Local criminal action

Raylo32

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Used to be all we ever saw back here was raccoons, cats and squirrels, now this. Some sort of B&E crew working our neighborhood looking for open back doors. Pretty scary considering most folks were home so any B&E would turn into a home invasion. Police report filed. Unfortunately I had my LED sensor spotlight disabled.. hit the wrong switch one of those days, I guess. That would have deterred him... or at least given daylight like video.

Intruder checking rear door - YouTube
 
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Raylo32

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Speaking of local criminals... this is what we are used to dealing with. My hummingbird feeder kept getting drained overnight so I put a cam out to see what was going on. Raccoon, of course. I put up a little Have-A-Heart shocker to try to train him but as you can see in the first video the bugger cleans out the feeder anyway. I repositioned it and had better luck the second time. We have a bunch of raccoons around. I once saw an entire family of 4 in the view at once from the cam that caught the door checker.


 

bigredfish

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I like having a few minutes, or even 30 seconds heads up. Enough time to wake up and say WTF was that? And grab the appropriate “tool”

 
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Raylo32

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No way to get that sort of long range notice in a townhouse situation. And the close in video detects, line crossings, and other alerts are just too unreliable to have it active, especially at night, for real time warnings. Far too many nuisance alarms from the critters at night and waving trees and shadows during the day. Maybe some sort of light beam setup above critter height level would work.

I like having a few minutes, or even 30 seconds heads up. Enough time to wake up and say WTF was that? And grab the appropriate “tool”

 
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bigredfish

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Mine have been installed on a zero lot line home for 6-7 years. Cats, coons, dogs, leaves, wind, shadows, do NOT affect it. They just work.

But hey, some folks prefer to be surprised
 

Raylo32

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I hear you but I have never seen any really reliable motion sensors that eliminate FARs and NARs.

Here is a snip from one of many similar reviews of Guardian on Amazon:

" — but there are plenty of times it gets triggered by small critters, leaves, wind, rain, etc. At those times, we usually just turn down the volume so we can almost not hear it (and a bit of pain to remember to turn up the volume later).

It’s alarming and frustrating when it goes off in the middle of the night and is a false alarm. That’s probably the worst part.

It does serve it’s purpose when it works, but be prepared as others have mentioned for a good amount of false alarms (maybe 10-20% of the time). "
 

wittaj

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Many of us have found the Dahua AI cams to be spot on in eliminating false triggers:

 

Raylo32

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What would be a particular model I could read up on? I prefer a dome or turret, starlight, and 4 mm lens... but could get by with a 2.8 I suppose. Varifocal would be great if not too $$$.

Many of us have found the Dahua AI cams to be spot on in eliminating false triggers:

 

bigredfish

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I hear you but I have never seen any really reliable motion sensors that eliminate FARs and NARs.

Here is a snip from one of many similar reviews of Guardian on Amazon:

" — but there are plenty of times it gets triggered by small critters, leaves, wind, rain, etc. At those times, we usually just turn down the volume so we can almost not hear it (and a bit of pain to remember to turn up the volume later).

It’s alarming and frustrating when it goes off in the middle of the night and is a false alarm. That’s probably the worst part.

It does serve it’s purpose when it works, but be prepared as others have mentioned for a good amount of false alarms (maybe 10-20% of the time). "

They arent doing something right. Mine have gone through many storms, cats leaves etc for years. and I cant recall 2-3 "false alarms" which were a bear and a couple of cats who decided to play right ion top of it.

AI cameras are great, I have a bunch, but I want to know before he gets to my door not the next morning.
 
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What would be a particular model I could read up on? I prefer a dome or turret, starlight, and 4 mm lens... but could get by with a 2.8 I suppose
If that cam is all you have covering that back door and it is a 4mm, then even if you got lighting you would not get a good face shot. You are too far from the face in that video. Consider replacing that 4mm with a varifocal and zoom in more. Also consider a second or third cam at the door.
 

Raylo32

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Yeah, as usual it's tough to balance side to side coverage with distance. I really need the FOV about what you see here to be able to view potential approaches to disable the camera. Maybe a little, but much narrower and you could get to it from the right side. It is up about 9 or 10 feet high in a corner under a deck but that's not much. Sure, one of those PTZ autotrackers would be the bomb. But those are $$ and I really need it to be a dome or turret form factor, not the pendant mount type. Real crooks sneaking around the back in the dark wear hoodies and masks anyway so I am not sure there would be much benefit. House has an alarm with doors/window coverage as well as glass break detector, PIR, and another cam just inside that door.

The Dahua/Loryta 5442 with motorized varifocal 3.6-12mm looks interesting. I wonder if the varifocal is just for setup or does it work as a zoom in operation and does it have detect and auto zoom to capture a close up of a target (I know it can't pan and tilt)? If so, that would work.


If that cam is all you have covering that back door and it is a 4mm, then even if you got lighting you would not get a good face shot. You are too far from the face in that video. Consider replacing that 4mm with a varifocal and zoom in more. Also consider a second or third cam at the door.
 
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Raylo32

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I understand that to be the case originally with manual varifocal cams... but this Dahua has a motorized varifocal so one would think it could zoom in operation?

A varifocal camera is meant to be set to the focal length required at installation and left there. It is not a PTZ style camera at all and cannot zoom on command.
 

Raylo32

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This could work to replace my existing sensor floodlight right next to that door. It would have a very close up view of anyone approaching the door and perhaps be a bit of a deterrent. Anyone here have one?

Amcrest SmartHome 1080p WiFi Outdoor Security Camera with Floodlight, Built-in Siren Alarm, 2000lm Floodlight, Two-Way Audio, 114° View, IP65 Weatherproof, MicroSD & Smart Cloud Storage, ASH26-W

If that cam is all you have covering that back door and it is a 4mm, then even if you got lighting you would not get a good face shot. You are too far from the face in that video. Consider replacing that 4mm with a varifocal and zoom in more. Also consider a second or third cam at the door.
 

The Automation Guy

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I wonder if the varifocal is just for setup or does it work as a zoom in operation and does it have detect and auto zoom to capture a close up of a target (I know it can't pan and tilt)? If so, that would work.
Just to add that zoom without pan or tilt is pretty useless anyway. It zooms into the center of the view, so unless the subject is exactly in the center the zoom will cut them out of the image.
 

looney2ns

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Speaking of local criminals... this is what we are used to dealing with. My hummingbird feeder kept getting drained overnight so I put a cam out to see what was going on. Raccoon, of course. I put up a little Have-A-Heart shocker to try to train him but as you can see in the first video the bugger cleans out the feeder anyway. I repositioned it and had better luck the second time. We have a bunch of raccoons around. I once saw an entire family of 4 in the view at once from the cam that caught the door checker.


You will need to move the feeder father away from anything he can climb to get to it. Or the @bigredfish way.
 
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