5442TM-AS Day Image Quality Issues

[TheDank]

(Long story that has to do with burnt italian sausage... ahem)

Hey BigRed (that's Mister Fish to you!), you'll have to tell us the story of the sausage if you haven't already. Start a thread in the ChitChat section? The missus and I just had an awesome homemade sourdough pizza tonight, including Italian sausage. No fire trucks were involved, thank goodness.

But to add to this thread... yah the 5442 series really rocks. I have a fixed turret and a varifocal bullet, love them both. Waiting for the varifocal turret for the new house and I'll order a bunch from Andy. It looks like maybe the OP's camera might be ok, crossing fingers for the higher bitrate working out!

 

[bigredfish]

The two covering the drive are fixed 3.6mm bullets. The fixed are a bit brighter than the VF. I prefer bullets in most cases as they seem to have a little better depth of field.

https://www.dahuasecurity.com/products/All-Products/Network-Cameras/WizMind-Series/5-Series/4MP/IPC-HFW5442T-ASE

I'll get some shots from my buddies install with the fixed turrets,

 

[TheDank]

Hey @bigredfish, I've seen you mention in a few threads that you prefer bullets because they have better depth of field. Can you say some more about that? (Or if there's a thread already where you talk about it, I can go to that thread, or if we're hijacking this thread we can start a new one.)

Putting aside the oft-touted spider-web/bug/reflection/etc I'm just wondering, why would you say that a bullet has better depth of field, wouldn't that only depend on the f/ratio of the lens? Wouldn't a turret or dome with the same lens and sensor have the same depth of field?

BTW by "better", I figure you mean that for security cameras better would mean a deeper dof, whereas for photographers they often seek a more shallow dof. Do I understand correctly that a deeper dof is what you mean?

BTW BTW, I use bullets on my driveway also; it's the first location that's visible to the Bad Guys™ and hopefully if they see the more noticeable cameras they'll move on.

 

[shalem2014]

Thank you everyone for all your help, this forum is awesome!

@bigredfish I only changed to H265 to save disk space and I also tried with default H264. I just tried tried with 8192 bitrate on CBR and it looked the same.

I tried with default EVERYTHING using the reset to factory option. I'm recording to an NVR and using SmartPSS to take those screenshots. Other cams screenshots look perfect and so does the old camera that used to be there.


@TheDank Its the 2.8 mm from Andy. The camera is not inside, its mounted under an eave to protect it from the elements. I tried with default and custom FPS and bitrate. The old camera is no longer mounted. Below is a image when its dark outside and it looks great (no street lights). All the IR you see on the left is coming from the PTZ.

Looking at your nighttime image, there is definitely something not right with the alignment of the lens on this camera. The entire left side of the image is blurry, while the right side is razor sharp. If you can get the camera replaced, I would recommend doing so. If not, you could take it apart and attempt to correct the issue yourself. I would be checking to make sure that the lens holder is properly and tightly seated on the circuit board and that the lens isn't cross-threaded. If both are right, then perhaps the CMOS sensor wasn't soldered down flat. To correct for this error, you would need to ascertain which side is off (same or opposite side as is blurry), loosen the lens holder, insert a tiny shim under that side, and then possibly refocus the lens.
Regarding the garish, contrasty look, I do not believe this is a camera defect. I noticed that several other people's images on this thread were also over-sharpened, and believe that this may have more to do with your scene and lighting than anything else. I don't know what else to suggest other than to try the settings I proposed earlier, as my 5442s don't look like that!

 

[jd415]

@EMPIRETECANDY please see the last post by @shalem2014 and several other folks and my pictures below. The left side of the camera images are blurry or not in focus. There is a hardware issue with the camera, it's not software related. Camera has also been reset to factory settings as well.

May I please return the camera for a new one. I kept the original packaging, paperwork, box and I got it a few months ago from you. I will direct message you as well. Thank you

 

[bigredfish]

One thing correctly noted by @shalem2014 is that the 5442’s do seem to have an over sharpening effect out of the box. I’ve turned sharpness down (40-45 or so) on a few of mine and it seems to improve a bit.

The other thing I’ve noticed with some turrets, is a barrel distortion along the top of the image when they are pointed at a more severe angle down like your front yard. I’m not a photog so pure speculation, but on my neighbors turrets we noticed improvement by lowering the mounting location to get a more straight on view. Now this could just be we are seeing more sky and less physical objects so that the barrel distortion isn’t as easily perceived?

 

[biggen]

See those bushes don’t look out of focus to me. Your corners are warped a bit though.

 

[bigredfish]

See those bushes don’t look out of focus to me. Your corners are warped a bit though.

Barrel distortion

 

[biggen]

Barrel distortion

Yeah and that is more pronounced in his camera than in mine for sure.

 

[IAmATeaf]

Look at the definition of the cracks in the soil in front of the bush, the old camera had much more detail and definition.

Sorry if I missed it but what Mp is the old cam and the PTZ?

 

[shalem2014]

One thing correctly noted by @shalem2014 is that the 5442’s do seem to have an over sharpening effect out of the box. I’ve turned sharpness down (40-45 or so) on a few of mine and it seems to improve a bit.

