External IR for Foscam FI9900P - Spider Issue

[OllyF]

Hi everyone

I have the above camera which I have had for around 1 year - no problems (since I connected it via ethernet) however one issue I do have is that virtually every day a spider spins a web over the camera and as soon as it gets dark it triggers it every 5 minutes at the slightest breeze, sending push notifications to my phone and constant recordings.

I have assumed that it is because the bugs are attracted to the IR and the spider things it is a good place to put a web. So after heading out with my specially bought brush to clean them off again, I decided action had to be taken and I bought one of these cheap IR lights off amazon, positioned it around half a metre away from the cam and connected a power splitter and turned off the IR in the web interface.

However, despite the new IR lights glowing the camera sees nothing but black in the night.

So is there a specific type of light required or something or am I doing something wrong?

Or any other tips to stop these spiders spinning the web over the camera?

 

[alastairstevenson]

turned off the IR in the web interface.

You've likely also as a consequence turned on the IR cut in the camera, ie the camera is in day mode and blocking all IR.
You can check that by shining a white light (eg a torch) on the scene and seeing if there is colour in the video.

 

[OllyF]

Ah ok that makes perfect sense - and thank you for the quick response.

Before posting I was looking around online and I now understand other people referring to this IR cut so therefore I am guessing there is not a straight forward solution to this problem.

 

[alastairstevenson]

therefore I am guessing there is not a straight forward solution to this problem.

It depends on whether the camera can independently control 'day / night mode' and the 'IR LEDs'. Some can. Some can't.

 

[OllyF]

Looks like mine cannot.

Might try taping the IR lights!

 

[mat200]

Welcome OllyF,

Thanks for joining us and posting, as I see you're new to posting I wanted to be certain you've had a chance to see some of the notes we've been gathering here to help others more quickly pick up some of the great information which is being shared here.

It's easy to get swamped with information here, so I wanted to share some notes with you

Please check out @giomania 's notes:
Dahua Starlight Varifocal Turret (IPC-HDW5231R-Z)

I have also made notes which are a summary of a lot of the reading I've been doing here,:
Looking for some advice and direction!

Have fun joining us here.

 

[Kawboy12R]

Turn that Foscam into a puppy cam or something and replace it with a modern Dahua or Hikvision. Just about everything supports turning off the IR for the best usage of external illuminators. All the cool kids on a budget are getting the Dahua IPC-HDW5231R-Z Starlight varifocal turret. It's not Wi-Fi like your Foscam but wired is much more reliable than Wi-Fi and you're better off switching anyway. If you MUST use WiFi, and there are very very few situations where you really truly can't use wired net, then use a real camera with a Ubiquiti WiFi setup. Here's a link to the best guide I've seen explaining things and setting up the radio(s) . Ubiquiti NanoStation M2 (2.4GHz) Wireless Bridge & WiFi AP

The long range client model will turn any wired camera into a stable WiFi camera, but the best bet is the bridge, called the direct peer2peer link on that page.