I need advice :-) IPC-EBW81242

[king_20001]

Hello all,
I am thinking of buying an IPC-EBW81242 camera from Ali. The dealer has been around for 7 years, so it should be fine.
Does anyone know the camera? The place of use should be the driveway. The camera will be on the roof overhang at 5.90m height. The area to be monitored is 4,5x8m.
Or would you recommend something else for the roof overhang?

 

[wittaj]

What is your intent for the camera? To observe or identify?

That MP to sensor ratio will be horrible at night.

It is simple LOL do not chase MP - do not buy a 4MP camera that is anything other than a 1/1.8" sensor. Do not buy a 2MP camera that is anything other than a 1/2.8" sensor. Do not buy a 4K (8MP) camera on anything smaller than a 1/1.2" sensor. Unfortunately, most 4k cams are on the same sensor as a 2MP and thus the 2MP will kick its butt all night long as the 4k will need 4 times the light than the 2MP... 4k will do very poor at night unless you have stadium quality lighting (well a lot of lighting LOL).

At at 5.9 meters high, someone would have to be within 1 meter or so to Identify, and you have more than that just vertically.

You do not need a fisheye for that area to be monitored. But again, it comes down to the intent and goal of camera.

 

[sebastiantombs]

First, why a fisheye to watch the driveway? Second, even though it is a 1/1.7" sensor it is also a 12MP which will limit its ability to provide good night video unless you have a lot of outside lighting. Third, mounted that high, 5.9 meters say about 20 feet, you will get nice shots of the top of everyone's heads and not get any shots that are useable to provide identification. If it's strictly an overview camera that height might work, but even then it's still too high IMHO.

 

[king_20001]

Hello, thank you for your feedback. I am aware that I will not be able to see the faces from this height. We just built 2 years ago and I have installed power cables on the roof overhang. I think that a simple observation (what happens in the entrance area) would be enough for me. For facial recognition, of course, I would have to think of something else.

 

[sebastiantombs]

I'll again caution you that at that height the amount of information you'll get from a video, especially a fisheye, will be extremely limited. It sounds to me like you're tying to cover far too much area with one camera. That always leads to failure because there is little to no available detail. You will not be able to digitally zoom in to see what went on, it'll turn into a pixelated mess at more than a 1.5 zoom level.

 

[wittaj]

A fisheye is meant to see far and wide with very little detail (like 180 degrees or more).

The camera you are looking at works well in a well-lit area like a manufacturing facility, warehouse, etc. with a lot of light and more for observation - when did the forklift flip over type events LOL, but never to recognize people or details.

You will be disappointed in that camera outside for the "little" area you are trying to cover. Everything will be tiny and at night it will be blind.

The B5442 series fixed cam like the 2.8mm or 3.6mm would be a much better choice.

But even at that, recognize that you will NEVER be able to IDENTIFY a stranger at the height that camera is at. You will get tops of heads and hoodies and ballcaps. But to have a look-see around, that is all you will get from that height.

 

[samplenhold]

I have several overview cams on my house, which serve the purpose they are tasked to do. There is nothing wrong with having an overview cam. But as the others have stated, it will only tell you WHAT happened, not WHO did it. These two threads below touch upon the interaction of overview cams and ID cams.

Why I like Continuous Recording (aka 24/7)

So a guy came to the door yesterday, and while my wife did not open the door, it kind of spooked her out. She said he seem suspicious saying he found a driver's license on the lawn and wanted to know if it belonged to her. So when I got back from the range, I checked out the cams. This is one...

ipcamtalk.com

Why I Like Redundant Views/Multiple Cam Views

A lot of newbies ask for help with their camera setups and most think that they can get by with a single cam to cover quite a bit of area. While that is possible if all you are interested in is a wide-angle overview, it usually will not give you a great chance of getting a face shot good enough...

ipcamtalk.com

Picking a dome cam for outside mounting is not recommended due to the dome's propensity for attracting dust/dirt and water spots. Mounted that high, you will not have good access for cleaning every few weeks.