The other thing I’ve noticed with some turrets, is a barrel distortion along the top of the image when they are pointed at a more severe angle down like your front yard. I’m not a photog so pure speculation, but on my neighbors turrets we noticed improvement by lowering the mounting location to get a more straight on view. Now this could just be we are seeing more sky and less physical objects so that the barrel distortion isn’t as easily perceived?

I am an astute observer; all of my observations on this thread have been correct, not just one of them. We are seeing minimal edge blurring due to barrel distortion. The entire lens/sensor are slightly tilted in relation to each other. This defocuses one entire side of the photo, and exaggerates the expected minor barrel focusing effect, making it very noticeable on the most affected corner due to the axis of distortion.

See those bushes don’t look out of focus to me. Your corners are warped a bit though.

Look again. Download the attached image and carefully view it 1:1 or even zoomed in. This effect is most noticeable in IR (night) mode due to the mono-wavelength of the IR light and chromatic aberration of the lens. During the daytime, blue would be slightly defocused on the right and red moreso on the left, thus reducing the effect. Look for detail and the fineness of detail, not the over-sharpening shadows. This lack of detail would make the user loath to drop the sharpness because the image starts to look fuzzy, even though it's still oversharpened. Bumping sharpness up to overcome the lack of detail on the left results in the horrible picture in the first post.

 

[bigredfish]

I am an astute observer; all of my observations on this thread have been correct, not just one of them. We are seeing minimal barrel distortion. The entire lens/sensor are slightly tilted in relation to each other. This defocuses one entire side of the photo, and exaggerates the expected minor barrel effect, making it very noticeable on the most affected corner due to the axis of distortion.


Look again. Download the attached image and carefully view it 1:1 or even zoomed in. This effect is most noticeable in IR (night) mode due to the mono-wavelength of the IR light and chromatic aberration of the lens. During the daytime, blue would be slightly defocused on the right and red moreso on the left, thus reducing the effect. Look for detail and the fineness of detail, not the over-sharpening shadows. This lack of detail would make the user loath to drop the sharpness because the image starts to look fuzzy, even though it's still oversharpened. Bumping sharpness up to overcome the lack of detail on the left results in the horrible picture in the first post.

View attachment 64911

Well pardon me. I didnt mean to imply that all of your observations weren’t perfectly correct, I was simply agreeing with one in that comment.

 

[ljw2k]

@jd415 You are unhappy with your purchase and It is obvious that it is OOF especially now you have posted night time shots. It wouldn't be any better no matter what settings you used or if you had your monitor calibrated it's a faulty camera which is not fit for purpose, return it for a replacement or refund simples.

These new camera's cost a lot of money now and you shouldn't be expected to strip it down to fix something that shouldn't be broken in the first place. It is not your fault but a Dahua Quality control issue.

 

[bigredfish]

Agree. Send it back.

As to barrel distortion, its not uncommon but its more pronounced in the first image. Wider FOV may have something to do with it, just an observation.

 

[jd415]

New camera has been installed and it's no longer blurry on the left side. Thank you everyone for all your help!

 

[EMPIRETECANDY]

I purchased a Loryta IPC-T5442TM-AS from @EMPIRETECANDY after reading all the great reviews from many people in this forum. The night shots are amazing however the day shots compared to my old camera look horrible.

I tried changing all the settings, reset camera to default, confirmed firmware is up to date and also reached out to Andy. Anyone have any ideas?

We replaced a new camea for @jd415 , for all products which bought from us can get warranty or replacement if has hardware issues, we are working with dahua now for faster and better warranty support now.

 

[thor87]

New camera has been installed and it's no longer blurry on the left side. Thank you everyone for all your help!

I just purchased this same camera from @EMPIRETECANDY Amazon store and am having the same daytime image quality issues as you reported. Did you ever settle on specific image settings? I'm not having focus issues, just image quality issues - looks way over saturated / over-exposed out of the box with the default settings. I've purchased a half dozen cams from Andy and have never had problems before.

 

[jd415]

@thor87 mine was a hardware issue. Try changing the settings after you web browse into the camera.

 

[ljw2k]

I just purchased this same camera from @EMPIRETECANDY Amazon store and am having the same daytime image quality issues as you reported. Did you ever settle on specific image settings? I'm not having focus issues, just image quality issues - looks way over saturated / over-exposed out of the box with the default settings. I've purchased a half dozen cams from Andy and have never had problems before.

The ONLY 1 thing you can do if the same problem as above is return to sender for an exchange or refund , no matter what settings or updates you do will not fix this issue of OOF, it is a Quality Control hardware issue.

 

[bigredfish]

I just purchased this same camera from @EMPIRETECANDY Amazon store and am having the same daytime image quality issues as you reported. Did you ever settle on specific image settings? I'm not having focus issues, just image quality issues - looks way over saturated / over-exposed out of the box with the default settings. I've purchased a half dozen cams from Andy and have never had problems before.

post a sample clip and your image and exposure settings. And tell us your bitrate