he gave me a quote of $2300 canadian. that includes the NVR and 3 cameras, but he's given me another camera option which I have to look at first. but I did notice that the depth of field of this camera is a little over 3m. so that might be fine for an overview of the property, but it won't be good for a camera at the entrance of the house. so I have to talk to him about that. I will also look into getting a better NVR because I think the combination of camera and NVR won't give me 4k video with 30fps which is what i'm hoping for. I think he said he uses cat 6 cables for outdoor use, but I'll have to double check.
he gave me a quote of $2300 canadian. that includes the NVR and 3 cameras, but he's given me another camera option which I have to look at first. but I did notice that the depth of field of this camera is a little over 3m. so that might be fine for an overview of the property, but it won't be good for a camera at the entrance of the house. so I have to talk to him about that. I will also look into getting a better NVR because I think the combination of camera and NVR won't give me 4k video with 30fps which is what i'm hoping for. I think he said he uses cat 6 cables for outdoor use, but I'll have to double check.
$2,300 will barely cover the NVR, cameras, cables, etc. and labor associated with running the cables and slapping the cameras on the wall.
Where is the cost to dial in the cameras to their field of view and ongoing support?
I think you need to have it very explicitly outlined what is covered (day and night tuning of the cameras, etc.) or you will get the typical trunk slammer experience.
4K and 30FPS is way overkill and will probably be on less than ideal sensors.
Where is the cost to dial in the cameras to their field of view and ongoing support?
I think you need to have it very explicitly outlined what is covered (day and night tuning of the cameras, etc.) or you will get the typical trunk slammer experience.
4K and 30FPS is way overkill and will probably be on less than ideal sensors.
Most here feel 4MP on the 1/1.8" sensor is the sweet spot.
Many of the 8MP cameras suffer from limited focus distance in the 15-18 foot range and anything shorter or further is soft/blurry. Plus most of them don't see infrared so you need white light.
Shutter speed is more important than FPS. I capture plates at 8FPS and the plate is in and out of the field of view in about a half second (so I capture 4 frames) because I am using the correct shutter speed for the task at hand.
Movies for the movie theater are shot at 24FPS. I think 15 is adequate for our little monitors LOL.
And because the data for the image is stored in KB/s, the more frames per second you use, the less data available per frame. See this thread.
As an example, what about a camera that maxes out bitrate at 8,192 KB/s:
60FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 136KB per frame
30FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 273KB per frame
15FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 546 KB per frame - or double the KB data at 30FPS or four times the data amount at 60FPS! So you essentially degrade the image running higher FPS. And with a lot of motion, that could essentially render a 12MP image more like 3MP to 8MP image at 60FPS.
Sure 30FPS can provide a smoother video but no police officer has said "wow that person really is running smooth". They want the ability to freeze frame and get a clean image. So be it if the video is a little choppy....and at 10-15FPS it won't be appreciable. My neighbor runs his at 30FPS, so the person or car goes by looking smooth, but it is a blur when trying to freeze frame it because the camera can't keep up. Meanwhile my camera at 15FPS with the proper shutter speed gets the clean shots.
We wouldn't take these cameras to an NBA game to broadcast, nor would we take the cameras they use at an NBA game to put on a house. Not all cameras are alike and the approach of "a camera is a camera" mentality will result in failure. Another example, I can watch an MLB game and they can slow it down to see the stitching on the baseball. Surveillance cams are not capable of that regardless of the FPS you run.
We are not making Hollywood movies. Nor do these operate like Go-Pro's with slow motion effects by running higher FPS.
Watch these, for most of us, it isn't annoying until below 10FPS
Many of the 8MP cameras suffer from limited focus distance in the 15-18 foot range and anything shorter or further is soft/blurry. Plus most of them don't see infrared so you need white light.
Shutter speed is more important than FPS. I capture plates at 8FPS and the plate is in and out of the field of view in about a half second (so I capture 4 frames) because I am using the correct shutter speed for the task at hand.
Movies for the movie theater are shot at 24FPS. I think 15 is adequate for our little monitors LOL.
And because the data for the image is stored in KB/s, the more frames per second you use, the less data available per frame. See this thread.
As an example, what about a camera that maxes out bitrate at 8,192 KB/s:
60FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 136KB per frame
30FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 273KB per frame
15FPS at 8,192 KB/s bitrate is 546 KB per frame - or double the KB data at 30FPS or four times the data amount at 60FPS! So you essentially degrade the image running higher FPS. And with a lot of motion, that could essentially render a 12MP image more like 3MP to 8MP image at 60FPS.
