Why Are Most Cams Crappy

[rfj]

I have a bunch of HikVision cams like DS-2CD3145F-I, DS-CD3132-I etc. The image quality was kind of bad so I upgraded one of them to a Dahua. I don't recall the model number but it was one recommended on this forum and around $200. There is a pretty big improvement over my HikVision cams. However, it is still pretty bad, especially if it is dark (night time with multiple lights on).

I can buy some pretty good lens for my still camera (SLR if you are old enough to know what that is) for a few hundred dollars and they would to an excellent job in low light. My cell phone is doing a pretty good job in enhancing images (not enough for a security cam but the cell phone uses a VERY tiny lens). So if you combine the two, i.e. bigger glass and technology from cell phone cams I would expect MUCH(!) better results. Why do we not have this for security cameras?

 

[wittaj]

You realize that the sensors in these cameras are still pretty small and probably a lot smaller than your SLR. Some cellphones have the same size sensor or larger than some of these cameras.

However, these cameras are equipped with infrared that the cellphone and SLR camera doesn't have.

The cell phone can produce decent night images of stills with the algorithms in it, but motion will be a blur.

Are you running default/auto settings? These cameras are not plug-n-play and need to be dialed in to your field of view and once that is done, they become capable.

Very few people have enough light at night that the camera will stay in color if you are not on auto/default settings, so you either force it in color and deal with some ghost/blur or run B/W with infrared.

 

[rfj]

Yes, I do see that most cams have very small sensors and lenses. I understand cost is an issue but it shouldn't be that expensive to make those sensors 4x or more bigger which would result in much better images/videos.

My new Dahua cam is color all the time. It's not that I force it to be in color but because where it is located I have a lot of lights (the HikVision did go grayscale, btw). I mostly leave the cameras at their default settings except I increase the I-frame rate a bit so I have a new frame every half second or so. I also set them at the highest data rate. I am somewhat a novice when it comes to cams/Blue Iris so I might be missing something but I somewhat doubt that I could get any good images/videos from those cams.

 

[sebastiantombs]

The "standard" line of thought is to never leave cameras on auto settings. Using a separate profile for day and night, using manual shutter with a range set that is appropriate for those conditions, is the optimal configuration at least in my experience. Usually, since this is surveillance and not Hollyweird movies, a frame rate of 15 and an iframe rate of 15 works well, especially with Blue Iris.

In terms of sensors, while I have no idea what each sensor costs, I do know that prices go up on what seems to be an exponential scale as size increases. Not only are we stuck with a ratio of resolution versus sensor size, but another of sensor cost versus sensor size versus what the market will accept. Add in that there is now a shortage of "chips", including sensors, and things get really messy. There are cameras with 35x35mm sensor and larger available, but bring your check book, a spare arm and your first born young. The camera body starts in the $1500 range, then a lens, then an enclosure. So the total is well past $2000. If that's what you want, that's the reality.

Of course, you could always buy a commercial grade camera like broadcasters use. You know what they cost, and they cost that for a good reason.

 

[wittaj]

The Dahua camera cannot set an i-frame any quicker than 1 per second. If you set FPS at 15 FPS, the lowest you can set iframe is 15. If you change the FPS to 20 FPS, then the lowest iframe you can set is 20FPS.

So if you are running FPS at 15FPS and set an iframe rate of 30, then that is one iframe every 2 seconds.

Almost any camera can stay in color running on default settings. It slows the shutter down to 1/30 or slower. At night change your shutter to 1/120 with a gain of 50 and see if it stays in color without you forcing it.

And then the next question is do you you have the correct camera for the area trying to be covered. A 2.8mm to IDENTIFY someone 40 feet away is the wrong camera regardless of how good the camera is. A 2.8mm camera to IDENTIFY someone within 10 feet is a good choice OR it is an overview camera to see something happened but not be able to identify who.\

But if you have the correct camera for the area you are trying to cover, many of us have shown they are capable cameras.

