IR Security Cam with Flood Light

[sdillinger]

I am considering the Ubiquiti AirCam (google 'airvision). It looks like a great camera, but is missing IR. I plan to use it along the side of my house where there is a motion sensing flood light. Will the flood give me enough light to not need the IR?

Thanks for the help!

 

[tmbrown97]

That really depends on what you're after. So far the first version of their NVR is a bit buggy and won't stay running long enough for me to be able to get a good test of the motion sensing - but I access the web-cam directly and leave the stream up all the time on my office computer just to see what's going on outside.

At night, I have two CFL's - one on either side of the driveway, putting out like 75W equivalent each... and a fairly well-lit street - and at night it's fine for getting a general feel for what's going on, but won't do law enforcement any good.

Here's a shot at night:

These things do have changeable lenses - and someone on the ubiquiti forum tried putting in a non-IR filtered lense - and it worked at night, but couldn't handle the daytime anymore (colors were washed out and picture was bad). I suppose for the cost, you could do a day one and a night one? Or wait until that product evolves a bit. I have one of those non-IR and wider-angle lenses to try, but don't often have the big ladder out to try - and after seeing the other poster's results, I'm not in any hurry... I may need to order a wider-angled lens that still has the IR filter (I felt the lense was a bit too narrow for my tastes... At least for what I'm doing with it, I need a wider angle - luckily this can be changed out)

I sell ubiquiti products, and bought this one for testing... I have a client who only needs day-time viewing, and for that they're fine - or for indoor; but for night time they're just not the right solution - there are far better ones out there. Hopefully their future products will include a solution for night viewing.

 

[Kevin L]

Welcome to CocoonTech!

I wrestled with a lot of decisions on video surveillance before setting up my system, including IR vs non-IR cameras. I decided not to do IR. One reason is I'm in SW Florida, and IR attracts flying insects that drive motion detection nuts. Instead, I went with day/night cams with mechanical IR-cut filters and d/n lenses. A great place for research is CCTV Forum.

Here are pics taken the last 24 hours from one of my cams. These are JPEGs that are emailed, so the resolution is lower than the recorded video. The only lights on (besides the headlights from the passing car) are two coach lights at the garage (you can see one of them). These lights have one 100W incandescant bulb set to 50% dim level.


Front Cam at Mid-Afternoon


Front Cam at Night

HTH,
Kevin

 

[jskibo]

What Cam is that?

 

[Kevin L]

IQEye 753, a 3.1MP day/night cam in a Pelco outdoor enclosure.

 

[sdillinger]

Thanks for the welcome Kevin. Long time (years) lurker.

What accounts for the difference between your night shot and work2play's night shot. You have a 100 watt bulb vs his 75 watt, but I assume that isn't making much of a difference. Is it the IR cut filter?

The camera specs look great- the price is tough (around $600 online). Of course the security cameras I see in big box stores look like they would fall apart if you breathed on them wrong.

Also, which Pelco enclosure are you using for that camera? Is it powered?

Thanks!

 

[jskibo]

Grabbed an older IQeye3 to play with.....

 

[Kevin L]

Thanks for the welcome Kevin. Long time (years) lurker.

What accounts for the difference between your night shot and work2play's night shot. You have a 100 watt bulb vs his 75 watt, but I assume that isn't making much of a difference. Is it the IR cut filter?

The camera specs look great- the price is tough (around $600 online). Of course the security cameras I see in big box stores look like they would fall apart if you breathed on them wrong.

Also, which Pelco enclosure are you using for that camera? Is it powered?

Thanks!

I'm not familiar with cameras being discussed, but I saw webcam mentioned, and that is an entirely different class than what I'm using. Since it's a true day/night megapixel camera with cut filter and day/night lens, I expect that is the difference in quality. The IR cut filter is what makes the difference in daytime quality. If you have a night lens only, it won't look good in day (washed out strange colors).

Yes, they are pretty expensive. This is the only 753 I have, but I do have three 752s outside (same cam except 2MP) and a 1.2MP dome cam on the front porch. I need to add one or two more to have complete coverage outside.

I use the Pelco EH1512 mounts for the cameras. They are powered and have heaters and blowers, but I don't use any of that. My cams are POE and in SW Florida, no need for the heaters. I do use the sun shield for most of them.

Kevin

 

[Kevin L]

Grabbed an older IQeye3 to play with.....

I like the IQEye cams. They are not the highest-rated cams, but they are easy to work with and you don't have to log in to access the video from a browser. I have some Acti cams that require you to log in, a bit of a pain.

Have fun with the cam.

Kevin

 

[jskibo]

I like the IQEye cams. They are not the highest-rated cams, but they are easy to work with and you don't have to log in to access the video from a browser. I have some Acti cams that require you to log in, a bit of a pain.

Have fun with the cam.

Kevin

Thanks Kevin. $150 for it with a new lens seemed like a good deal (still in box). No log in? Just assign it a port and view?

 

[Kevin L]

Thanks Kevin. $150 for it with a new lens seemed like a good deal (still in box). No log in? Just assign it a port and view?

That's it. Assign a port and set your router to forward to it. Type your WAN IP and cam port in any browser and you're connected. You still have to log in to get into setup, and you can set a login requirement for viewing, too. My feeling is that my exterior video is nothing that anyone can't see if they were passing by. Plus, the chances of anyone knowing my WAN IP and port number is fairly slim.

Kevin