Sure 30FPS can provide a smoother video but no police officer has said "wow that person really is running smooth". They want the ability to freeze frame and get a clean image. So be it if the video is a little choppy....and at 10-15FPS it won't be appreciable. My neighbor runs his at 30FPS, so the person or car goes by looking smooth, but it is a blur when trying to freeze frame it because the camera can't keep up. Meanwhile my camera at 15FPS with the proper shutter speed gets the clean shots.
We wouldn't take these cameras to an NBA game to broadcast, nor would we take the cameras they use at an NBA game to put on a house. Not all cameras are alike and the approach of "a camera is a camera" mentality will result in failure. Another example, I can watch an MLB game and they can slow it down to see the stitching on the baseball. Surveillance cams are not capable of that regardless of the FPS you run.
We are not making Hollywood movies. Nor do these operate like Go-Pro's with slow motion effects by running higher FPS.
Watch these, for most of us, it isn't annoying until below 10FPS
Wow, you blew my mind! I never thought of the fact that the video would need to be paused and that image needs to be clear. So what is a good shutter speed to have on these cameras? And also I'm concerned with the depth of field (not the field of view) on the camera i mentioned. It has a depth of field of about 3 meters or a bit higher. From a photography stand stand point, that means anyone that is within 3 meters of the camera will not be in focus. So in this case, i figure this camera is not suitable for a front entrance to the house cause anyone there is easily within 3 meters of the camera. Is this the case with security cameras? Am i worried about nothing?
Contrary to popular belief, these cameras are not infinity focus cameras.
But some cameras do better than others and some cameras do worse than others.
That is why it is important to select the right camera for the location and goal.
That is one of the reason why varifocal cameras are recommended in that we can adjust the focus to the location we are targeting.
You need to get the correct camera for the area trying to be covered. A wide angle 2.8mm to IDENTIFY someone 40 feet away is the wrong camera regardless of how good the camera is. A 2.8mm camera to IDENTIFY someone within 10 feet is a good choice OR it is an overview camera to see something happened but not be able to identify who.
One camera cannot be the be all, see all. Each one is selected for covering a specific area. Most of us here have different brands and types, from fixed cams, to varifocals, to PTZs, each one selected for it's primary purpose and to utilize the strength of that particular camera.
So you will need to identify the distance the camera would be from the activities you want to IDENTIFY on and purchase the correct camera for that distance as an optical zoom.
If you want to see things far away, you need optical zoom, digital zoom only works in the movies and TV...And the optical zoom is done real time - for a varifocal it is a set it and forget it. You cannot go to recorded video and optically zoom in later, at that point it is digital zoom, and the sensors on these cameras are so small which is why digital zoom doesn't work very well after the fact.
In terms of getting the most out of the camera, here is my "standard" post that many use as a start for dialing in day and night that helps get the clean captures and help the camera recognize people and cars.
Start with:
H264
8192 bitrate
CBR
15FPS
15 iframes
Every field of view is different, but I have found you need contrast to usually be 6-8 higher than the brightness number at night.
We want the ability to freeze frame capture a clean image from the video at night, and that is only done with a shutter of 1/60 or faster (1/120 or faster is better). At night, default/auto may be on 1/12s shutter or worse to make the image bright.
In my opinion, shutter (exposure) and gain are the two most important parameters and then base the others off of it. Shutter is more important than FPS. It is the shutter speed that prevents motion blur, not FPS. 15 FPS is more than enough for surveillance cameras as we are not producing Hollywood movies. Match iframes to FPS. 15FPS is all that is usually needed.
Many people do not realize there is manual shutter that lets you adjust shutter and gain and a shutter priority that only lets you adjust shutter speed but not gain. The higher the gain, the bigger the noise and see-through ghosting start to appear because the noise is amplified. Most people select shutter priority and run a faster shutter than they should because it is likely being done at 100 gain, so it is actually defeating their purpose of a faster shutter.
Go into shutter settings and change to manual shutter and start with custom shutter as ms and change to 0-8.3ms and gain 0-50 (night) and 0-4ms exposure and 0-30 gain (day)for starters. Auto could have a shutter speed of 100ms or more with a gain at 100 and shutter priority could result in gain up at 100 which will contribute to significant ghosting and that blinding white you will get from the infrared or white light.
