR filter.

I've not been able to see a lot of night movement to see how bad the ghosting is, but there are enough good reviews that this should work well in the spot I have for it. I'm at the end of a street with a turnaround, so this will get me good footage of everyone who turns around here. I also have a good bit of ambient lighting by the camera. It's similarly priced to 8mp (4k) cameras, but has much better night time.


Next up is either a PTZ or vari-focal camera to zoom in on a particular spot on the road to ensure I can grab plates of every vehicle that comes down the street (It's technically private but people often ignore the sign).

Partly want to stick with Hikvision (this cam in the video is a rebranded hikivision) cameras for consistency across the landscape and allowing me to use their native app. There is a 25X optical PTZ hikvision 4MP for $500 or so now that I am tempted with because 25X optical is pretty insane.

I've still never used an NVR. I like the independence of running each cam by itself, storing its data independently, though I know people love stuff like blueiris.

 

[Bob]

Has anybody tried the security cam app for Synology NAS devices?

I'm thinking about either purchasing a Synology device or building a Xpenology box for my media at home. There's no reason why I couldn't set aside a couple TB for camera storage. MyBlue Iris installation is long out of support, and I still haven't been able to get the optimal performance out of it that I'm looking for. I've actually reverted back to the motion detection and event monitoring built into the individual cameras.

 

[Blimey]

Has anybody tried the security cam app for Synology NAS devices?

I'm thinking about either purchasing a Synology device or building a Xpenology box for my media at home. There's no reason why I couldn't set aside a couple TB for camera storage. MyBlue Iris installation is long out of support, and I still haven't been able to get the optimal performance out of it that I'm looking for. I've actually reverted back to the motion detection and event monitoring built into the individual cameras.

I have not used them. There is a new version of BI. It may be better tuned than older ones. I only experimented briefly with it years back and concluded that for several cameras moving a good bit of footage I'd need a really beefy machine. I was surprised how resource heavy it was. It was just crushing my CPU streaming video. It also was a single point of failure.

At this time I have four cameras--fairly old hikvisions--that store footage on a NAS, with one on microsd. Several days video on each and then on event only I have them also dump images to an FTP server, which serves as my backup should something happen to the primary storage. Microsd storage on these is much faster for playing back footage (scrubbing) and also simpler, so all my new cameras will be microsd.

I used the hikvision thick client and it's fine but basically whenever I need to play back I either use the iphone app or just bring up internet explorer and do it there.

I think the main drawback of not using something like BI is that the motion detection on these is terrible so it needs to be tuned as hyper sensitive (BI over time gets better at detection), so I end up with gobs of extra stuff, but it's better too much than not enough, in my FTP feed of images. I wrote a small app that's been running for years that just kills off the old images, like a loop recorder, so that I never have to manually go into the FTP and remove anything.

 

[NYGuns]

I just ordered one of the hikvision 4MP cameras that claims to have outrageous color images at night. It doesn't even have an IR filter.

I've not been able to see a lot of night movement to see how bad the ghosting is, but there are enough good reviews that this should work well in the spot I have for it. I'm at the end of a street with a turnaround, so this will get me good footage of everyone who turns around here. I also have a good bit of ambient lighting by the camera. It's similarly priced to 8mp (4k) cameras, but has much better night time.


Next up is either a PTZ or vari-focal camera to zoom in on a particular spot on the road to ensure I can grab plates of every vehicle that comes down the street (It's technically private but people often ignore the sign).

Partly want to stick with Hikvision (this cam in the video is a rebranded hikivision) cameras for consistency across the landscape and allowing me to use their native app. There is a 25X optical PTZ hikvision 4MP for $500 or so now that I am tempted with because 25X optical is pretty insane.

I've still never used an NVR. I like the independence of running each cam by itself, storing its data independently, though I know people love stuff like blueiris.

These cameras are awesome. You know you can get them / everything else cheaper from here - 4MP Extreme Low Light IP w/ LED | IP Cam Talk Store

Has anybody tried the security cam app for Synology NAS devices?

I'm thinking about either purchasing a Synology device or building a Xpenology box for my media at home. There's no reason why I couldn't set aside a couple TB for camera storage. MyBlue Iris installation is long out of support, and I still haven't been able to get the optimal performance out of it that I'm looking for. I've actually reverted back to the motion detection and event monitoring built into the individual cameras.

Blue Iris crushes Synology. I have used Synology and it's okay, but not nearly as good as BI. What is wrong with your BI? Want me to remote into your system and tweak it up for you? Hit me up, i'll gladly help you.

 

[Blimey]

These cameras are awesome. You know you can get them / everything else cheaper from here - 4MP Extreme Low Light IP w/ LED | IP Cam Talk Store



Blue Iris crushes Synology. I have used Synology and it's okay, but not nearly as good as BI. What is wrong with your BI? Want me to remote into your system and tweak it up for you? Hit me up, i'll gladly help you.

I have the cam setup now and pretty happy with its night time quality.

