Super wide angle camera suggestion

[Michael James]

Not sure where to post this .. I have Dahua and Amcrest installed right now. I'm looking for a really high resolution night camera that will span a large area from house to street.
180 degree, maybe something that uses 2 lenses and splicing technology?

1) Screenshot 2023-03-15 is what I want covered
2) Attachment 20230315 is current view using Amcrest ASH22 model
3) Night ASH22: Shows night

The ASH22 has 102 degree FOV and I'm not getting great resolution out of it. Would be nice to get a camera that could read a license plate and have wider angle.
I have power to the location and I have Ethernet to the location both. So I can go either way.
The ethernet cable goes down into the garage where I have a mesh node.
I need sound to hear whats going on. Strongly prefer built in sound for listening. Dont need 2 way talk necessarily.
And I cant use white light into the street... only IR for night vision

let me know your thoughts here.

 

[Mike A.]

Would be nice to get a camera that could read a license plate and have wider angle.

Kind of opposing objectives. You'd really need two cameras: one for wider overview, one dedicated for plates.

 

[wittaj]

That throws the 180 degree cameras out as they cannot see infrared.

I would think most 2.8mm cameras will get you the width you are trying to cover.

But as pointed out, 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.

 

[Michael James]

Would an really high res non PTZ pick up enough image so you could blow up the image to see the license plate. License plate image isnt actuall a must just a nice to have. Let me throw a few out here and get your opinion.:

Amcrest Night Color AI Bullet IP PoE Camera w/ 164ft Full Color Nightvision, Security IP Camera Outdoor, Built-in Microphone, Face Detection, Human & Vehicle Detection, 4K@30fps IP8M-TB2886EW-AI

IPC-PFW5849-A180-E2-ASTE (dahuasecurity.com)

 

[wittaj]

NOPE.

That is not the way it works.

You need OPTICAL zoom, not DIGITAL zoom.

A 2.8mm or 3.6mm lens is great for IDENTIFY at 15ish feet, but beyond that you need a different focal length. Those are two great cameras you picked out, but it won't get plates other than those within 20 feet of the camera on your driveway if it is parked.

Digital zoom only works in the movies and on TV.

You would need a camera OPTICALLY zoomed to a field of view not much bigger than this red box:




You may get away with a little digital zoom in the day, 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 lots of examples.


Here is a great example of two images taken at the same time (early AM while still dark out) of the same person 60 feet away from just slightly different angles - one from the 5442-ZE 4MP set to 3.6mm that I digitally zoomed to make the person about the same size as the person in the 2MP varifocal optically zoomed.

So think of this compared to a plate. Notice how you can read some of the stickers in the optically zoomed image, and it is just a blur in the digitally zoomed image.

The digitally zoomed image can't be used for much.

Now compare this to a 2MP that is OPTICALLY zoomed.

In case someone cannot figure it out, the 4MP that is digitally zoomed in is the B&W picture and the 2MP varifocal optically zoomed in is the color picture LOL. I think everyone will say the 2MP that is OPTICALLY zoomed beats a higher MP that is DIGITALLY zoomed.


See this thread on the importance of focal length (optical zoom) versus MP. Most of us here only use 2MP for plate reading, and you can even use 720P or D1 resolution if the camera has enough optical zoom.

The Importance of Focal Length over MP in camera selection

At the urging of several folks here, I created a thread to show the importance of focal length and how focal length can be more important than megapixels (MP). I mentioned some of this in the post regarding The Hookup’s latest video demonstrating different cameras, including one sold from a...

ipcamtalk.com

 

[Michael James]

Are there any cameras that optically zoom with a super wide angle?

 

[wittaj]

Super wide and optically zoom don't really go together.

A varifocal is designed as a set it and forget it type camera. They are designed for the install where the user isn't sure what focal length is needed. They typically start around the 2.8mm focal length field of view.

A PTZ is designed for going in and out with zoom, but I wouldn't really call it a super wide angle as the bigger ones will start around a 7mm focal length.

 

[looney2ns]

New to LPR? Considerations Before You Begin | IP Cam Talk

 

[Michael James]

Thanks everyone. Have another question. I have this PTZ camera out front (Dahua):
Loryta Outdoor 4MP Starlight 25X Optical Zoom IR PTZ Smart AI IP Camera Support Auto-Tracking, PoE+,Perimeter Protection,Face Detection,Smart Capture SD49425XB-HNR

Is there any way to change the tracking time to lock onto a target? Once locked onto a target I want it to zoom in faster.

 

[Michael James]

Also, for those who use Dahua PTZ's.. do these attachments look right?
On pic 1, how do these settings look?
On pic 2, look at the blue box around the picture frame (Rule)..is that too close to the edges?

Its not tracking cars very well. Sometimes it looks at the car and doesnt lock in. Sometimes locks in but doesnt follow. Many times its to late to lock onto the car at all.. it tries to find it then returns to Preset 1 almost immediately.

 

[wittaj]

A couple of things I noticed.

First, it is a matter of getting the brightness/contrast and target ratio settings correct

You need to adjust gamma and the others as well.

I always knew that you shouldn't chase a bright picture - it looks nice and people migrate towards a brighter TV for example, but upon closer examination, most images need to be toned down in order to get all the details. You will be surprised how much changing a parameter like gamma could impact tracking. For example, if you have a pesky tree or something in the middle of the view during an autotrack, just by changing some image parameters you can get autotrack to pass it. Making the image a little darker at night actually helped with tracking someone across the street, which was opposite of what I thought you would think to do. So add some contrast to your image and see if it improves.

I have a yard lamp post that more times than not autotrack would get stuck on it as someone was walking and the autotrack would only go so far. Because my image has soo much contrast (bright white concrete a third, blacktop road a third, grass a third), knocking down the gamma made the lamp post not be so "trackable" lol, and along with that I turned of PFA and that gave it just enough time to retrack the person walking past the lamp post. The camera may still autotrack the lamp post when a small kid goes by, but an adult it is autotracking past the lamp post. Most see better results if the contrast number is 8-10 higher than the brightness number.

Your intrusion box is too large and too perpendicular to the motion, especially a vehicle coming from the right.

Ideally for an intrusion box or tripwires, you should have the initial field of view be such that the camera doesn't have to initially pan too much up/down or left/right to get the object in the center of the screen to start tracking. The closer the object is to the center of the image, the better the chance that it will track correctly. An entire Field of View intrusion box can cause it to latch on to the wrong item, as can a tripwire to far on the left or right.

So what happens is what you are experiencing where it doesn't track and sometimes the initial track may wonder off to nowhere. The reason it starts looking upward or left or right is usually because the intrusion box is too big or the tripwire isn't close to the center so the camera identifies the object before it is in the center of the field of view and then sometimes something else matches the "algorithm signature" of the initial object and then starts trying to track something that isn't there. Adjusting the field of view and the locations of the IVS rules to be closer to the center can fix that.

Autotracking PTZs are great, but they have limitations like everything else. Installed in a wrong location or using default/auto settings or with fields of view that do not give it a chance will be problematic.