Looking for advice on a local storage only camera system

[Ben Catoe]

Hello, looking for advice on a solution for my HOA. We have 2 entrances, both with islands. We are wanting to mount cameras to catch cars entering/exiting as a way of helping identify "candidates" for the police to investigate when needed. We don't have a lot of crime but there have been some and this seems like a way of improving overall security. We have signage and a flagpole in the islands which gives us multiple mounting options. We also have power. A major issue is that we don't have much budget since we are not a large HOA. We'd like to avoid paying for cellular service and there really isn't another feasible way to get the data online, and we don't really want to pay for cloud storage either.

My idea, which may sound silly, is to have the cameras store locally. This would require us to physically go to the camera to download/get the data whenever it is needed. Perhaps a small size NVR that can take the Florida heat for each island or just a memory card in each camera large enough to store 2MP camera data for a week? Sadly, the 2 islands are not close enough to share a system.

Camera wise, we'd be down fairly low and close to the cars. This is FL so tags only on the rear.

 

[TonyR]

I looked at that intersection in Jacksonville on Google Maps.

Is there an HOA office nearby? I ask because you said there's power at that sign and I'm wondering if its possible to get the video from the cams to an office or residence down the road using a wireless bridge, such as a Ubiquiti Layer 2 Transparent Bridge.

If there is such a building or someone is willing to host one of the radios and the NVR, is there LOS (Line Of Sight) between their location and the area near the flagpole?

 

[Mike A.]

Tony's suggestion sounds like a good idea if possible. Unless you can keep a better eye on how things are working, just as it tends to go, there's a high likelihood that whenever you eventually went to look something wouldn't be.

 

[Ben Catoe]

I looked at that intersection in Jacksonville on Google Maps.

Is there an HOA office nearby? I ask because you said there's power at that sign and I'm wondering if its possible to get the video from the cams to an office or residence down the road using a wireless bridge, such as a Ubiquiti Layer 2 Transparent Bridge.

If there is such a building or someone is willing to host one of the radios and the NVR, is there LOS (Line Of Sight) between their location and the area near the flagpole?

I would love to do something like that however there is no office. Our HOA staff are completely volunteer. One thought was to parasite off the closest neighbor's wifi (with permission) but that is obviously subject to change. I considered some kind of wifi extenders to get the signals to my house, which might be possible though it would take some effort with the obstructions. Not likely to be able to do wifi bridge directly between the 2 entrances due to the curve of the road and amount of trees. I guess I could borrow some equipment from work to test those ideas. This would still leave us dependent on me continuing to live there and being willing to babysit the system...not that I expect that to be an issue anytime soon. This would certainly be a better solution that the local storage idea. I appreciate the ideas and will chase this a bit. THANKS!!!

 

[wittaj]

You do not want to use internet wifi and extenders with cameras. It will bring the internet and internal wifi to a grinding halt.

They need to be isolated point to point or on their own system as an access point that nobody else uses for LAN wifi.

These cameras do not buffer like streaming services do, so it is problematic for wifi as part of someone's wifi network.

 

[Ben Catoe]

You do not want to use internet wifi and extenders with cameras. It will bring the internet and internal wifi to a grinding halt.

They need to be isolated point to point or on their own system as an access point that nobody else uses for LAN wifi.

These cameras do not buffer like streaming services do, so it is problematic for wifi as part of someone's wifi network.

yep, understand. I took some typing shortcuts in that. I meant wireless links. I'll borrow some equipment from work and see if I can reach from my house. It isn't a huge distance but there are houses and trees in the way.

 

[tangent]

I don't know the pricing, but many municipalities have been deploying cellular cameras for LPR lately. I'm, sure it's more than the DIY option long term.
AFIK, these are sending still images. The main one I've seen deployed lately is Flock Safety | Eliminate Crime with Flock Safety.

EDIT: They're fairly pricey, $2500 / camera / year plus installation. Must pay for two years up front. It's just interesting as they're popping up like weeds around me.