Now what you will notice immediately at night is that your image gets A LOT darker. That faster the shutter, the more light that is needed. But it is a balance. The nice bright night static image results in Casper blur and ghost during motion LOL. What do we want, a nice static image or a clean image when there is motion introduced to the scene?
In the daytime, if it is still too bright, then drop the 4ms down to 3ms then 2ms, etc. You have to play with it for your field of view.
Then at night, if it is too dark, then start adding ms to the time. Go to 10ms, 12ms, etc. until you find what you feel is acceptable as an image. Then have someone walk around and see if you can get a clean shot. Try not to go above 16.67ms (but certainly not above 30ms) as that tends to be the point where blur starts to occur. Conversely, if it is still bright, then drop down in time to get a faster shutter.
You can also adjust brightness and contrast to improve the image. But try not to go above 70 for anything and try to have contrast be at least 7-10 digits higher than brightness.
You can also add some gain to brighten the image - but the higher the gain, the more ghosting you get. Some cameras can go to 70 or so before it is an issue and some can't go over 50.
But adjusting those two settings will have the biggest impact. The next one is noise reduction. Want to keep that as low as possible. Depending on the amount of light you have, you might be able to get down to 40 or so at night (again camera dependent) and 20-30 during the day, but take it as low as you can before it gets too noisy. Again this one is a balance as well. Too smooth and no noise can result in soft images and contribute to blur.
Do not use backlight features until you have exhausted every other parameter setting. And if you do have to use backlight, take it down as low as possible.
After every setting adjustment, have someone walk around outside and see if you can freeze-frame to get a clean image. If not, keep changing until you do. Clean motion pictures are what we are after, not a clean static image.
But some cameras do better than others and some cameras do worse than others.
That is why it is important to select the right camera for the location and goal.
That is one of the reason why varifocal cameras are recommended in that we can adjust the focus to the location we are targeting.
You need to get the correct camera for the area trying to be covered. A wide angle 2.8mm to IDENTIFY someone 40 feet away is the wrong camera regardless of how good the camera is. A 2.8mm camera to IDENTIFY someone within 10 feet is a good choice OR it is an overview camera to see something happened but not be able to identify who.
One camera cannot be the be all, see all. Each one is selected for covering a specific area. Most of us here have different brands and types, from fixed cams, to varifocals, to PTZs, each one selected for it's primary purpose and to utilize the strength of that particular camera.
So you will need to identify the distance the camera would be from the activities you want to IDENTIFY on and purchase the correct camera for that distance as an optical zoom.
If you want to see things far away, you need optical zoom, digital zoom only works in the movies and TV...And the optical zoom is done real time - for a varifocal it is a set it and forget it. You cannot go to recorded video and optically zoom in later, at that point it is digital zoom, and the sensors on these cameras are so small which is why digital zoom doesn't work very well after the fact.
In terms of getting the most out of the camera, here is my "standard" post that many use as a start for dialing in day and night that helps get the clean captures and help the camera recognize people and cars.
Start with:
H264
8192 bitrate
CBR
15FPS
15 iframes
Every field of view is different, but I have found you need contrast to usually be 6-8 higher than the brightness number at night.
We want the ability to freeze frame capture a clean image from the video at night, and that is only done with a shutter of 1/60 or faster (1/120 or faster is better). At night, default/auto may be on 1/12s shutter or worse to make the image bright.
In my opinion, shutter (exposure) and gain are the two most important parameters and then base the others off of it. Shutter is more important than FPS. It is the shutter speed that prevents motion blur, not FPS. 15 FPS is more than enough for surveillance cameras as we are not producing Hollywood movies. Match iframes to FPS. 15FPS is all that is usually needed.
Many people do not realize there is manual shutter that lets you adjust shutter and gain and a shutter priority that only lets you adjust shutter speed but not gain. The higher the gain, the bigger the noise and see-through ghosting start to appear because the noise is amplified. Most people select shutter priority and run a faster shutter than they should because it is likely being done at 100 gain, so it is actually defeating their purpose of a faster shutter.
Go into shutter settings and change to manual shutter and start with custom shutter as ms and change to 0-8.3ms and gain 0-50 (night) and 0-4ms exposure and 0-30 gain (day)for starters. Auto could have a shutter speed of 100ms or more with a gain at 100 and shutter priority could result in gain up at 100 which will contribute to significant ghosting and that blinding white you will get from the infrared or white light.
