Raccoon w 2 babies, possum, fox

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBvClS6dk2w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG04XR6eYXM

The first possum clip is just a little bit of fluorescent lighting, the second is lots of IR at 850nm (i.e. nearly invisible to the human eye, that corner of the lot appears "dark") and it does not seem to faze the possum. Rabbits do not seem distracted by it either, nor raccoons.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59yGID2qDBc

The second portion of the fox clip is a cropped view of the front driveway, as captured by an Axis HD camera with a Raymax IR illuminator (note how the grass in the lower right portion of the frame appears bright). It is interesting to me how the fox appears to "see" the IR and avoid it.

 

These are awesome! I have to know- do you review all your footage or does it only record when it senses movement?

 

Reviewing all the footage would take years. I use VitaminD, which saves clips (movement that it has determined is actual movement, not a leaf blowing in the wind) and then performs analytics to determine person vs. object. You can also set rules, say object in portion of the yard at 3AM and have it send you an email etc. This is far beyond what you can do with a DVR, and much more accurate.

http://www.vitamindinc.com/

1 channel demo is free and fully functional and easy to use, you can even hook it up to a USB camera. Kind of funny they say on the homepage now "scan hours of video in seconds". On an Intel I7 you can literally just hold down the down arrow and it will race through the video super fast - someone really did a great job with this software.

Usually anything video I associate with painfully slow to deal with (e.g. imovie on my macbook).

This all started out when I wanted a notice sent to my phone that a package had been delivered...

To save the video I simply right click and save as (to a Synology NAS in my case).

 

For example here is one of those raccoons, with a green box the software puts around it indicating an object as opposed to a person.

Also attached is the UPS guy, with a yellow box which indicates a person. I have this set up to send a picture to my cell phone.

 

very cool stuff. how much to get a sytem like that setup?

 

And do you offer consulting services???

 

http://www.broadlandshoa.org/hoaforum/showthread.php?t=22536

Anywhere from $60 (see example above) to what a normal person (non-engineer) would consider too much money...It really depends on what one wants to accomplish, and on the lighting and amount of coverage.

 

We have a long standing family tradition of free advice so ask and I'll try to help.

I approach things from a "network" aka IP camera point of view, I think the software is much more user friendly.

It's obvious by this point is that I really have had a lot of fun with Vitamin D (originally recommended to me on these forums by "Nutria"). If that did not exist I might buy Milestone "Essential", although even the free version of "Xprotect Go" is pretty cool (it's kind of like a command center) if you have a computer that can handle it. Most older computers (5 years) can only process a few cameras, the new Intel I7 is truly amazing what it can handle. The analytics with the ease of review and notifications on Vitamin D are the key thing for me though.

How do we get cameras on the network? The example above actually uses an inexpensive network camera, but has limitations e.g. does not have any night vision.

To do night vision: the best (and also the least expensive) results are still digitizing analog cameras unless you want your house to be lit up like a football field or want to spend some serious money on IR lighting. The best analog cameras are still 5-10x more light sensitive than the best IP cameras. Buy a used Axis 241S or 243 video server on ebay for $100 (converts any analog camera to a network camera). Plug the 241S into the router/switch and hook the camera up to it's input.

Bosch LTC0355 is $5 on ebay or a better camera is a Bosch LTC0495 around $100. Use the default camera settings to get started. If you're just trying to get some clips for your kids to enjoy you can set one of these in the back window and use the flood light for lighting. A fluorescent PAR works fine, or here is an example with IR:

http://www.broadlandshoa.org/hoaforum/showthread.php?t=23587

If you don't want to mess with "box" cameras which are kind are a pain to integrate around the house aesthetically you might try a bullet style or dome. Here is a good one:

http://www.broadlandshoa.org/hoaforum/showthread.php?t=25304

Recent experiments we've done are pretty amazing in terms of night vision and quality of the picture. If you're just trying to watch your car buy a CNB dome like the LKM20VF (disconnect the internal IR) and mount it above the garage door, and add some external IR. What we did with the garage was remove some of that perforated stuff, got some 6" wide 1/4" thick vinyl board and a hole saw to mount the camera. FWIW the modifications committee had no problem with that. This model has a anti-saturation feature that allows you to get plenty of light without turning the face solid white at night, this is more important though if you are trying to do the driveway and get even lighting from the garage door to the mailbox.

All these cameras mentioned run on 12VDC. One trick is that you do not need to run coax on these analog cameras, you can use cat5 and "baluns".

If you're looking to spend some money look at the Axis P3344/P3346 (they've been at it a long time, have actual support etc). The hummingbird shots I did a while back were with a P1344, the UPS guy was also an Axis camera. Axis is expensive brand but shows up on ebay sometimes. If anyone goes to Lifetime Fitness look around they have a ton of Axis cameras.

One other option out there that is probably a little easier but does not have the analytics was mentioned by "honerjo" here

http://www.broadlandshoa.org/hoaforum/showthread.php?t=24856&page=3

Hope this helps.

 

Wow, that's a ton of amazing info. I'm more of a "get the prefab system from Costco and hope I can follow the instructions well enough to get it to work" kind of person. But I think I may be able to understand this. Thanks for the info.