insects and surveillance cameras?

wkearney99

wkearney99

Senior Member
Now that the weather's improving, the bugs are back.  I'm noticing a fair bit of noise on the IR cameras from the bugs flitting around the camera.  Apparently they're either drawn to the heat of the unit or the IR light.  
 
I'm not running anything fancy here, just a Swann D1 setup and the Pro-640 cameras.  
 
I ask because it's annoying to not be able to utilize at least some bit of the DVR's motion detection features.  I've already tighten up the sensitivity regions and re-aimed the cameras a bit.  The bugs tend to flit across the upper region of the screen and I can crop that out of the detection zone.  
 
What're the options on minimizing this?  Are there any analog day/night cameras out there that are less problematic for this? 
 
I'm not expecting miracles, I realize there are limits to what a relatively simply box like this can accomplish.  I don't depend on it for notifications nor is it directly involved in the security system.  It's just the noise tends to trigger recording and eventually enough of the false alarms makes it a hassle to find legit sequences later.
 
Here I have multiple analog and IP cameras outside.  The IP cameras outside are now all HD.  Some have IR night illumination and others do not.
 
The older legacy Optex combo cameras do not have IR illumination and they have always worked fine with the ambient outdoor lighting in my small court today. 
 
I do see "bug" issues with the IR IP HD cameras.  I do not see any bug issues with night views of the IP HD cameras that are using external IR Illumination.
 
My favorite IP cameras today are my DIY combos using Grandstream based OS's and fitted inside of the Speco outdoor rated domes.  I have configured these with IR illumination and mostly keep it off.
 
You can shut off the IR illumination on the newest IP HD cameras and add external IR illumination to give it a try yourself. 
 
The lighting is inexpensive these days.
 
Good point about using external IR illumination.  I'll have to look into that.  Any tips on units that worked well, or warnings of what to avoid?
 
Outside stuff utilized to trigger this and that.  Its more than just PIR stuff these days.  
 
The LED illuminators do not utilize much electricity; heck you can even use a battery and solar charger for one panel today and control it wirelessly.  The old stuff is expensive because it can be.  The technology is cheap though.
 
I personally like the "daylight" look at 3 AM in the morning.  This is personally the least invasive and most effective.  But that is me.
 
wkearney99 said:
Apparently they're either drawn to the heat of the unit or the IR light.  
Click to expand...
 
It would be interesting to know which of the two it is.  I know you can buy LED emitters in at least two commonly available but different frequencies.  Of the two, one is outside the range of human perception, and the other is very dimly visible (or maybe the emitted frequency cutoff isn't very sharp).   So, if the bugs are attracted to the IR light, maybe they can see one frequency but not the other?  It's a long shot, but a little wikipedia research might suggest whether there's any hope for the approach. 
 
Unless you have the need to be covert, why not just leverage your existing outdoor lighting that's in the visible spectrum?  It also helps deter typical bad guys rather than merely aid in surveiling them.  I got more than 4 years of life out of a typical compact fluorescent bulb, and of course LED bulbs are cheap now and will last even longer and cost even less to operate.
 
Alternately, maybe use so called "bug lights" for outdoor illumination?  Never tried one, but aren't they supposed to attract fewer flying insects?
 
I prefer to avoid bringing up the exterior lighting as it's too much most of the time.  There's a balancing act to be maintained.  In an area with crime problems it'd be well worth using the visible spectrum lighting as a deterrent measure.  Lighting the place up like the face of the sun would also serve to let neighbors also know something's up and allow them to possibly witness the activity.  But in a low-crime suburban environment bringing up the outside spots might be more annoying than useful.  
 
The most typical problem we get trivial stuff like unlocked cars being rifled through.  Having video of the attempt is sometimes more useful than just scaring people away.   But it also picks up stuff like foxes and other wildlife roaming through unexpectedly.  Trouble is finding those clips among the avalanche of false alarms due to bugs is a hassle.
 
So I don't "need" to be covert, but it's useful, interesting and sometimes entertaining.
 
It doesn't get talked about nearly as much now that surveillance cameras can be picked up at any box store or fry's - but when it was still at item more just for pros, it was generally advised to avoid the all in one cameras with IR and stick with external emitters just for these reasons.  Otherwise it ends up being a bit of a PM item to walk around and dust the webs off your cameras fairly regularly.  The problem is, of the normal affordable cameras available I don't see many that are compatible with IR light that don't have it built in (ie: intended to use external illumination).
 
With most cameras and software however you can adjust the sensitivity so that something like a little bug won't trigger it but hopefully something larger like a person would - of course a spider crawling across the lens *looks* huge so that only gets you so far.
 
Personally I enjoy watching those little buggers at night; sort of soothing in a distracting sort of way....
 
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