 

[Ben Catoe]

I would love to do something like that however there is no office. Our HOA staff are completely volunteer. One thought was to parasite off the closest neighbor's wifi (with permission) but that is obviously subject to change. I considered some kind of wifi extenders to get the signals to my house, which might be possible though it would take some effort with the obstructions. Not likely to be able to do wifi bridge directly between the 2 entrances due to the curve of the road and amount of trees. I guess I could borrow some equipment from work to test those ideas. This would still leave us dependent on me continuing to live there and being willing to babysit the system...not that I expect that to be an issue anytime soon. This would certainly be a better solution that the local storage idea. I appreciate the ideas and will chase this a bit. THANKS!!!

@TonyR and everyone else... thank you all again for the nudge. I borrowed a couple of Mimosa C5x from work (approx $100/ea on Amazon). Even though I am not planning to push my video across the Internet, I attached to my home network so I could use Speedtest.org. I taped 1 of them to a window on my house and the other to a rake which I then leaned against the entrance sign. I also did a test to the other entrance. In both cases, they linked right up and gave me 50mg speed (sadly my max Internet speed) even though I was shooting thru houses in both directions. This was with only the internal antennas. Very pleased with the results. I plan to implement it (with better mounting) back to the house to start so I can monitor/adjust. Then we might build a small NEMA box at one of the entrances to house the NVR.

Now I need to pick out some cameras and an NVR. We are planning to put up new info signs on the islands so we should be able to mount a camera facing each way to the sign. This would keep them down low and close for good views of front and back of the cars. Ideally the NVR records 24x7 and also triggers on motion. This is how I have my home system (Dahua) setup. I'll need to make sure to have enough storage for 1-2 weeks so thankfully drives are cheap these days. I appreciate any advice on this.

 

[wittaj]

If you want to capture plates, 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. You will need two cameras.

For LPR we need to OPTICALLY 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 5241-Z12E camera (that is all that is needed for plates):

See the LPR subforum for more details.

 

[Ben Catoe]

If you want to capture plates, 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. You will need two cameras.

For LPR we need to OPTICALLY 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 5241-Z12E camera (that is all that is needed for plates):

See the LPR subforum for more details.

My hope is that they have to stop/slow drastically for the exit to go around the island and then the stop sign. If we mount the camera on the info sign then we would be close to the curb, 5-10' high and a range of 20-60'. I was thinking that avoiding IR would be best so the tag doesn't get washed out by the tail lights. Traffic coming in has a tighter turn around the island which then should give us a direct view from the back and I was hoping shots of the front of the cars on the way out. Thank you for the info... I'll go do some reading thru the LPR forum.

 

[wittaj]

Keep in mind a perp probably isn't stopping at the stop sign!

So unless you have an abundance of light, if you can't run the shutter faster than say 1/250 in color then the plate would probably be a blur or not have enough light on it to capture it.

Infrared is actually your friend regarding plates because we are taking advantage of the reflective property of the plate to bounce back the plate. Obviously a camera shutter needs to be fast enough or you get this kind of washout of the plate:



Basically, don't discount that you may need another camera to reliably capture plates.

 

[Ben Catoe]

Keep in mind a perp probably isn't stopping at the stop sign!

So unless you have an abundance of light, if you can't run the shutter faster than say 1/250 in color then the plate would probably be a blur or not have enough light on it to capture it.

Infrared is actually your friend regarding plates because we are taking advantage of the reflective property of the plate to bounce back the plate. Obviously a camera shutter needs to be fast enough or you get this kind of washout of the plate:

View attachment 171837

Basically, don't discount that you may need another camera to reliably capture plates.

fair enough, really appreciate how much everyone is willing to help on this site. I'm in FL where the tags are only on the back. Currently I'm looking at the Dahua NVR-5-EI and 5241-Z12E cameras so I certainly have IR capability. I figure I'll have to try different options to get the best results. I've noticed with the cameras on my house that the tags white-out in IR mode...but that is a wide shot.

 

[wittaj]

If the plates are washed out white in IR mode, that means your camera is probably either on default/auto shutter (which could be 1/30 shutter or slower) or you set the shutter to slow.

