Need input on camera options for this doorway

[RevJoe]

So I am trying to find a camera option, with either 2.8 or 3.6 mm Lens and mounting position for my doorway. The goal is to keep an eye on packages and catch faces on walk up. Packages are normally left against the bench side wall and window to the left of the door. I know for facial/id 8 feet or lower is best not sure how I am dealing with mounting to the brick. I am thinking turret style cam, leaning towards a 3.6 lens but concerned about the FOV and blind spot of the 3.6 based on the IPVM calc. I could be missing it but I don't think the calc allows you to simulate corridor mode thus my conundrum. Wiring will come from above. The entryway light is normally on motion sensor at night, but we may switch to a LED day/night sensor bulb and leave on all night. I did not think to measure out the height of the light for comparison, but should be about 7'. I'll try to replace the last pic with a daytime one. There will be other cameras out front covering the approaches as well.

My original thought was the right hand corner as viewed facing out of the entryway at about 7' using a 4mm Lens. Plan to run conduit from overhead in the corner to the camera mount position rather then go through brick or deal with the window frames. With downward angel to try and capture most of the space between the left hand window and bench etc. the Space is 8'4"W x 17'D x 9.5'H. I been playing with different lens and FOV on IPVM but I did not have alot of luck narrowing it down. At one point I thought 67d FOV and tilt of 12d with a 3.6mm lens for 5' blind spot. I think that gives me the package view but loses the facial view around the near end of the bench. But I think that would be sufficient for the porch thieves. How does corridor view effect the blind spot? If multi-imagers were cheaper I think one of them would be the ideal solution.

 

[RevJoe]

So If I want I camera to work with Blue Iris, that does motion detection/line crossing etc I need one that supports ONVIF Profile T correct? Would this space benefit more using a 2MP 4MP, or 4K camera? Some of the ones I was looking at at come in a variety of offerings, Still trying to sort out how the corridor blind spot is effected using lens between 2.8-4mm. I am hoping to have a list to post this weekend for feedback.

 

[samplenhold]

Welcome and sorry no one has answered you on this post. Just saw it now.

Not sure how you can use the IPVM calculator to get a design of your doorway? Post one of the ones that you did.

Have you read the Cliff Notes?

My front door has a similar layout to yours, two side light windows, recessed door area, brick.


What I have done is to mount cams looking through the windows with IR turned off. I have very good night lighting, just above the door you can see a spot that is 5000k at 1750 lumens. It comes on at dusk and off at dawn. You can see them mounted here. See the shots from the high mounted one also. The cams are Dahua IPC-HDBW4231FP-AS in 3.6mm. The night shot is not as good due to the window needing to be cleaned.


I am presently going to install a Dahua IPC-T5442TM-AS in 2.8mm facing back from the post on the right to pick up anyone coming back from the door and pick up the window along the left side of the house. These are the current good low-light turrets and are 4MP on a 1/1.8" sensor and come in 2.8, 3.6, and 6mm lenses. A varifocal has just become available also, but is more expensive.

Any of these Dahua cams will work in BI. I have 19 Dahua cams that I bought from @EMPIRETECANDY and they are all in BI.

Using 4K (8MP) cams will not give you good night color. Too many pixels on a small sensor.

You are better off mounting your cams at 5-6' to get a good face shot. Light at night is your friend. Motion activated can be problematic as the cams need to adjust to the light coming on and can miss a lot when that happens.

 

[Tekbotslaya]

Varifocal may be your best bet, that way you can play around with it and dial it in exactly to your liking. A bit more money of course but can come in handy testing focal lengths for other future cameras.
IPC-T5442T-ZE is worth looking at.

 

[RevJoe]

Thanks for the input, your making me think now about a cam on the inside like that. IPVM calc was just helping me with the camera details not the actual view, because I did not see away to simulate a corridor view. Lens size, fov, and some basic details facial recognition distance factors. Your cam looks like it is 4-5 feet high, but whats with the one at ground level? I am eyeballing the 4231. So nice to see some actually pics form one especially from a space that is similar to mine.

I guess my other question is are the empiretecandy cams gray market? I kind of got lost one that.
I was looking at some cams over on Nelly's Security, also at SCW, and then I was reading about a bunch of the brouhaha with ONVIF and Dahua and Hik. I figured OEM might be the safe way to go for firmware support if I understood the ONVIF aspect.
I am actually looking at using a varifocal out on the corner of the porch cover to point at the mailbox, its about 70' and slightly down hill about 12d. I want to be able to see faces out there, as we have had issues.
Had not thought about a varifocal for the entryway.

 

[samplenhold]

Your cam looks like it is 4-5 feet high, but whats with the one at ground level?

So it is at about 5'9" high. One on each side of the door. I also mounted one at about 18" pointing up and out.


This view is facing south and depending on the time of day and season, the sun can interfere with the quality of the video. Having multiple cams there ensures I get a good shot. Before I mounted those, I used a 5231 varifocal turret to calculate the proper lens and to give me an idea of what I could expect for quality. I was concerned about placing the cams behind a window, with reflections and all. Having curtains behind them made a difference. One does need to keep the windows clean.

The cams that @EMPIRETECANDY sells are not grey market. They are current models with English firmware and are upgradeable. If you are worried about that, you could buy them off of his Amazon storefront. I order directly from him so that it does not deplete his USA stock. He gives a little discount for IPCAMTALK members.

