Cameras for home monitoring

[c64]

I want to install few cameras in different areas around the house (outside). Never done it before. Total cameras needed I think around 8.

After searching the internets I think this should work.
- Router in the center of the house, Just plain standard home wifi router everybody have at home.
- Two unmanaged network switches (with PoE) located in each half of the house and connected to the router
- Four IP cameras (PoE) connected to each switch
- Dedicated computer/laptop connected to the router

No cloud crap required

All connections are wired. As I understand having Wi-Fi for this setup is not a good idea, right?

What software do I install on the computer? Prefer open source. Just want to view cameras individually or all together. Maybe record 24/7 as well. Cameras probably will be cheap without any ability to control them (no pan/tilt etc)

What keywords do I use when looking for cameras? IP camera / RTSP / ONVIF / anything else ?

Does it make sense to buy Network video recorder? Will NVR with 4 LAN inputs support 8 cameras like in my setup (with network switches in between)

[Dan123456]

A good first question to ask yourself is, how serious do you want your security camera system to be / what role do you see it playing in the over all defence of your home and property?

I.e. do you have any reason to believe your home could be a high value target and want it to be always functional 24/7, even when the power goes out? Or more just something just to keep an eye out when you are away / something you can review on the rare occasion something were to happen?

Of course we all think of our homes and stuff as high value (and rightfully so) but what I mean by that is do you have any rare / extremely valuable cars, piles of gold bullion or million dollar artwork etc. in your home? Or do you live in a high crime area and expect someone breaking in to not be out of the question and want the resolution to be high enough to be able to identify the person even in pitch black darkness?

Obviously don’t answer that here but it is always good to just evaluate how strong each layer of your home’s security systems need to be so you can budget for and design a system to suit your needs 

[c64]

Or more just something just to keep an eye out when you are away / something you can review on the rare occasion something were to happen?

This. I think it's safe to say I have less valuable items than average person in this country

[Dan123456]

Or more just something just to keep an eye out when you are away / something you can review on the rare occasion something were to happen?

This. I think it's safe to say I have less valuable items than average person in this country

Na, all good mate  I am definitely with you there 

It is always a good question to ask just to get people thinking about what they really need 

In that case, Wifi cameras may not be a terrible idea  I personally like them less then wired setups but they can be quite a bit cheaper and less hassle to set up and for a non-critical application, could be a good option for your needs 

[NiHaoMike]

You won't be able to beat ESP32 camera boards for lowest cost IP cameras that can easily run your own code. Can make a decent doorbell camera with the addition of a 3D printed case and a few support components. If that's not good enough, Raspberry Pi Zero with a camera is worth a consideration.

I'm surprised Homeplug IP cameras are not more common, more reliable than Wifi and still not requiring the installation of new wiring.

[Halcyon]

Really depends on how much you want to spend. You can go all-out and buy Axis cameras and basically records to anywhere, but if you want a decent "just works" solution, Ubiquiti do a really nice, elegant CCTV solution.

[pickle9000]

I found cameras to be a big help, sitting at the bench and catching the delivery guy, basically keeping an eye on things while working. Security turned out to be secondary.

[AG6QR]

I have almost exactly that sort of thing, except with just five cameras instead of eight. A hardwired network is faster, more reliable, and harder to jam than WiFi.  If it's not too inconvenient to run the wires, hardwired is the way to go.  You've got to run power anyway.

I'm using Amcrest cameras, model IP5M-B1186EW-28MM.  They have a web interface, so I can watch them from a web browser in my home.  If I configured the right port forwarding in my router, I could get at them from anywhere on the web, but that seems to open more opportunity for privacy violation than I prefer.  I don't use any cloud storage for my cameras.

The cameras are set up to detect motion, and save video clips whenever they detect motion.  They can save the clips locally on the camera's microSD card, or (what I do) they can be set to copy video files to a local computer (or to the cloud).  I have mine copy the video clips to a small linux computer that's running a web server.  The linux computer then publishes the clips on a password-protected web page, using apache running on that same linux computer.  I shrink the video resolution down for a quick preview, and then also save the full high-resolution original clips.  So at any time, from anywhere, I can watch all the motion detection events detected in the previous month, or watch a sped-up concatenation of all the motion detected on a particular day, or see a real-time instant snapshot from each of the cameras.  Getting all this working involved writing some fairly simple scripts to copy files around on the web server machine.  There's a basic .php script that goes out and grabs the instant snapshots and displays them when I ask for them.