Plus like you said being a wide shot, you would never read plates anyway.

Ideally the field of view should be the size of a car or a little bigger. Too wide of a view and the plates won't be able to be read.

Further, the plates can only be read with a fast enough shutter, and for most of us, when we speed the shutter up to be able to freeze frame to read a plate, the image is too dark for color. That faster the shutter speed, the more light is needed. That is where the 1/2000 shutter speed and reflective properties of the plate come in!

So try it and see. Like you said, fortunately the Z12E is a great camera selection and if you don't have enough light for color at night, that camera is the go to camera for plates. This is from my Z12E at 175 feet:

 

[Ben Catoe]

Hello, I have another question on the NVR8CH-8P-2AI. I know it can hand out DHCP on the built-in POE ports. Can it also hand out DHCP via its regular Ethernet port or can I attach a switch to one of the POE ports and have multiple cameras get DHCP that are located at the other island? Apologies if I've posted this question twice. I distinctly remember typing this up but can't find it.

 

[wittaj]

You cannot hook a POE switch to one of the the POE ports of the NVR.

Instead, you would have to connect the POE switch to the WAN/LAN port of the NVR.

You would have to manually assign the cameras IP addresses and then manually add them to the NVR...although some have seen that sometimes the same brand NVR and camera can find them, but I wouldn't count on it.

Also, you cannot exceed the number of channels the NVR is rated for, so if you have an 8 channel NVR, you cannot have 8 on the NVR ports and add anymore cameras.

 

[Ben Catoe]

You cannot hook a POE switch to one of the the POE ports of the NVR.

Instead, you would have to connect the POE switch to the WAN/LAN port of the NVR.

You would have to manually assign the cameras IP addresses and then manually add them to the NVR...although some have seen that sometimes the same brand NVR and camera can find them, but I wouldn't count on it.

Also, you cannot exceed the number of channels the NVR is rated for, so if you have an 8 channel NVR, you cannot have 8 on the NVR ports and add anymore cameras.

Thank you. I was thinking I would have to add something to assign DHCP to the other cameras. Not sure why I didn't think of just assigning static IP's. Simple enough solution. Also, thank you for the reminder on the total channels. I should be good since we're looking at 4-6 total.

 

[Ben Catoe]

I can't believe how long our grant and budgeting process has taken..but finally ready to move forward with this camera project. I'm looking to make the purchase of the NVR8CH-8P-2AI and the Z12E cameras. I notice that the camera doesn't list LPR in its feature list but the NVR does and WITTAG above recommended it specifically so I think I'm good. The Mimosa wireless solution is no longer offered so I'm looking to use the Ubiquiti Nanostations instead.

 

[wittaj]

The Z12E is not a true LPR camera. It is a camera that you can manually set up to read the plates.

A camera that can read plates is an ANPR or ALPR camera.

I think the new NVRs can read plates if the camera is configured to be able to manually read them, but i dont think it is as accurate as an ANPR camera? I never could get it to work with my neighbors and the Z12E.

 

[bigredfish]

I think only in MetaData mode, not sure how efficient/accurate that is though, not true ANPR. (ANPR by camera only)

If its anything like my little neighborhood it wont matter. Being able to identify a rough time of day, it takes but a few minutes to review video and get a tag assuming you have overview to ID the car (nighttime)

How much traffic do you get at that location? We have a culdesac street with 41 homes and I'll see 200 total in/outs per day normally

 

[Ben Catoe]

hmm, now I'm concerned that I don't have the correct setup. Our HOA has 180 homes with 2 entrances so we have a fair amount of traffic. My plan was to place the cameras on the islands with 1 pointed in and another pointed out (the angles are excellent). The inward facing would get the front of exiting cars and the back of entering cars. The outward facing will get the back of the exiting cars. If need be later, we could add a 3rd overview camera but my hope was that wouldn't be needed. Primarily the usage would be that if someone had a break in or such we would review the footage to give the police the vehicles moving during that time window (description and plates).