Help identifying license plate from video footage

S0619212

Getting the hang of it
Sep 19, 2020
119
24
austin
We have got an issue in our neighborhood and we are trying to identify this vehicle, my camera was able to get this vehicle but I do not see the license plate since it is quite far away. I have uploaded the video on youtube , the actual video quality is much better than what is on youtube. I vaguely remember there was some sort of 3rd party service with BI to ID license plates? Are there any other services that would help ID this vehicle? Thanks for feedback.
 
Are you able to at least manually read the license plate if you digitally zoom into the image/frame in the video? Not sure when you say much better, if you are able to read the license plate. If it is not clear enough to be read by a human when digitally zoomed in, I'm not sure if a computer would be even able to do it either. It would be more of guessing at that point.

I cannot comment on available services to ID license plates that can integrate into Blue Iris but I do know there should be some open source software to take RTSP streams and use machine learning to ID objects in the video (something I'm looking to try doing soon when I have some more free time).
 
You are going to have to add a camera, to that location that has a varifocal lens, where you can focus it out in the road. Unfortunately I doubt there is any readable plate in that video.
 
Let's enhance it!


Here's a REALLY cheap Dahua bullet cam I bought, for $60USD it's fine to stick in the garden during Christmas light season to keep an eye on a controller box.
But here I trialled it in place of a previous 12mm camera. Previous camera was analogue, but it could just about gets plate numbers in daylight for a 420TVL image.

So image a 12mm with the clarity of digital cameras around 2MP+ how well it will pick up a plate.

I reckon you could also put a camera in the garden (fence there?) to the bottom left of the video you have shared.
 
Yep, just to jump in, you will not get a plate from the field of view, nor will any 3rd party plate reader be able to either.

If you want to see things far away, you need optical zoom, digital zoom only works in the movies and TV. And the image looks kinda washed out like you have too much WDR on, which will impact the ability to zoom in as well. You can make out it is possibly an older model maroon/red Toyota Camry, maybe 2008-2015 model.

It is basically the same information we provided to you previously regarding being able to IDENTIFY someone at a distance, except now it is for an even smaller plate.


Regarding a camera for plates (LPR) - keep in mind that this is a camera dedicated to plates and not an overview camera also. It is as much an art as it is a science. It is why you cannot read them now with your current camera.

For LPR we need to zoom in tight to make the plate as large as possible. For most of us, all you see is the not much more than a vehicle in the entire frame. Now maybe in the right location during the day it might be able to see some other things, but not at night.

At night, we have to run a very fast shutter speed (1/2,000) and in B/W with IR and the image will be black. All you will see are head/tail lights and the plate. Some people can get away with color if they have enough street lights, but most of us cannot. Here is a representative sample of plates I get at night of vehicles traveling about 45MPH at 175 feet from my 2MP camera (that is all that is needed for plates):

1633234305589.png

Guessing at the distance you would be based on the image, I do not think the ZE varifocal you have now would be able to get the plates fully zoomed in either. You would need the 5442-Z4E (and that is probably pushing it), or the 5241-Z12E. Since they are the same price, I would go with the one with more zoom.
 
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Let's enhance it!


Here's a REALLY cheap Dahua bullet cam I bought, for $60USD it's fine to stick in the garden during Christmas light season to keep an eye on a controller box.
But here I trialled it in place of a previous 12mm camera. Previous camera was analogue, but it could just about gets plate numbers in daylight for a 420TVL image.

So image a 12mm with the clarity of digital cameras around 2MP+ how well it will pick up a plate.

I reckon you could also put a camera in the garden (fence there?) to the bottom left of the video you have shared.


Yeah you could get it when the car stopped (barely), but could it get it with motion?

But in addition to the focal length of 12mm, the distance it is covering is important as well. I don't think 12mm will capture a plate at speed 50 feet away.
 
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Yeah you could get it when the car stopped (barely), but could it get it with motion?
But in addition to the focal length of 12mm, the distance it is covering is important as well. I don't think 12mm will capture a plate at speed 50 feet away.
That's my example to digitally zoom on a reordered video.
That's about 35ft distance, not 50ft.

I put a standard camera out there to my laptop, there's a reason you (and others) have dedicated LPR cameras.

Just an extra video I had that I thought I would share for relation on FOV.
 
That's my example to digitally zoom on a reordered video.
That's about 35ft distance, not 50ft.

I put a standard camera out there to my laptop, there's a reason you (and others) have dedicated LPR cameras.

Just an extra video I had that I thought I would share for relation on FOV.

Yeah, I know what you were getting at and know that wasn't 50 feet, but I didn't want the OP to think with his varifocal that he could zoom in to 12mm and capture a plate - his distance is far greater, and the US plates are far smaller than your example as well.
 
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Let's enhance it!


Here's a REALLY cheap Dahua bullet cam I bought, for $60USD it's fine to stick in the garden during Christmas light season to keep an eye on a controller box.
But here I trialled it in place of a previous 12mm camera. Previous camera was analogue, but it could just about gets plate numbers in daylight for a 420TVL image.

So image a 12mm with the clarity of digital cameras around 2MP+ how well it will pick up a plate.

I reckon you could also put a camera in the garden (fence there?) to the bottom left of the video you have shared.

You have the benefit of having monster sized plates, compared to ours.
 
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We have got an issue in our neighborhood and we are trying to identify this vehicle, my camera was able to get this vehicle but I do not see the license plate since it is quite far away. I have uploaded the video on youtube , the actual video quality is much better than what is on youtube. I vaguely remember there was some sort of 3rd party service with BI to ID license plates? Are there any other services that would help ID this vehicle? Thanks for feedback.



Is it a recurring issue? If it is then this intelligence can be gathered by other means. You could hop in your car, and cruise the area scanning for that particular vehicle. You could even try Google street view, and do the same thing virtually but then you're relying on them being at home as well - the difference though is that you can click back through historic data unlike doing scouting in RL.

Any chance they live within a mile radius? I see a vehicle in the driveway of "1513 SS Lane" which may fit the look, but I'm going off an experimental Google Earth since you guys appear to value your privacy in that area.

If it helps, it appears to be a 2003 Toyota Corolla S 4dr Sedan as seen in the photos below for clarity. If not, it's very close to that model.

2003_toyota_corolla_sedan_s_s_oem_1_1600x1067.jpg

2003_toyota_corolla_sedan_s_fq_oem_1_1600x1067.jpg

2003_toyota_corolla_sedan_s_rq_oem_1_1600x1067.jpg
 
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You have to remember as well, that 2 or 3 yrs ago your place on the Trail didn't exist, but a dozen homes had been built on the Lane nearby - including 1513. The imagery is too vague to say with certainty but I can imagine that if a family with a teen moved in to that home that he might be inclined to be a dumb teen on your street since it was just a dirt road and dead end before ya'll moved in. You'd see the same thing if the kid owned a dirt bike etc. Another thing you tend to see in these scenarios are crimes such as vandalism, or even arson. New developments tend to see theft, vandalism or arson. Hopefully you haven't had to deal with any of that since you moved in, but it looks like you're left with a kid (18-26?) who feels a certain ownership to what he sees as his original stomping grounds. (If you asked him, he'd say you're all interlopers) He's likely been ripping around that area since day one. But yeah, now that the subdivision is fully populated he needs to re-calibrate his sense of entitlement to those grounds and should be advised to go elsewhere to test his latest cherry bomb muffler or what have you.


I'd go for a drive .. he's there somewhere close by. Then knock on the door...