Previously, I had used Raspberry Pis to handle the cameras and motion detection.  I had purchased a housing that was marketed as a dummy camera, then I hacked the Raspberry Pi and camera into the housing. The Amcrest cameras are nicer in many ways, with higher resolution cameras, built-in infrared lighting, and a nicer looking compact weathertight housing.  And they were less fussy to set up.

Consider putting your POE switches on a UPS, to keep the cameras going during a power outage.

[mendip_discovery]

I have 4 Blink cameras that are set to inform me of movement in areas that don't normally have movement in. They are cloud but as they use 2xAA batteries that last a year its handy for a remote shed, though I did stick a solar panel on the roof and a leisure battery so I could give it wifi.

I also have 2 IP cameras which constantly record as I use them to see what that noise that just woke me at 3am was and to review the day after when we have a report of somthing happened and I just want to see if we collectively in the village can see who it is.

It saves me a lot of anxiety as I can check easily that my stuff is safe. I have had the odd nice thing stolen so random noises at night do set me off on a sleepless night if I am not careful.

[jonpaul]

Choice: DIY, cheap Chinese(3..10 cams $300..500)

High quality Eternet industrial professional

We use Pelco, made in USA

Very costly but excellet.

j

[LaserSteve]

Get a security grade rough service  hard drive,  My DVR burned  through two drives before I learned. In my case, I now use Western Digital's  "Purple" product. 

   Use enough gun, ie avoid four channel DVR boxes and buy an eight. Four channel DVR boxes tend to be short on memory, which hammers you during playback. 

Pay a few more Dollars for the hi res color cameras, which these days turn into a fantastic B/W camera at night. Experiment with camera BLC/AWB settings.  Some of Sony's chipsets rival Gen II nightvision.

For  DVRs, I use Amcrest, which  are a Linux box with added security and a sophisticated compression chip.

Write down your DVRs primary and secondary passwords some place secure.  You might not need to access it for months.

I hate motion sensing on outdoor cameras, trees move, cars pass by, spider webs,wind, insects, leaves, and the solar cycle cause constant false triggers.  Might as well just stream it all, and I do.

Don't leave the DVR where it is accessible, and do not use a WIFi. Do not let the offenders see the monitor, and do not share the video.

Pick your camera's field of view carefully. Choice of lens is important,  overlaping fields of view are important outdoors, and take care to not look into other's window's.

Amcrest and others have an option to turn off the visible pilot lights on their cameras, use it!

Hilarity insued when the local psych case neighbor hired a camera "expert" who told him my cameras were dummy cams. Trespassing the problem neighbor was priceless.  Caught his sexually explicit jestures on camera.

Overlap the camera fields of view. Problem neighbors will try to
destroy the cameras  or map out fields of view.
Video of problem neighbor trying to whack the camera, also priceless.

Don't call LE on the first offense, build up a pattern of videos showing the pattern of offenses. LE in most cases, if they have a pattern, can scare the problem neghbor enough to stop the problem without going to Court.

Buy one camera, evaluate with your laptop,
make sure you have facial recognition in your problem area. Then install.

I live in a nice neighborhood, one bozo is all it takes.

Cameras do not cure all problems, an offending act, even at 30 FPS, may only show in just a few frames. The camera may result in constraints on your families behavior as well.

Steve

[nctnico]

I used a Foscam camera for this purpose which works together with a QNAP NAS (installed in a secured space) to create a motion based DVR system. The camera can be viewed through the cloud for free using the Foscam app, the NAS is only available locally. One of the features of the Foscam camera is that it also supports two way sound remotely so you can talk to somebody who is near the camera using a mobile phone app. Not required for my purpose but it is a nice touch. The Foscam camera has a mode to only detect moving people so it doesn't record other movements.

[c64]

You won't be able to beat ESP32 camera boards for lowest cost IP cameras that can easily run your own code.

How crappy is the picture quality on those?

I'm actually thinking to also add one or two wi-fi cameras as well. For remote locations.

[c64]

Really depends on how much you want to spend.

