Posted: 9/11/2012 10:31:15 AM EDT
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I'm up to four cameras on the outside of my house, and the shortcomings of $80 cameras are beginning to make themselves apparent.
The poor handing of contrast is perhaps the biggest disappointment. Take my front porch camera. It is pointed at my driveway as well as my front porch, which offers the advantage of seeing both the cars that drive up and the people that approach my front door. Problem is, during the early part of the day the porch is completely shaded while the driveway receives full sun. The bright, white driveway lessens the exposure, resulting in a uselessly dark picture of my porch. When people walk up to the door, all I see are dark, shadowy figures. The all-around picture is pretty good during other parts of the day (nighttime, too). I have also added an opposite facing camera aimed towards the house, mitigating some of the issues I have with the outward facing camera. But on the whole, during sunny days, shadowy areas covered by my cameras offer no valuable footage. Just thought I'd share the insight, as well as ask about better cameras that handle contrast more appropriately. |
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You might need a camera with WDR (Wide dynamic range).
http://www.2mcctv.com/product_info-VeiluxVD70DNL2812D.html I bought 6 of these to put in our church and school where I have glass and harsh ourdoor lighting with dim interior lighting. For the money, I am extremely pleased. These are made for interior use though, not exterior. |
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Quoted:
You might need a camera with WDR (Wide dynamic range). http://www.2mcctv.com/product_info-VeiluxVD70DNL2812D.html I bought 6 of these to put in our church and school where I have glass and harsh ourdoor lighting with dim interior lighting. For the money, I am extremely pleased. These are made for interior use though, not exterior. Thanks. I still have four more channels on the DVR, so that might be something to consider in the future. |
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Have you considered the people on your porch may actually be dark and shadowy? Snicker... At night the infrared LEDs make people's eyes glow just like in your avatar. The other night my daughter asked me to walk around in the back yard like a zombie while she watched on the TV, and I happily obliged. 
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Meh, not bad cheap cameras. I'm finding it hard to believe you can't adjust for the contrast issues in the DVR settings. Who makes your DVR. I got the DVR from the Apex CCTV, same place I got the dome cameras. Actually, I'm not really sure that I want to dick with the exposure settings. If I increase the exposure when the front porch is shaded I'll just end up blowing out the sunlit driveway area. I'm really just venting, here. Cameras will have their limitations. I'll probably just have to live with the fact the harsh shadows are going to f with my picture during certain times of the day. |
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Quoted: Quoted: Meh, not bad cheap cameras. I'm finding it hard to believe you can't adjust for the contrast issues in the DVR settings. Who makes your DVR. I got the DVR from the Apex CCTV, same place I got the dome cameras. Actually, I'm not really sure that I want to dick with the exposure settings. If I increase the exposure when the front porch is shaded I'll just end up blowing out the sunlit driveway area. I'm really just venting, here. Cameras will have their limitations. I'll probably just have to live with the fact the harsh shadows are going to f with my picture during certain times of the day. So that DVR won't let you adjust setting for the individual cameras/channels? That is very rare these days if that is the case. I had the same problem you did with settings on my Geovision system. There were just to many to mess with when I first got it and I didn't really want to mess with it. Once I took a couple of days to really dig into the system and get it setup correctly, I was much happier with what I had to work with. I have been constantly upgrading my cameras with newer and better technology. I started out buying the cheap 30 dollar cameras for my system. I recently purchased 3 of these and I am extremely impressed with their performance. http://www.123securityproducts.com/ldm-20s.html One thing to remember, don't rely on the built in infrared emitters to light the area you are trying to cover. Make sure you have additional lighting (non LED) available as well. The only reason I purchase cameras with IR is for backup purposes only. My system has a battery backup that will carry it 1.5 days without power. |
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One thing to remember, don't rely on the built in infrared emitters to light the area you are trying to cover. Make sure you have additional lighting (non LED) available as well. The only reason I purchase cameras with IR is for backup purposes only. My system has a battery backup that will carry it 1.5 days without power. I've been thinking about a UPS for my system. What are you using? |
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Quoted: It's a homebuilt system built using 6v batteries that were removed from a data center. I use two of the 6v batteries(in series, 12v) to power the cameras central power supply and then 6 in series parallel, to power an inverter for the DVR computer.Quoted: One thing to remember, don't rely on the built in infrared emitters to light the area you are trying to cover. Make sure you have additional lighting (non LED) available as well. The only reason I purchase cameras with IR is for backup purposes only. My system has a battery backup that will carry it 1.5 days without power. I've been thinking about a UPS for my system. What are you using? |
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I had the Lorex and hated it. I have sone similar to those others and I had a similar problem when I put them in my warehouse, I can see the shadows just fine, but go blind when they look through an exterior door. |
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I've had good luck with security cams from Empire Security Cameras. Good prices, good tech.
Sony Effio-P chips http://empiresecuritycameras.com/ |
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I have 4 night owls(came with the system), and so far, have added 2 swan dome style cameras. The swan cameras handle color and contrast far better than the night owls. Additionally, they have a much clearer night time image. For the money, the swan cameras aren't bad.
ETA....The system has been up for less than a year and one of the night owl cameras seems to already be dying a slow death. |