Putting front-door Camera in Attic

[IVB]

I have a 1-floor house with very easy access to the attic, which has blown-in insulation directly on top of the wood/plaster&lathe ceiling that I have.

In an attempt to maintain WAF but still have a front-door camera, i've opted to get this Sony HAD CCD camera and ideally mount it in the attic just above the front door. That way I can drill a small hole, put the camera up against that, hopefully get a good image.

In my uneducated world, I think I have 2 issues that I need to determine:
1) Dust/etc from the blown-in insulation. To remediate this, i was going to get a plastic box to house the camera.
2) Heat from attic & the plastic box above. To remediate this, i was going to get a small 60mm CPU fan, cutout the plastic box so it would fit, and vent the air out. I obviously can't blow air in to cool it off as that air would have insulation particles in it.

Should I have any other concerns? Would my 2 remediation steps work? Am I throwing away $150?

I don't know how else to get a front-door camera without destroying WAF. I've seen some embedded front-door cameras, but they seem pretty visible & obtrusive.

 

[Rupp]

If you mount the camera below the insulation then you shouldn't have to worry about the attic heat.

 

[WayneW]

Are you mounting it on the interior or exterior side of the front door? If doing it on the exterior side (out in the entryway or eaves) then you shouldn't have insulation to worry about so you could just use a coffee can or something to keep any blown insulation away. and that camera should only get warm at night when the IR LEDs are on, so I am not sure the cooling fan is required, but it probably wouldn't hurt.

 

[markthomas]

If you mount the camera below the insulation then you shouldn't have to worry about the attic heat.

Yeah. That's what I was thinking. If you use more insulation, you won't need the fan at all.

 

[pkoslow]

IVB,

Aside from the environmental & insulation concerns, can you get an acceptable angle of view when mounting the camera overhead?

While better than nothing, I'd be concerned that you'll only be getting video of the tops of heads unless you can get a bit of an angle on the camera?

Paul

 

[ver0776]

Put it like 6' off to the side, so you are looking down from the side, so you will see faces.

For that matter, put it 25' off to the side and use a long distance lens. (on lower end cameras you can get a telescopic lens for $30).

Point is, are you stuck to the space above the door?

I cut out my doorbell and used a bulletcam in that space. There are also peephole cams, but running wires can be real hard/expensive... The doorbell was easy except people kept poking it and broke the outer casing glass...

Vaughn

 

[Rupp]

If it's an extremely wide angle camera it should work. Here's a shot of my camera mounted in the ceiling of my porch in the very corner and pointing down.

 

[IVB]

Thanks for the replies.

I neglected to mention that I have a "mud room", which is basically california-speak for an entry way. I also have an outer-door, which the salespeople tend to ignore, and an inner door.

Hence I can't mount the camera outside/off to the side. You guys bring up a good point; i should hold it up to see what kind of angle i'd get, to see if it's even worthwhile.

It's not as easy to solve this problem in a WAF-acceptable fashion as I originally thought...