Not much 

[wraper]

Does it make sense to buy Network video recorder? Will NVR with 4 LAN inputs support 8 cameras like in my setup (with network switches in between)

There is very little relation between number of ports and how many cameras NVR supports. You can buy NVR with a single ethernet port that supports 16 cameras or NVR with 4 ports that supports just 4 cameras. As of dedicated PC, AFAIK Australia isn't known for cheap electricity, so even if you had a free PC, buying dedicated NVR can easily save more in electricity costs than its own cost in less than a year.

[wraper]

Also think about choosing ecosystem as a whole. Generally you don't want to buy cameras and NVR from different brands. Often you can get it work together but it may be pain in the ass to get it configured or you may lose part of functionality. You may also want door intercom and indoor station all in the same ecosystem. It may be pain in the ass if you want something from different manufacturer added later.

[beanflying]

Unless you like hammering your NAS just don't go down that path! Plenty of glowing (falsely) reviews on YouTube without any consideration to what you do to the drive life or performance of the NAS when doing double duty. If you have a serious NAS and can live with the other downsides then it works well.

Earlier in the year I picked up 4 cameras and an NVR eBay auction: #394407728602 The Cameras run internal batteries and will take an SD card as a backup to the NVR if you are keen. I have Solar panels on two of them and two mains supplied for charging. This suits my current situation over running a POE/Wired solution.

Overall simple setup and range is 'ok' at up to 20-30m from the base station through a few walls and some tin.

Added a WD 1Tb SSD internally which worked straight up so don't buy theirs or feel you need spinning rust.

Software on the NVR works well and external monitoring is where it gets a little mixed.

The PC software I run is EseeCloud which in spite of it's name actually pulls the data off the SSD and NVR as I am only pinging my home network address.

The Mobile Apps overall SUCK as they randomly stop sending push notifications and also rely of sending video and data via random servers. I have actually uninstalled them.

In conjunction to this I do run Door and Gate sensors that do have reliable push notifications so if it seems out of the ordinary I can login and check the cameras and unless someone comes in over the fence I think I am well covered.

Anyway just some potted thoughts on what I got in Oz that works.

** Should have mentioned too it runs it's own WiFi network which is hidden and a wired LAN to my main Network for access.

[LaserSteve]

Check your attic if your placing cameras under the eaves. I found  perpendicular 2x6s, long edge up, capping the sills at the edge of the roof.  We can have Tornados here, so the 2x6s reinforce the roof junction.

Right angle drill head, parachute cord,  and fiberglass flexible pole  resulted in adding  80 USD to the mission as my flabby body cannot get in tight to the shallow  pitched roof, and the roofing nails hurt your back and neck. So I drilled the 2x6s and probed from the outside to find my passageway. That was a PITA.

Summer heat, crawling in an attic with no floors,  small hatches,  wasps, lack of suitable assistant, and fiberglass insulation itch can be factors.  Pulling POE in a modern house  really wasn't a problem. The last half meter was the problem. 

Expect to need spray foam or RTV if things can get wet, the cameras generally come with seals for the POE junction to the short jumper extending from the camera.

In my case the POE can rub on sheet metal, so split loom tubing went around the POE at the sill and through the eave.  Probably overkill, but good practice.

Hopefully 1 TB SSD is in my future, but "spinning rust" was far cheaper at the time.

Good cameras come with template stickers. However the Amcrest self tapping screws were not for sheet steel,  I replaced the screws with #6 self tapping sheet metal screws, stainless steel.

In three years of operation in farmland, I have cleaned the domes twice,  and repositioned  the ccd board inside a dome once on a camera on the windward side. Outdoor side is low maintenance.

  We have serious winters here, but the internal heat from the IR leds and camera core has been sufficient to deter fogging and icing.

Amcrest's Camera  AGC drives the IR  Leds and receives an evaluation of "Awesome".

Creepy neighbor used his cell phone camera, according to another neighbor, to map the IR pattern.  My upper  cameras are aimed somewhat parallel to the house walls, so there are no sneak paths, but have plenty of angle left to cover out in the yard and 20 meters to the local road.  The cameras are adjusted not to see in my windows, but do view the house walls and  windows.

Something to think about if using OEM /experimenter grade camera is the day/night transition.