As @sebastiantombs mentions - there are cameras out there much more capable with bigger sensors, but they are 10 times more expensive and significantly larger. Most of us in a residential setting feel like the cameras are too large to begin with, so I can't see many forking out $2k per camera for one the size of a VW bug LOL. But the varifocals can do a very good job of getting closer to the object optically to get a clean shot.

 

[bp2008]

Higher i-frame rates hurt compression.

 

[looney2ns]

As others have said, cameras are pretty good these days, but they take tuning for each location. This takes time in some case's.
They are heads and shoulders better than the Ring, Nest, Arlo, Wyze cam toy crap.

 

[rfj]

@wittaj indeed you are correct. My Dahua is set at 1 i-frame per second (every 15 frames). I understand the higher the I-frame the higher the bandwith which might increase compression and therefore image quality. I attended some of the BlueIris webinars to optimize my cams but I am still on a learning curve.

 

[The Automation Guy]

Comparing a CCTV camera to a SLR camera isn't really fair. The SLR cameras have much larger sensor sizes. A 1/1.8" chip has an area of approx. 38.20mm. Even a APC sized SLR sensor (smaller than the full size 35mm sensor) has an area of approx. 368–370mm. That's nearly 10x the size. A full size 35mm sensor (full frame) has an area of around 856–864mm.

Obviously that is no comparison. Add to that the fact that SLR lenses are larger and use real glass elements in them and the difference grows even more.

 

[rfj]

Comparing a CCTV camera to a SLR camera isn't really fair. The SLR cameras have much larger sensor sizes. A 1/1.8" chip has an area of approx. 38.20mm. Even a APC sized SLR sensor (smaller than the full size 35mm sensor) has an area of approx. 368–370mm. That's nearly 10x the size. A full size 35mm sensor (full frame) has an area of around 856–864mm.

Obviously that is no comparison. Add to that the fact that SLR lenses are larger and use real glass elements in them and the difference grows even more.

That was kind of my point. I can buy a lens with a lot of glass and an SLR with a big sensor for just a few hundred dollars. So why can't we get cams with like 4x the sensor size and better optics for a couple hundred dollars? My Dahua has a fairly large sensor size compared to other cams but it is still pretty tiny and still gives crappy images (I might be doing something wrong, too but still the image quality is rather questionable).

 

[The Automation Guy]

For starters, I'm willing to bet that the economy of scale is drastically different between SLR cameras and CCTV cameras. I have to assume the number of cameras sold by Nikon or Canon far exceeds the number of CCTV cameras sold by Dahua for example. So you are able to get a better price on something like an SLR camera because of the volume of sales the company does. Add to that the fact that the number of models manufactured by a CCTV producers is far greater than a camera company like Nikon or Canon and it doesn't help the CCTV prices.

 

[looney2ns]

That was kind of my point. I can buy a lens with a lot of glass and an SLR with a big sensor for just a few hundred dollars. So why can't we get cams with like 4x the sensor size and better optics for a couple hundred dollars? My Dahua has a fairly large sensor size compared to other cams but it is still pretty tiny and still gives crappy images (I might be doing something wrong, too but still the image quality is rather questionable).

If you want better cams, then purchase a Sony or Axis cam. Be ready to mortgage your house.

 

[rfj]

For starters, I'm willing to bet that the economy of scale is drastically different between SLR cameras and CCTV cameras. I have to assume the number of SLR cameras sold by Nikon or Canon far exceeds the number of CCTV cameras sold by Dahua for example. So you are able to get a better price on something like an SLR camera because of the volume of sales the company does. Add to that the fact that the number of models manufactured by a CCTV producers is far greater than a camera company like Nikon or Canon and it doesn't help the CCTV prices.

You probably have a point here. People want to get 8-16 cameras with a DVR for $500-1000 from Costco so they can record crappy videos recording how people steal stuff from them but have no proper video to identify the person, It is surprising there is no middle ground, though, i.e. a camera with better IQ in the range of some $200-$300.

 

[sebastiantombs]

See post number 4. Cameras like that are available, just go ahead and order one.