Now what you will notice immediately at night is that your image gets A LOT darker. That faster the shutter, the more light that is needed. But it is a balance. The nice bright night static image results in Casper blur and ghost during motion LOL. What do we want, a nice static image or a clean image when there is motion introduced to the scene?
In the daytime, if it is still too bright, then drop the 4ms down to 3ms then 2ms, etc. You have to play with it for your field of view.
Then at night, if it is too dark, then start adding ms to the time. Go to 10ms, 12ms, etc. until you find what you feel is acceptable as an image. Then have someone walk around and see if you can get a clean shot. Try not to go above 16.67ms (but certainly not above 30ms) as that tends to be the point where blur starts to occur. Conversely, if it is still bright, then drop down in time to get a faster shutter.
You can also adjust brightness and contrast to improve the image. But try not to go above 70 for anything and try to have contrast be at least 7-10 digits higher than brightness.
You can also add some gain to brighten the image - but the higher the gain, the more ghosting you get. Some cameras can go to 70 or so before it is an issue and some can't go over 50.
But adjusting those two settings will have the biggest impact. The next one is noise reduction. Want to keep that as low as possible. Depending on the amount of light you have, you might be able to get down to 40 or so at night (again camera dependent) and 20-30 during the day, but take it as low as you can before it gets too noisy. Again this one is a balance as well. Too smooth and no noise can result in soft images and contribute to blur.
Do not use backlight features until you have exhausted every other parameter setting. And if you do have to use backlight, take it down as low as possible.
After every setting adjustment, have someone walk around outside and see if you can freeze-frame to get a clean image. If not, keep changing until you do. Clean motion pictures are what we are after, not a clean static image.
I'm talking about depth of field, not field of view. field of view is how much of the scene the camera can capture. depth of field is how much of the scene is in focus. field of view is measured in degrees I guess, but depth of field is a distance. in this case the depth of field of this camera is 3.3 meter to infiinity. That means anything that is 3.3 meters away or farther will be in focus and everything closer than 3.3 meters to the camera will not be in focus. so i'm thinking this camera is not suitable to be placed at the front entrance of my house because anyone there will be within 3.3 meters of the camera and their face will not be in focus. this is a camera more suited to capture a large area like the entire property or a parking lot. would you agree with this?
Yeah I know the difference between depth of field and field of view and I am talking about depth of field when referring to focus...
Every camera has an optimal focus depth. As I said, some do better than others. But these cameras are not infinity focus. But on 2.8mm lens, 100 feet out doesn't really matter because you can't tell anyway.
And a camera that is not infinity focus means the depth of the field may have some parts (like up close) that are out of focus on a field of view. Many cameras have a focus circle in the 15-18 foot range and anything shorter or longer than that is soft/blurry/out of focus.
Yes, you have the wrong camera selected if your primary focus point is within 3 meters.
mat200
IPCT Contributor
- Jan 17, 2017
- 16,581
- 27,870
Please see the DORI section of the cliff notes.
Basic principle is you want 100 ppf or more ( some use 80 ppf ) on a straight on face image to get a good chance of ID.
ppf = pixel per foot
effective pixels I should say.
To maximize chances to get good effective image capture :
- Get good cameras
- Get enough cameras to increase chances of a good image capture ( I want anyone coming to my front door, to walk through at least 2 camera zones )
- Position the camera well to maximize chance of image capture ( there is a minimum, and maximum focus zone for each camera. Too high and you will not get enough pixels on a facial image unless the perp looks directly at the camera )
- Provide enough light ( white, or IR depending on your cameras )
- Tune the camera settings
- Do real world testing of positions and cameras before you run the cables.
- Stills are more important than smooth video. Check each snap shot for quality of image capture. Tune cameras to reduce blur.
- In most situations 15 fps works well for pedestrians
so if the dori of a camera using 2.8mm focal length is: 2.8 mm, D: 79 m, O: 31 m, R: 15 m, I: 7 m, that means it would be able to identify someone at 7 meter, therefore if that person is 1-2 meters away, they will be out of focus and therefore will not be identifiable?
mat200
IPCT Contributor
- Jan 17, 2017
- 16,581
- 27,870
We have found the DORI specs from the vendors to be optimistic.