My cameras have a RCA plug with bias for an electret mic and a contact closure input   for a standard NC sensor. The DVR supports audio over Ethernet from the camera, the contact closures, and scheduling for each camera if needed.   Also have SD card for stand alone.

My neighbor was harassing , teasing and perhaps extorting  my late, elderly Mom. Key word " Was".

  Net cost 700 USD, spread out over time. Plenum POE cable that meets fire regs for the attic  was a major cost. That does not include the LCD monitor. I caught a closeout sale for the cameras.

The Homeowners Insurance offers a discount for fire alarms, Co2 alarms, and security systems. Not much, but it will offset some of the cost per year.

RFI on the  over the air TV nixed using un-shielded  Ethernet  cable for two attic runs.  Our TV antenna is a massive YAGI inside the attic roof with a parallel run of 300 Ohm Twinlead to the pre-amp. I suspect the actual emitted RFI is very low.

Make sure you can export the video in a common format with stills.

Cloud Option added 19.95. a month for very  limited storage. Decided it was cheaper long term to store on site.

Steve

[fourtytwo42]

Try this site https://www.jvsg.com/calculators/cctv-lens-calculator/ to sort out your fields of view and resolution, no good having camera's that do not provide sufficient quality for evidence purposes!
I use Reolink here in the UK, good price/performance, good range of products and compatible with just about any 3rd party software. Also manages remote access without the security problems of port forwarding BUT does call home, just a little!
I found Hikvision software simply did not work and that along with there reported security issues and higher cost was enough to put me off.

[soldar]

I have almost exactly that sort of thing, except with just five cameras instead of eight. A hardwired network is faster, more reliable, and harder to jam than WiFi.  If it's not too inconvenient to run the wires, hardwired is the way to go.  You've got to run power anyway.

I'm using Amcrest cameras, model IP5M-B1186EW-28MM.  They have a web interface, so I can watch them from a web browser in my home.  If I configured the right port forwarding in my router, I could get at them from anywhere on the web, but that seems to open more opportunity for privacy violation than I prefer.  I don't use any cloud storage for my cameras.

The cameras are set up to detect motion, and save video clips whenever they detect motion.  They can save the clips locally on the camera's microSD card, or (what I do) they can be set to copy video files to a local computer (or to the cloud).  I have mine copy the video clips to a small linux computer that's running a web server.  The linux computer then publishes the clips on a password-protected web page, using apache running on that same linux computer.  I shrink the video resolution down for a quick preview, and then also save the full high-resolution original clips.  So at any time, from anywhere, I can watch all the motion detection events detected in the previous month, or watch a sped-up concatenation of all the motion detected on a particular day, or see a real-time instant snapshot from each of the cameras.  Getting all this working involved writing some fairly simple scripts to copy files around on the web server machine.  There's a basic .php script that goes out and grabs the instant snapshots and displays them when I ask for them.

Previously, I had used Raspberry Pis to handle the cameras and motion detection.  I had purchased a housing that was marketed as a dummy camera, then I hacked the Raspberry Pi and camera into the housing. The Amcrest cameras are nicer in many ways, with higher resolution cameras, built-in infrared lighting, and a nicer looking compact weathertight housing.  And they were less fussy to set up.

Consider putting your POE switches on a UPS, to keep the cameras going during a power outage.

I agree on hardwire. WIFI is too easy to jam either deliberately or not.

Motion detection is strictly for indoors and closed windows. Anything outdoors or through windows will trigger it. Outside light changes, car reflections, etc.

My cameras are all on the outside so no privacy issues but they record 24/7 to a separate NVR. Make sure you use special HDD for NVR.

In any case, I would not connect that LAN to the internet, Better to isolate it and VPN into it from outside.

You can set up a really cheap system for very little but for me it is a given that I do not trust ANY camera. None.

[fourtytwo42]

Motion detection is strictly for indoors and closed windows. Anything outdoors or through windows will trigger it. Outside light changes, car reflections, etc.

Not true if you have the right camera and they are set-up & positioned correctly, all my camera's are outdoors and have motion detection, it works correctly without fake triggers. If you have these problems you should check your camera for bad reviews (maybe change it for a better camera) and/or spend more time on it's location and the motion detection settings.