It is preferred to use turrets or bullets for outside mounting. The current go to cam for outdoors is the 5442 series of Dahua cams. They come in turrets and bullets with 2.8, 3.6, or 6mm fixed lenses, or a varifocal in 2.7-12mm or 8-32mm. You won't go wrong with them. But there are other less expensive cams that might possibly fit the bill if you define your requirements properly.

As others have stated, a fisheye cam for this application would not be recommended for the reasons stated above.

Be very careful of buying from vendors on Ali. Just because it has been around for 7 years does not mean it supplies good, useable cams. Most come with hacked Chinese firmware that are not upgradable. Most folks here buy from @EMPIRETECANDY. He has an Ali storefront and an Amazon one. Or you could contact him directly via email or message him here.

 

[king_20001]

Hello everybody ! Wow, you are a great community. These are really great tips. Thank you.
I probably really need to consider the line-up a lot.
I will definitely have a look at the 5442 series.

 

[king_20001]

.

It is preferred to use turrets or bullets for outside mounting. The current go to cam for outdoors is the 5442 series of Dahua cams. They come in turrets and bullets with 2.8, 3.6, or 6mm fixed lenses, or a varifocal in 2.7-12mm or 8-32mm. You won't go wrong with them. .

can you recommend a 5442 turretst, preferably with infrared? What is the full name?

 

[wittaj]

The T is for turret, D for some and B for bullet in its name.

So T5442T for turret and then varifocal version is ZE and Z4E.

Buy from Andy here @EMPIRETECANDY

Prime Day Discount From June.19th - June.22nd

Hey Guys As Amazon invites us to do some discount on Prime day(They ask for 40-60% discount, that is crazy too much, lol), But we will do some REAL discount too, Memorial Day lots of guys were on a short real break after covid 19, so we hope this time can help make more guys can get the...

ipcamtalk.com

 

[king_20001]

Wow, the camera is really perfect. I am really excited and very glad that I asked you for advice.
I have decided to go with Dahua IPC-T5442TM-AS-LED. Since I have a network cable on all 4 corners of the house, I will just put the cameras on each side and have everything in view. After that, I'll figure out something for a lower area so you can see the face as well.
I'm just not sure about the lens. 2.8 or 3.6mm which would you guys recommend? Can you look somewhere the a few pictures where you can see the difference?

 

[wittaj]

Keep in mind that one doesn't see infrared, so if you do not have enough ambient light at night it will suffer and you cannot add an external ir since the camera cannot see it

The LED light on these are gimmicky and most of us do not use it and instead rely on our floodlights.

That camera still needs light and the LED is no different than trying to light up a backyard with a cellphone LED.

 

[king_20001]

Oh thanks for the tip! Which model detect an external infrared light?
I have added a picture of the situation on site. The red circles should symbolize the cameras, the green rectangle should symbolize an infrared emitter. Or is there a better camera for this situation?

 

[wittaj]

All of them but the LED version.

At that height I would opt for the 3.6 or 6mm version. The 2.8 would get too much of your neighbor buildings and if you have to run IR you would get too much IR bounce off of it.

 

[king_20001]

Great, thanks for the tips. I found this camera in Andy's store : IPC-T5442T-ZE 4MP
There you can even adjust the focal length? Is there anything that speaks against this camera?

 

[wittaj]

Unless you know for sure that a fixed lens will serve the purpose, most of us are big fans of the varifocal that allows you to optically zoom in to the area you want to cover.

All of my 5442 cams are varifocal ZE or Z4E depending on how far way the camera is from where I want coverage.

 

[samplenhold]

IPC-T5442T-ZE

That cam is the 2.7-12mm varifocal. That means you can adjust the FOV within the 2.7-12mm range to get the view you want. It comes with it's own IR emitters built in. Before you install an IR emitter test the cams and see if you really need the external emitter.

Do not confuse a varifocal cam with an optical zoom cam, or a PTZ cam. The motorized lens is designed to have the FOV set and left that way. Occasional adjusting of the FOV is ok, but more than that, like daily adjusting the FOV, will kill the motor. It is not designed for that kind of use.

 

[EMPIRETECANDY]

The fisheye normally use inside shop , super market or a business place, house using not too useful, So the best is to use turret OR some bullet cams.