Also note, the DORI info from the vendors is based on a straight on facial ID image in best lighting conditions and best tuning.
In real life, environmental conditions will reduce the effective DORI ranges.
( shadows, darkness, rain, fog, haze, lights shining into the cameras, .. )
When selecting a camera for up close within a couple meters of the camera, you need to see what the close-distance spec is. Some may be 0.5 meter and others may be 2 meters or more.
As pointed out, DORI is a nice tool in the tool box, but these numbers are under ideal situations with a marketing spin and real world experiences of DORI is that those numbers are established by the manufacturer and are based on best case scenarios like an object not moving and ideal light conditions.
Real world you should cut them in half during daytime and cut that half in half or more at night time.
As an example, our long time resident camera expert Wildcat ran the Dahua 4K/X 8MP 1/1.2" sensor thru the paces. Keep in mind this 4K/X camera is incredible.
He had the 3.6mm version and here is the screenshot from 40 feet in the ideal daylight and standing still, which based on DORI numbers is the supposed IDENTIFY distance for this camera with the 3.6mm lens and I think most of would agree that this is not IDENTIFY quality, even if digitally zoomed in:
I have the 4K/X and 4K/T and they are incredible cameras, but I wouldn't use it for IDENTIFY past 15-20 feet, or half of what the DORI number is.
As pointed out, DORI is a nice tool in the tool box, but these numbers are under ideal situations with a marketing spin and real world experiences of DORI is that those numbers are established by the manufacturer and are based on best case scenarios like an object not moving and ideal light conditions.
Real world you should cut them in half during daytime and cut that half in half or more at night time.
As an example, our long time resident camera expert Wildcat ran the Dahua 4K/X 8MP 1/1.2" sensor thru the paces. Keep in mind this 4K/X camera is incredible.
He had the 3.6mm version and here is the screenshot from 40 feet in the ideal daylight and standing still, which based on DORI numbers is the supposed IDENTIFY distance for this camera with the 3.6mm lens and I think most of would agree that this is not IDENTIFY quality, even if digitally zoomed in:
I have the 4K/X and 4K/T and they are incredible cameras, but I wouldn't use it for IDENTIFY past 15-20 feet, or half of what the DORI number is.
bigredfish
Known around here
While I agree of course on most of this, we all preach the same, there's that one part that doesnt add up for me even though it sounds logical
I know we've talked about this before, but here's two images a few minutes apart, one at 30fps one at 15fps
One 6.55MB one is 7.83MB in size and both at 16,384 Mbps bitrate, exported directly from the NVR playback GUI
Which is which?
Two .15sec videos with movement. One 30FPS one 15FPS
The 30fps is 31.3MB and the 15fps is 30.6MB
View attachment 192.168.1.110_ch5_20250815123445_20250815123500.mp4
View attachment 192.168.1.110_ch5_20250815125640_20250815125655.mp4
30fps - 5.54 MB
15fps 6.11 MB
So there is a small size difference in the snaps, but is it enough to matter?
I'll try some better experiments at night
Last edited:
Yeah why they are the same size has been that head scratcher we have tried to figure out for years LOL.
But picture quality aside and just talking about FPS, like everything, some cameras do better than others. Just like the cameras can do H265, but not not many here run that LOL.
The OP is looking at the lower end cameras and with an underpowered SOC, it could be problematic depending on the other parameters used.
This is totally a YMMV situation and some cameras are better than others, but many of them have low-end processors in them, so although they are spec'd and capable of these various parameters, real world testing by many of us shows if you try to run these units at higher FPS and higher bitrates than needed that you could max out the CPU in the unit and then it bugs out just long enough that you miss something or video is choppy or pixelated or you get lost signals. My car is rated for 6,000RPM redline, but I am not gonna run it in 3rd gear on the highway at 6,000RPM...same with these types of units - gotta keep them under rated capacity. Some may do better than others, but trying to use the rated "spec" of every option available is usually not going to work well, either with a car or a camera or NVR.
I'm not saying my analogy of a car redline or MPG is a perfect analogy, but rather I am pointing out a fact that stuff we buy is always marketed as more capable than it is, especially if you are using all of the features. Does your car get its stated MPG in every situation - NO...
Can a little 4 cylinder base model Ford go up an interstate incline of 4% with the air conditioning at full blast at the speed limit - NO. I remember growing up we would have to turn off the AC going up big hills LOL. We called it turbo boost LOL.
