Help Finding a Wi-Fi Camera with Good Night Vision

[MadPup]

Hi Folks. This is my first post here driven by the frustration of not finding what I'm looking for, partly because I'm not quite sure what it is I should be looking for. I'm hoping some of you peeps can help guide this blind man in a sand storm. Here's my conundrum...

I live at the end of a upward inclined cul-de-sac, about 70 feet from the street with no hedge and overall dimly lit. I'm looking for a single camera that can be fitted to the wall of my house (no eaves) and look down along garden with trees either side and onto the street. This isn't a serious security endeavor, I'm just interested in the technical side and watching capturing comings and goings. I am really not interested in hard-wiring anything other than for power and I think I can get a good wi-fi signal to where i need it. The biggest problem I'm having (probably needless to say) is with night vision. I'm open to using using floodlights if it would help, but lighting up the whole street is a bit ambitious. My requirement in bullets would be:

• Wi-fi
• Good night vision 100+ feet
• Not wide angle: <= 90 degrees would be fine
• Motion detection with zones
• Integration with Amazon Echo Show and Android
• Local storage (SD card)
• 1 or 2-way audio optional

I've tried a few cheap Amazon cameras and have not got what I want. That said, I've been really impressed with what you can get for under $50 but I'm beyond that now. I'd pay for a good camera and be done with it.

 

[Mark_M]

Hi MadPup,
First thing that's going to be mentioned is why WiFi....
I'll leave that aside if you're willing to have lag and quality issues with interference.

Bullet cameras can be a pain for attracting bugs under the sun shield, turret is the best.
Decent night vision will have to be externally powered, battery camera won't do.
Motion detection is standard in pretty much every camera, having a PIR sensor in conjunction to camera analytics may be a help.
Local SD card is easy with decent cameras.
Audio may be a seperate model of the same kind.
Integration with Alexa hints towards consumer cameras, unless there is a medium to bridge the two.
Lower than 90 degree viewing angles would be 2.8mm and above. Probably a baseline of 3.6mm and above. Maybe look at a varifocal.

If you are adamit for WiFi it will be best to utilise that SD card and use the WiFi to access the footage later. This will be a standalone solution, but will only be able to record motion for the small storage space. Recording motion is likely to exclude key events beforehand. For general observation it's perfectly fine though.

If IR is an issue maybe look at newer color night vision cameras...... just putting it out there.

 

[fenderman]

You are already running power, why not run a single ethernet cable.
any camera can be made wifi using a wifi bridge ...there are a bunch of threads on quality low light cameras.

 

[MadPup]

You are already running power, why not run a single ethernet cable.

I'm thinking about what you're saying but it's not making sense to me. Are you say that because I have a power point near where i want to have a camera that I also somehow have an easy route to run an Ethernet cable from the camera to my router? That's not the case.

 

[fenderman]

I'm thinking about what you're saying but it's not making sense to me. Are you say that because I have a power point near where i want to have a camera that I also somehow have an easy route to run an Ethernet cable from the camera to my router? That's not the case.

You don't need to run the cable to your router if you have an network connection elsewhere. In 99.9 percent of cases a cable is easily run in the wall, if you cant do it, have someone do it for you. Will save you lots of grief.
Regardless, you can still use a wifi bridge. Why limit yourself to crappy cameras.

 

[MadPup]

You don't need to run the cable to your router if you have an network connection elsewhere. In 99.9 percent of cases a cable is easily run in the wall, if you cant do it, have someone do it for you. Will save you lots of grief.
Regardless, you can still use a wifi bridge. Why limit yourself to crappy cameras.

Thanks to Mark_M and yourself for replying. If you are saying that most/all wifi cameras are crappy then that helps a lot. I can start by striking those off my list. I'll start to look at a wifi bridge option.

It would also be good to know if cameras with a halo of IR emitters can be any good at 100 feet. If not, what's the alternative for that? Are there sensors (such as Starvis) that are actually usable in near darkness?

 

[fenderman]

Thanks to Mark_M and yourself for replying. If you are saying that most/all wifi cameras are crappy then that helps a lot. I can start by striking those off my list. I'll start to look at a wifi bridge option.

It would also be good to know if cameras with a halo of IR emitters can be any good at 100 feet. If not, what's the alternative for that? Are there sensors (such as Starvis) that are actually usable in near darkness?

you are not going to capture anything useful at 100f without a varifocal or zoom lens..

 

[mat200]

Hi Folks. This is my first post here driven by the frustration of not finding what I'm looking for, partly because I'm not quite sure what it is I should be looking for. I'm hoping some of you peeps can help guide this blind man in a sand storm. Here's my conundrum...

