Blue Iris UI3

Joined
Jun 15, 2018
Messages
4
Reaction score
4
Location
USA
First off, let me say thanks to the author(s) of UI3 for their great software. My family and I use it all the time. It's great to have such a full-featured web UI available for free.

That said, I am having some trouble with the playback controls under ui3. Often, if I pause playback while viewing a clip or alert, when I resume, the video will jump to a seemingly random point either before or after the place that I paused. Sometimes this point is within a few seconds of paused position, other times the distance will be much larger. This makes it very difficult to use the pause to feature to study a clip in detail.

The interesting thing about this issue is that it only seems to occur when viewing the currently active (i.e. recording) clip. Pausing and resuming on previous recorded clips behave as expected.

Another thing I noticed: My cameras are configured to insert a time overlay into the video, and time on the cameras as well as on the BI server is synchronized via ntp to a common clock source. If I compare the overlay time with the clip offset time shown in the playback controls, the two times are always within a second of each other when viewing a non-active clip. However, when viewing the active clip, the clip offset time shows a later time than the overlay time the further I seek into the clip. For example, at 13 minutes into the current clip (per the camera overlay), the offset time in the playback control will show 15:20. (Intriguingly, the Frame Time in the Stats for Nerds dialog always matches the overlay time from the camera).

This discrepancy in the offset time also seems to affect the playback slider. In particular, if I slide to time later in the clip, when I release the mouse, the position will snap to a totally different position and time. The effect seems to be magnified the further into the clip I go.

I've been assuming all of this was some sort of operator error on my part and double checking my settings. But I don't see anything wrong, so I'm beginning to suspect its a bug. Any insights would be helpful.

Thanks.

BI and Browser Details:
  • UI3 version 120
  • Blue Iris version: 5.3.2.11
  • FireFox 81.0.2 (64-bit Windows 10), but also observed under Chrome 86.0.4240.111
  • H.264 direct to disk recording
  • Clips rotated hourly

Camera Details:
  • Dahua IPC-HDW5231R-ZE
  • H.264H encoding
  • 1080P, 15 FPS, I-frame interval 15
  • CBR, 8192 Kbps
 
Joined
Aug 8, 2018
Messages
7,386
Reaction score
25,889
Location
Spring, Texas
I have similar issue. I also have noticed that if I click on an alert image on the left, it sometimes does not go to that time, it goes to a few minutes earlier. So I have to click again to get it to the proper position.

I just use the cam's time and cam name. I do not have BI put a separate overlay on.
 

bp2008

Staff member
Joined
Mar 10, 2014
Messages
12,666
Reaction score
14,005
Location
USA
@dare-ipcamtalk

This is a known issue which stems from UI3 and Blue Iris getting out of sync in their knowledge about the length of the clip you are playing. The mobile apps have traditionally not cared at all about the duration of clips, therefore Blue Iris's streaming methods were not designed to deal with it when the clips get longer while they are playing. I need to look into the issue again; recent changes to the clip timestamp format just might provide the information I need to finally fix this in UI3. I just need to find the time somewhere.

@samplenhold

I have no idea what would cause that. Can you describe how you do recordings? Continuous? Multiple motion-triggered recordings combined into one big file? Is it only for clips that are still "open" for recording?
 
Joined
Aug 8, 2018
Messages
7,386
Reaction score
25,889
Location
Spring, Texas
Can you describe how you do recordings? Continuous? Multiple motion-triggered recordings combined into one big file? Is it only for clips that are still "open" for recording?
I record continuous, cut at 4GB. I had not investigated the issue. But the last time I tried to look a an alert, the time stamp for the alert was listed as 09:44:51pm and the viewer began at about 9:00pm. So I closed that viewer and reclicked the alert and it cam up just fine. It is possible that the clip was still open for recording. The next time it happens I will do a screen grab for you.
 

bp2008

Staff member
Joined
Mar 10, 2014
Messages
12,666
Reaction score
14,005
Location
USA
I wish your screenshots were a little more complete. Was the seek bar at the beginning or is it essentially random how far back it opened the clip? I see there was no alert anywhere near the timestamps in your two screenshots, which is very curious.
 
Joined
Aug 8, 2018
Messages
7,386
Reaction score
25,889
Location
Spring, Texas
Also, I just started noticing this as I have been working on my LPR install. So the cams I notice this on are all bullets. B5442E-Z4E and HFW5241EP-Z12E cams.

BI version 5.3.2.11 and UI3 version 120.
 

biggen

Known around here
Joined
May 6, 2018
Messages
2,539
Reaction score
2,765
I have similar issue. I also have noticed that if I click on an alert image on the left, it sometimes does not go to that time, it goes to a few minutes earlier. So I have to click again to get it to the proper position.

I just use the cam's time and cam name. I do not have BI put a separate overlay on.
I can confirm I've had the same issue. Only happens with the currently active clip open for writing if I recall correctly.
 

bp2008

Staff member
Joined
Mar 10, 2014
Messages
12,666
Reaction score
14,005
Location
USA
I've had my new thermal cam recording continuous for about a day now in 8 hour / 4 GB clips and so far none of the alerts have opened at the wrong time.
 

sebastiantombs

Known around here
Joined
Dec 28, 2019
Messages
11,511
Reaction score
27,690
Location
New Jersey
I hate to ask, but have to. Is there a way to gt UI# to display the trigger source as in a BI zone or external/ONVIF? I know I'm being anal, but....
 

bp2008

Staff member
Joined
Mar 10, 2014
Messages
12,666
Reaction score
14,005
Location
USA
@sebastiantombs check out UI Settings > Clip / Alert Icons. All the display options are in there. I know the "externally-triggered" option is shown when you trigger a cam manually through UI3. No idea what is done with ONVIF events.

There's also a little bit more information if you right click a clip/alert and open its properties, like the number of zones. But I don't think BI says which zones specifically. In fact depending on the way I request the alert list it might not even include the zone count.

edit: Actually the zone number on the camera is a bitmask that I could decode to say which zones were involved in creating the alert. (A, B, C, etc). I guess I'll make a note to do that.
 

tdwilli1

Getting the hang of it
Joined
Aug 25, 2016
Messages
111
Reaction score
51
Here is what's happening to me now. Not sure when this started. The clip lengths are not showing the correct durations. I'm on BI 5.3.2.11. All these clips are under 1 minute.

UI3.jpg
 
Top