Do we really believe every marketing claim of every product we see on Amazon?
Just like a computer - it is rated for this and that, but if you are running the CPU at 100%, something is going to give. Same with these little cameras with a lot less computing power.
This was the eye opener to me - a few of my cams have a system status screen, and they call it a CPU, so that is why I am calling it a CPU, but this shows this camera running at 8192 bitrate, H264, CBR, and 12 FPS is hitting the camera processor at 47% and jumps to 70% with motion. If I up the camera to 30 FPS, the usage is in the high 90% range, but then with motion, it maxes out and would get unstable.
Or if I keep it at 12 FPS and use the camera motion detection, the CPU in the camera goes to 60% idle.
This would be nice if all cams had this so we could see how our settings impact the performance of the camera. I think running these cams close to capacity is probably harder to overcome than a computer spike at 100% CPU.
At the end of the day, if the unknowing consumer wants cameras that can do 30 or 60 FPS, they will not look at any cameras that do not have that rated spec, so some companies will throw that in to appease the person looking for that. Unfortunately, that is marketing. It takes someone with experience in the industry to know for sure if it is really capable of what marketing says.
And in a few scenarios maybe you can squeak 30FPS out of these cameras - maybe the better cameras, not using every AI function, etc or just watching a simple feed. But maybe when two users log in or multiple IVS rules, it can't handle it for example. The more features you use, the less likely it will work as one expects.
And if the complaints get bad enough, we have seen firmware updates to popular models that do just that - cut FPS or some other feature to make the camera stable...
In addition, look at all the threads where people came here with a jitter in the video or video dropping signal or IVS missing motion or the SD card doesn't overwrite and they were running 30FPS and when people tell them to drop the FPS and they dropped the FPS to 15FPS the camera became stable and they could actual freeze frame the image to get a clean capture. The goal of these cameras are to capture a perp, not capture smooth motion. When we see the news, are they showing the video or a freeze frame screen shot? Nobody cares if it isn't butter smooth...getting the features to make an ID is the important factor. As always, YMMV...
Further, these types of cameras are not GoPro or Hollywood type cameras that offer slow-mo capabilities and other features. As I said, they "offer" 30FPS and 60FPS to appease the general public that thinks that is what they need, but you will not find many of us here running more than 15 FPS; and movies are shot at 24 FPS, so anything above that is a waste of storage space for what these cameras are used for. If 24 FPS works for the big screen, I think 15 FPS is more than enough for phones and tablets and most monitors LOL. Many of my cameras are running at 12FPS.
In fact, many times if a CPU is maxing out, if it doesn't drop signal, then it will adhere to the FPS but then slow the shutter down to try to not max the CPU, which then produces a smooth blurry image..that is the video my neighbor gets who insists on running 60FPS. He gets smooth walking people but you can't freeze frame it cause every frame is a blur, meanwhile my 12FPS gets the clean freeze frame. Shutter speed is more important the FPS. We both run the same shutter speed by the way, but his camera CPU is maxing out and something gotta give when you push it that hard.
Now some here do run 30FPS and don't have a problem or don't notice a problem. They may have better cameras or maybe not maxing out every parameter.
OR maybe someone can run 30FPS when the matched camera and NVR brand, but using a 3rd party VMS is what causes problems.
OR maybe 30FPS and H264 codec works, but 30FPS and H265 doesn't because H265 uses more processing power.
Lot's of variables.
When I first entered this arena, I ran all of mine at max FPS. Then I learned shutter speed was more important than FPS. I run BI and it has been shown it is more stable at 15FPS or lower.
Then I figured since movies for the big screen are shot at 24FPS, I didn't need 30FPS for my monitor and phone LOL.
However, I have been testing 2 identical cameras side by side, one at 12FPS and the other at 30FPS. All other settings the same. I have yet to pull up a situation where the 30FPS captured something the 12FPS didn't. Of course the 30FPS was smoother, but someone can't swivel their head around fast enough to make a difference LOL.
But picture quality aside and just talking about FPS, like everything, some cameras do better than others. Just like the cameras can do H265, but not not many here run that LOL.
The OP is looking at the lower end cameras and with an underpowered SOC, it could be problematic depending on the other parameters used.