I live at the end of a upward inclined cul-de-sac, about 70 feet from the street with no hedge and overall dimly lit. I'm looking for a single camera that can be fitted to the wall of my house (no eaves) and look down along garden with trees either side and onto the street. This isn't a serious security endeavor, I'm just interested in the technical side and watching capturing comings and goings. I am really not interested in hard-wiring anything other than for power and I think I can get a good wi-fi signal to where i need it. The biggest problem I'm having (probably needless to say) is with night vision. I'm open to using using floodlights if it would help, but lighting up the whole street is a bit ambitious. My requirement in bullets would be:

• Wi-fi
• Good night vision 100+ feet
• Not wide angle: <= 90 degrees would be fine
• Motion detection with zones
• Integration with Amazon Echo Show and Android
• Local storage (SD card)
• 1 or 2-way audio optional

I've tried a few cheap Amazon cameras and have not got what I want. That said, I've been really impressed with what you can get for under $50 but I'm beyond that now. I'd pay for a good camera and be done with it.

Welcome @MadPup

Hard to really find something which will meet all of those requirements.

Suggest you knock the requirements down.

If you decide to go with wired IP PoE you will have more options.

Look for southernyankee's note to welcome new members, he has a good list of cameras worth considering - many of which have been reviewed by members here.

 

[SouthernYankee]

-----------------------------
Running Ethernet cable is not that hard. If you can not do that heir a low voltage electrician, the same guys that run telephone wire, satellite cables, alarm wires.
Using wifi in a surveillance system make the system next to useless. A wifi network can be jammed from a car park in from f your house.
-----------------------------
My standard welcome to the forum message.

Please read the IP Cam Talk Cliff Notes and other items in the IP Cam Talk Wiki. The wiki is in the blue bar at the top of the page.

Read How to Secure Your Network (Don't Get Hacked!) in the wiki also.

Quick start
1) If you do not have a wired monitored alarm system, get that first
2) Use Dahua starlight cameras or Hikvision darkfighter cameras if you need good low light cameras.
3) use a VPN to access home network (openVPN)
4) Do not use wifi cameras.
5) Do not use cloud storage
6) Do Not use uPNP, P2P, QR, do not open ports,
7) More megapixel is not necessarily better.
8) Avoid chinese hacked cameras (most ebay, amazon, aliexpress cameras(not all, but most))
9) Do not use reolink, ring, nest, Arlo cameras (they are junk), no cloud cameras
10) If possible use a turret camera , bullet collect spiders, dome collect dirt and reflect light (IR)
11) Use only solid copper, AWG 23 or 24 ethernet wire. , no CCA (Copper Clad Aluminum)
12) use a test mount to verify the camera mount location. My test rig: rev.2
13) (Looney2ns)If you want to be able to ID faces, don't mount cams higher than 8ft. You want to know who did it, not just what happened.
14) Use a router that has openVPN built in (Most ASUS, Some NetGear....)
15) camera placement use the calculator... IPVM Camera Calculator V3

Cameras to look at
IPC-T5442TM-AS-LED Review IPC-T5442TM-AS-LED (Full Color, Starlight+)
IPC-T5442TM-AS Review-OEM 4mp AI Cam IPC-T5442TM-AS Starlight+ - 4MP starlight+
IPC-HDW2231R-ZS Review-Dahua IPC-HDW2231RP-ZS Starlight Camera-Varifocal
IPC-HDW2231T-ZS-S2 Review-OEM IPC-T2231T-ZS 2mp Varifocal Starlight Camera
IPC-HDW5231R-ZE Review-Dahua Starlight IPC-HDW5231R-ZE 800 meter capable ePOE
IPC-HFW4239T-ASE IPC-HFW4239T-ASE
IPCT-HDW5431RE-I Review - IP Cam Talk 4 MP IR Fixed Turret Network Camera
DS-2CD2325FWD-I
IPC-T2347G-LU Review of the Hikvision OEM model IPC-T2347G-LU 'ColorVu' IP CCTV camera. (DS-2CD2347G1-LU)
N22AL12 New Dahua N22AL12 Budget Cam w/Starlight -- low cost entry

Other dahua 4MP starlight Dahua 4MP Starlight Lineup

My preferred indoor cameras
DS-2CD2442FWD-IW
IPC-K35A Review-Dahua IPC-K35A 3mp Cube Camera

If interested in Blue Iris and other setup items see the following post

Newbie Starter Guide to IP Cam System – VPN setup – Computer Hardware – Blue Iris – Dahua Cameras

This is an intermediate / newbie guide for people just starting out looking for a surveillance setup. I know this setup might not be for everyone and there are many options. You can find a lot of this information in the Wiki: IP Cam Talk Wiki | IP Cam Talk A great place to start in the Wiki...

ipcamtalk.com

Read,study,plan before spending money ..... plan plan plan
Test do not guess

 

[MadPup]

You guys are awesome. Thanks for the info, SY - I'll chew thru that for a while. I'm looking at my options for a cable run but will involve crawlspace and attic navigation and I'm starting to stiffen up with age. Maybe factor in a few yoga classes first.

BTW the Alexa integration is important to me because, contrary to my preferences once, I have ended up with a lot of Echo devices in my house and for the most part they have exceeded expectations. Having a day/night view of your property on voice command is very attractive. If I have 5", 8", and 10" screens at various locations around the house it's very cool just to be able to say "Alexa, show me front door / back yard / drive way / street" whenever there is an alert. I really don't see Blue Iris (or similar) filling that role for me... although I know it has its uses.