[Psi]

Have a look at MotionEyeOS for recording the video streamed from all your cameras and doing any motion detection stuff.
However, i don't think there is much active development in it any more.

[soldar]

Motion detection is strictly for indoors and closed windows. Anything outdoors or through windows will trigger it. Outside light changes, car reflections, etc.

Not true if you have the right camera and they are set-up & positioned correctly, all my camera's are outdoors and have motion detection, it works correctly without fake triggers. If you have these problems you should check your camera for bad reviews (maybe change it for a better camera) and/or spend more time on it's location and the motion detection settings.

Yes, I suppose there are cameras which incorporate enough AI that they can discern humans, faces, etc. Mine are simply very cheap basic IP cameras bought on eBay. I have them recording 24/7 outside.

[nfmax]

I'm using Annke cameras, a mixture of 5MP and 8MP low-light to cover the entrances. All wired PoE, all on a completely isolated LAN with no Internet access at all. I'm using Zyxel managed PoE switches. The recorder is Security Spy (payware) running on an M2 Mac Mini. My firewall allows this system to connect to the camera LAN, but not the other way. Security Spy does motion detection and classification, and I have configured it to record (only) appropriate motion events, configurable per camera, on the internal SSD. Recordings are deleted after a month, and the total storage used is usually around 30G - 50G.

Security Spy has a companion app which I installed on my phone. This lets you live monitor cameras and review motion triggered recordings. To use it, if not at home, I connect via VPN to my router (nobody else's VPN service involved). Otherwise there is no Internet access to the Mac Mini.

The M2 PRO Mac Mini has hardware video decoding and sum-of-products engines for 'artificial intelligence', and absolutely eats the workload without even burping. It draws less mains power than any NVR I looked at, and as it's my main computer as well, I could justify spending more on a higher-specced system for lower overall cost!

I don't use camera motion detection or storage. Everything is powered via UPS.

[watchmaker]

I used to have pretty much the set up you describe in your original post.  If you go that way, look up BlueIris to manage the system.

I needed that system because I had to protect the work that was sent to me (watch restoration),  I had it set up so that if motion was detected in the building when we were away, it would send me a text with a pic and the phone number of the local precinct.

I also had a license plate camera that recorded whatever came up my drive.  BlueIris woked well.  And is very inexpensive.

The only issue is power outages.  Also, make one or two outdoor cameras VERY visible.  I had a high mounted driveay camera (for delivery notificaiton) that was not touchable yet very visible.  I would rather prevent than catch.

Now, I am planning to go with under $100 dollar solar powered game cameras that text with pics.  Several hunters told me about them and I need to research them; but in the US these seem to be an excellent option.

Be careful.  The system can become a hobby in itself.  I could never get the geofence to work correctly, but that was 4 years ago.

In most cases, all you really need is something to tell you if UPS is outside, an unknown is inside, and a license plate to track them down.  Might consider fire sensors; I think that is more likely than a burgle. 

I am convinced entry alarms for vacations are a scam.  In modern construction, it is too easy to cut through a wall with a sawzall.  I think they can provide a level of occupancy protection; but if I were in an area where that was a concern, I would set up the camera system to alert me at night if something was near a door or window (camera pointed directly at).  Just keep the phone on the nightstand.

The BEST entry protection I ever saw was an acquaintance putting a bucket of .38 casings next to his front door.  No signs, no threats.  Just to say "Enough said".  Brilliant.

[c64]

Motion detection is strictly for indoors and closed windows. Anything outdoors or through windows will trigger it. Outside light changes, car reflections, etc.

Not true if you have the right camera and they are set-up & positioned correctly, all my camera's are outdoors and have motion detection, it works correctly without fake triggers. If you have these problems you should check your camera for bad reviews (maybe change it for a better camera) and/or spend more time on it's location and the motion detection settings.

Yes, I suppose there are cameras which incorporate enough AI that they can discern humans, faces, etc. Mine are simply very cheap basic IP cameras bought on eBay. I have them recording 24/7 outside.

What about PIR?

[soldar]

What about PIR?

Well, that's a totally different thing. I have a couple of PIR indoors but they do not record anything, just trigger an alarm.

By the way, I have collected different PIR devices over the years, some have radio that I cannot use but it is trivial to design a circuit that detects increase in current consumption and triggers the alarm.