This is totally a YMMV situation and some cameras are better than others, but many of them have low-end processors in them, so although they are spec'd and capable of these various parameters, real world testing by many of us shows if you try to run these units at higher FPS and higher bitrates than needed that you could max out the CPU in the unit and then it bugs out just long enough that you miss something or video is choppy or pixelated or you get lost signals. My car is rated for 6,000RPM redline, but I am not gonna run it in 3rd gear on the highway at 6,000RPM...same with these types of units - gotta keep them under rated capacity. Some may do better than others, but trying to use the rated "spec" of every option available is usually not going to work well, either with a car or a camera or NVR.
I'm not saying my analogy of a car redline or MPG is a perfect analogy, but rather I am pointing out a fact that stuff we buy is always marketed as more capable than it is, especially if you are using all of the features. Does your car get its stated MPG in every situation - NO...
Can a little 4 cylinder base model Ford go up an interstate incline of 4% with the air conditioning at full blast at the speed limit - NO. I remember growing up we would have to turn off the AC going up big hills LOL. We called it turbo boost LOL.
Do we really believe every marketing claim of every product we see on Amazon?
Just like a computer - it is rated for this and that, but if you are running the CPU at 100%, something is going to give. Same with these little cameras with a lot less computing power.
This was the eye opener to me - a few of my cams have a system status screen, and they call it a CPU, so that is why I am calling it a CPU, but this shows this camera running at 8192 bitrate, H264, CBR, and 12 FPS is hitting the camera processor at 47% and jumps to 70% with motion. If I up the camera to 30 FPS, the usage is in the high 90% range, but then with motion, it maxes out and would get unstable.
Or if I keep it at 12 FPS and use the camera motion detection, the CPU in the camera goes to 60% idle.
This would be nice if all cams had this so we could see how our settings impact the performance of the camera. I think running these cams close to capacity is probably harder to overcome than a computer spike at 100% CPU.
At the end of the day, if the unknowing consumer wants cameras that can do 30 or 60 FPS, they will not look at any cameras that do not have that rated spec, so some companies will throw that in to appease the person looking for that. Unfortunately, that is marketing. It takes someone with experience in the industry to know for sure if it is really capable of what marketing says.
And in a few scenarios maybe you can squeak 30FPS out of these cameras - maybe the better cameras, not using every AI function, etc or just watching a simple feed. But maybe when two users log in or multiple IVS rules, it can't handle it for example. The more features you use, the less likely it will work as one expects.
And if the complaints get bad enough, we have seen firmware updates to popular models that do just that - cut FPS or some other feature to make the camera stable...
In addition, look at all the threads where people came here with a jitter in the video or video dropping signal or IVS missing motion or the SD card doesn't overwrite and they were running 30FPS and when people tell them to drop the FPS and they dropped the FPS to 15FPS the camera became stable and they could actual freeze frame the image to get a clean capture. The goal of these cameras are to capture a perp, not capture smooth motion. When we see the news, are they showing the video or a freeze frame screen shot? Nobody cares if it isn't butter smooth...getting the features to make an ID is the important factor. As always, YMMV...
Further, these types of cameras are not GoPro or Hollywood type cameras that offer slow-mo capabilities and other features. As I said, they "offer" 30FPS and 60FPS to appease the general public that thinks that is what they need, but you will not find many of us here running more than 15 FPS; and movies are shot at 24 FPS, so anything above that is a waste of storage space for what these cameras are used for. If 24 FPS works for the big screen, I think 15 FPS is more than enough for phones and tablets and most monitors LOL. Many of my cameras are running at 12FPS.
In fact, many times if a CPU is maxing out, if it doesn't drop signal, then it will adhere to the FPS but then slow the shutter down to try to not max the CPU, which then produces a smooth blurry image..that is the video my neighbor gets who insists on running 60FPS. He gets smooth walking people but you can't freeze frame it cause every frame is a blur, meanwhile my 12FPS gets the clean freeze frame. Shutter speed is more important the FPS. We both run the same shutter speed by the way, but his camera CPU is maxing out and something gotta give when you push it that hard.
Now some here do run 30FPS and don't have a problem or don't notice a problem. They may have better cameras or maybe not maxing out every parameter.
OR maybe someone can run 30FPS when the matched camera and NVR brand, but using a 3rd party VMS is what causes problems.
OR maybe 30FPS and H264 codec works, but 30FPS and H265 doesn't because H265 uses more processing power.
Lot's of variables.
When I first entered this arena, I ran all of mine at max FPS. Then I learned shutter speed was more important than FPS. I run BI and it has been shown it is more stable at 15FPS or lower.