Nelly's Security is another IPCAMTALK vendor. I have never ordered from them, but others here have.

reading about a bunch of the brouhaha with ONVIF and Dahua and Hik

Not sure what you mean on this. Unless you are talking about the cams phoning home and can be hacked. The way to prevent that is to not allow cams access to the internet. Mine are on a separate sub-net on my LAN and that sub-net is physically separated from my modem/router. They have no physical route to the internet.

When I started here almost two years ago, I was given advice to start small. So I bought one varifocal cam and used it to test locations and help me decide what cam models would be best for a particular situation/location. I have 19 Dahuas spread out over 10 models. Each cam has a specific job to do and I chose each cam for the best fit for that job. This has become a hobby for me. My initial design has changed several times as I learned more about cams and what the options were. Also, as incidents happened in my neighborhood, it made me rethink my designs. We get door checkers here and while I have not had a problem, they have checked my doors, always locked. But I have provided footage to local law enforcement and they have used my stuff to ID a perp and arrest him.

 

[samplenhold]

The nice thing about varifocals is you can dial it in, within it's range, to exactly what you like. But that comes with a trade off. Varifocals are a little bit bigger, usually have a little bit less of low-light capability due to them having a larger F-stop (number, smaller lens opening), and cost more.

 

[RevJoe]

The ONVIF stuff I was referring to has to do with them US Banning there products, but as I understand it OEM products that are based on Dahua and Hik products are not banned if I read things correctly. The way I understand it is ONVIF will be dropping them from membership on the release of the next compatibility testings tool. I don't believe that tool has been release yet, they will not be allowed to certify there cameras for ONVIF compatibility afterwards. But can continue to do so until the next release, but like I said if I understood things correctly OEMs who use Dahua or Hik to produce their cameras would be able to continue to certifying ONVIF compatibility.

 

[samplenhold]

The ban is for government contracts. I do not know about ONVIF and really do not care about that. Their cams work with BI and will so in the future I am sure. Just because they will not be 'allowed' to certify them does not mean that they will not be compatible.

 

[RevJoe]

Thoughts on the Hik EXIR LED tech? I was looking at some of the NSC-2X4G-DM 4MP WDR EXIR Turret IP Security Camera from Nelly's for some of my coverage areas.

 

[RevJoe]

So after looking at my windows at the entry way I really cannot do a cam on the inside unless its at the bottom of the window and point it up. Something to play with thought once I narrow my choices down. I have a short list for this camera, and I looking at the colorvu and dahua 5442 for the the front, still need to shorten my varifocal options for the mailbox, and decide on a cams for the back and side. I think the option for the front might work for the side as well as they will point towards the front. But the back might be a pain. Probably try out the options I use for the front back there first before I settle on a camera for that area.

Do all the EXIR use a LED or is there a difference between EXIR and EXIR LED. I did not get a lot of hits on IPCAMTalk for EXIR LED. Still have some links to read through, but I thoguth a video I watched showed that the powered by dark fighter use EXIR, and I was not impressed with the powered by DF cams.

 

[samplenhold]

Do all the EXIR use a LED or is there a difference between EXIR and EXIR LED

I know nothing about Hik cams. I have not used any cam with LED lights.

 

[RevJoe]

So I think for the doorway I am going to try out the IPC-HDBW4231FP-AS 3.6mm lens, I think I saw something about a new version recently identified as -2AS? I don't recall seeing any videos/pic on it though.

For my large area coverage I looking at trying one of these, still narrowing it down:
Hik ColorVu T2347G1 4mm Lens
Dahua IPC-T5442TM-AS 4mm lens
Loryta OEM IPC- T2347G 4mm lens
And I also saw something about Nelly's have a version of the T2347, called nitecolor.
I need to view some more video to decide between the T2347 and the T5442.

For Varifocal I am looking at the following:
IPC-B5442E-ZE
IPC-HFW2831T-ZS 8 MP WDR
IPC-HDW2431R-ZS 4MP
DS-2CD2H23G0-IZS 4K
*But I also noted folks said to look at the 5831 and 1831. My narrowed focus of interest is about 80 feet.
Also on the note of Varifocal, do you guys like the turret more then the bullet? or is it about mounting? Preferable the turret would work better for me as I would be mostly mounting to soffits.

So from what I have seen none of the cameras mentioned above have issues with BI or did I miss something? I know folks at Nelly's told me most H series is used a lot with BI, not sure yet where the nitecolor falls at in their product line I assume the H series.

 

[samplenhold]

I really recommend that you first purchase a varifocal cam and use a test rig to decide what fixed lens options work best in each area before you buy them.

 

[RevJoe]

So I got a varifocal, took some images, I won't be able to mount a camera inside looking out through the window, too much glare occurred during my testing of view options, so now I am looking to mount a camera
like this: This was taken with the 5442 varifocal turret. WIth my dusk tell dawn lights the night shot are pretty good to, this shot is about a 25% zoom on the varifocal. I need to crawl into my attic and see what type of access I have to route wire into the small amount of wood framing of the windows and doorway here. Trying to aviod going through the brick if I can.

 

[RevJoe]

Final positions of my cameras, I have 4 total, a varifocal, 2.8, 3.4, and 6, these are all 5442s. . I put a ssd card in the 3 critical ones, but I am currently doing 24/7 continuous recording with BlueIris, in daytime mode. Default settings except for the zoom on the varifocal. And using the Sept Firmware. I plan to play around with the scheduling, I feel like I need to tweak for the nighttime for the lighting some. And then I want to set up alerts for line crossing or motion in certain areas, Still on the fence about opening up my network up with a incoming VPN so we can view the cams when away from the house.