Close to buying the 4 MP Hikvision PTZ for $200 now, to keep permanently zoomed in on the road. I can't quite get enough resolution to pull plates, and I've decided I must be able to. The 25X Hikvision PTZ is tempting but a bit much for a toy right now.

Recently I finally got around to setting up a VPN at home, so I've stopped all port forwarding (I knew it was a bad habit to begin with) on my cameras, and establish a vpn connection before remote viewing.

 

[Cleck]

@NYGuns I've been doing a lot of looking back and forth on ipct for a new low-light camera. One of mine bit the dust in a firmware episode gone bad, rip. I'm looking for a better low light option and there's so much back and forth about which one is the best. I know I don't want the one that has the LED lights in it. At some point, I'm going to mount a light right below where this camera is going, so I don't need that.

Bullet or turret doesn't matter, somewhere in the range of 2.8-4mm due to what I'm viewing (main driveway/front yard), I'm currently using a 2.8 though, but I understand for clarity, 2.8 is not the best. It's currently motorized, but I just leave it in the widest view now. Audio would have been nice, but if it's not attainable without being stupid expensive or sacrificing the other features, that's fine. It's also mounted right under my eave of my house (Cape style, so not too high). I basically just want to capture people coming up and down the driveway and walking the sidewalk/better view of the road w/o so much blurring. I had ok performance from these for a while, so I'm curious what a good camera can do.

 

[Robin]

One of my kids gave me a "Nest" security camera for mounting outside. I know nothing about these things but I would say by the quality of the packaging and unit itself, it must be a pretty good product. I will read through all the directions and put it up, get the APP, and spy on myself!
Opinions of this product are welcome.
Robin

 

[Cleck]

One of my kids gave me a "Nest" security camera for mounting outside. I know nothing about these things but I would say by the quality of the packaging and unit itself, it must be a pretty good product. I will read through all the directions and put it up, get the APP, and spy on myself!
Opinions of this product are welcome.
Robin

I recommend them to my neighbors who don't want to go all out like I did. I usually note that they're convenient, have a lot of different configurations, and it's a good way to talk them into doing cameras on their houses when they're initially wary of them, or intimidated by the tech. Not my first choice since I decided to wire everything, but these work for a lot of people, and it's better than nothing.

 

[Cleck]

As far as my search goes, I ended up going with a Dahua 5442 series because it boasted great night time performance. I don't run mine in nightvision because it's not aimed to catch cars, so I force color on it for identifying people at night better.

Here's a day shot, I'll get on and post from my pc for a night shot

 

[Cleck]

Here's a few shots at night:



I still gotta play around w/ the settings to fine-tune this, but I'd say that's a good enough picture to give a description to the police. Works for me

 

[spat]

I picked up one of these to mount out front.

I did a little fabrication and it's mounted on some conduit about 2 feet out from the corner of the roof for a better vantage point. From there it can cover about 270 degrees catching the south, west, and north of the house.

There is a blind spot immediately south of the house, and to the east that I'll have to cover with additional cameras, but this one can get nearly everywhere anyone could approach from.

With our location, you either come up the driveway, or you were doing some serious hiking/mountain climbing.

Amazon.com : Outdoor 5MP PTZ IP POE Dome Security Camera 30x Optical Zoom Pan Tilt 250FT IR Night Vision Motion Detection Remote View RTSP Audio Support 4.5inch : Camera & Photo

Amazon.com : Outdoor 5MP PTZ IP POE Dome Security Camera 30x Optical Zoom Pan Tilt 250FT IR Night Vision Motion Detection Remote View RTSP Audio Support 4.5inch : Camera & Photo

smile.amazon.com

I chose this one for the POE, and the high optical zoom and resolution.

I'll record some examples and post them later if there's interest.

 

[Cleck]

Support it with plenty of light in the areas you're watching and the quality of footage will go up

 

[Robin]

I put a Nest security camera up. It alerts to sound and movement, very cool, I can even talk to someone that sets it off, or tease the dog, Hah!
Maybe I should wait for the novelty to wear out, but right now I'm thinking about getting another one.
Robin

 

[Robin]

When I set my camera up the flag on a windy day would set it off.
i didn't get around to resetting it for over a week and by then it appeared that maybe 'Nest' had edited out that part of the cameras view. Can they do that? Trying to reset it and it doesn't seem to have the range of panorama that originally had. Of course, I'm not sure of all this, but if I am right, can I get that reset, and how?
Robin

 

[Blimey]

Been running a IPC-HFW5241E-Z12E for about a year. It's a dedicated plate cam and does an amazing job for a few hundred bucks. This picture is a sample taken yesterday late at night with no significant ambient lighting. This is cropped out of an image taken from 25 yards. Camera has a massive optical zoom so it's driven right into basically make a vehicle fill the full frame at this distance. Any high res camera can do plates at day but this thing's magic is night. The headlights don't blast out the frame and its shutter time is set so low that all it films is pure black at night until a vehicle drives in. You could walk in front of it and it would even see you.