Then I figured since movies for the big screen are shot at 24FPS, I didn't need 30FPS for my monitor and phone LOL.
However, I have been testing 2 identical cameras side by side, one at 12FPS and the other at 30FPS. All other settings the same. I have yet to pull up a situation where the 30FPS captured something the 12FPS didn't. Of course the 30FPS was smoother, but someone can't swivel their head around fast enough to make a difference LOL.
bigredfish
Known around here
"The goal of these cameras are to capture a perp, not capture smooth motion"
I prefer both
All nicely worded, and mostly valid, but I think the heart of the 15fps rule comes from limitations on certain VMS software/hardware
My camera has few moving mechanical parts unlike an engine.
Unless there's a difference in quality of image, I'll keep running 30FPS because 1) I like it better 2) its not hurting anything 3) I can
But I'll try to design a test for identical models/settings like you said you're doing and we can compare notes, and most importantly, still images
I prefer both
All nicely worded, and mostly valid, but I think the heart of the 15fps rule comes from limitations on certain VMS software/hardware
My camera has few moving mechanical parts unlike an engine.
Unless there's a difference in quality of image, I'll keep running 30FPS because 1) I like it better 2) its not hurting anything 3) I can
But I'll try to design a test for identical models/settings like you said you're doing and we can compare notes, and most importantly, still images
mat200
IPCT Contributor
- Jan 17, 2017
- 16,581
- 27,870
"The goal of these cameras are to capture a perp, not capture smooth motion"
I prefer both
All nicely worded, and mostly valid, but I think the heart of the 15fps rule comes from limitations on certain VMS software/hardware
My camera has few moving mechanical parts unlike an engine.
Unless there's a difference in quality of image, I'll keep running 30FPS because 1) I like it better 2) its not hurting anything 3) I can
But I'll try to design a test for identical models/settings like you said you're doing and we can compare notes, and most importantly, still images
15 fps vs 30 fps ..
historically a big issue is limits of camera hardware and firmware, as well has NVR / VMS compute limits and storage space.
If one gets better hardware in the camera, and cheaper storage I would think that picking 30 fps vs 15 fps would be less of an issue.
I know some of the cameras I have, if they are computing more ( line crossing and the like ) they will be unable to run at 30 fps. ( these now are considered older cameras )
I am still wondering about the issues you have been seeing, and look forward to a solid answer.
bigredfish
Known around here
Thats the thing, I run 30FPS on all of my cameras and typically high bitrates and HAVE no issues
I prefer both
All nicely worded, and mostly valid, but I think the heart of the 15fps rule comes from limitations on certain VMS software/hardware
My camera has few moving mechanical parts unlike an engine.
I had ability to play with a few different VMS in my life..
And none of them had such stupid limitations as BI...
Especially on encoding..
there is no difference in 15 vs 30 FPS from VMS (or NVR) standpoint.. video stream is video stream - stream of bytes - which should be stored on HDD by VMS/NVR...
The only situation where It can be problematic is when we try to display many channels at once - each hardware / software / graphics card combo have own limitation how many frames in what resolution can be decoded per second.
bigredfish
Known around here
@wittaj you know I love ya like a brother and respect your knowledge, but if we can just start that well done explanation with:
“ If your VMS or NVR has a hard time keeping up with encoding or is slightly underpowered, not to fear. The difference between 15fps and 30fps isn’t a dealbreaker and at the end of the day (other than maybe LPR or very specialized scenes) they’ll both provide the quality you need and won’t hurt a thing in most modern day higher end cameras”
I will acknowledge that low end cameras when all functions are enabled, especially AI, reducing bitrate and/or fps, and/or changing codecs can sometimes help.
“ If your VMS or NVR has a hard time keeping up with encoding or is slightly underpowered, not to fear. The difference between 15fps and 30fps isn’t a dealbreaker and at the end of the day (other than maybe LPR or very specialized scenes) they’ll both provide the quality you need and won’t hurt a thing in most modern day higher end cameras”
I will acknowledge that low end cameras when all functions are enabled, especially AI, reducing bitrate and/or fps, and/or changing codecs can sometimes help.
Sure I can add upfront too, but buried in my wall of text LOL is this:
OR maybe someone can run 30FPS when they matched camera and NVR brand, but using a 3rd party VMS is what causes problems.