Convince me Reolink is bad to buy

[blocksog]

Ok, folks. Last night, I tuned the PTZ425DB-AT to get licenses. It is not perfect, but I am surprised I can even do this. In pitch dark, I can see some license numbers, but this depends on the plate lights of the car itself.



By day, license plates are very easy to catch and identify:


I am thinking that if I had an IR illuminator by the mailbox, night reading of licenses would still be possible.

The trick at night was to set sharpness to 0. This was the winning move to remove all the noise from the picture, otherwise sharpness was fighting with Noise Reduction to do opposite things. Here are the settings I used for night (illuminator is 100% far, 0% near):




And these are the settings for Day:


Now I understand the opportunities of good cameras that give you schedule profiles with completely manual settings. I guess Reolink does not even give full manual control or night/day manual profiles, right?

@wittaj You may notice that I used Shutter manual, I did not realize there was a "Custom" setting under manual. But this seems to do it, what do you think?

Questions I still have is: if I put an IR illuminator by the mailbox, would I "kill it" for LPR over night? I could also put automated lawn lights to turn on, and point one of those spotlights to the street, but IR may be better concealed.

Other question: Is there IRs that can run on batteries for a month or two over night? Or perhaps with low voltage 12v?

 

[blocksog]

And before anybody says it, yes, I need to cut those branches that limit the clear view only to half the frame.

 

[Flintstone61]

Most retail consumer boxed kits are marketed for the guy who wants set it and forget it
And mobile app that sends notifications
Reolink, Lorex, Amcrest, Nightowl, etc…
But the “ Gotcha” for the consumer is when they want a better Camera in a couple locations and find out the company has you locked in their eco-verse for product.
It’s Marketing driving sales.

 

[Flintstone61]

You need a better reflective angle to get higher % of plates. Or like you say extra IR nearby.
My First IP came being a noob, was a 2mp Jidetech PTZ ( affectionately called Jivetech by some forum members) from Amazon. It did cool stuff but was never gonna be enough for a building security system. After I built out my system, the PTZ was relegated to an Overview cam of a Parking lot. The workhorses on that site were the 3241 ZAS, 5442 turrets, and a Z-12 in a choke point locked in B&W 24/7 to prevent day/night focus shifting. Inside the lighted garages I could get away with bargain basement Amcrest stuff.

 

[bigredfish]

There's very little if any IR getting to that plate.

Best way to test that is to grab an old plate or one off your car, and get wifey to stand out there with it unlit as you adjust.

What was the Day/Night setting? are you sure it was in B&W and that IR was actually on?

If you're sure, then adding longer range supplemental IR at or very near the camera will be next. IR tends to reflect towards the source.

 

[blocksog]

Lol @bigredfish , thanks for asking. I double checked to be sure and you are right, IR was off. Must have forgotten it during trials. Will have to wait another night how it works now

 

[wittaj]

Yes, custom shutter is correct for LPR purposes. My post was the standard for non-LPR purposes, but for LPR, especially at night, it is best to run a fixed custom shutter instead of a range.

An IR blaster would have to be installed close to the same plane as the camera. Every plate and situation is different, but because of the way the plates are designed to be reflective, some have noticed if the IR blaster is more than two feet away from the camera it was useless. But if you were in line with the camera, it might work.

This PTZ has a very weak IR. One of the weakest I have seen for a PTZ. So depending on your distance, you might be out of range if the IR was actually on.

I guess you take back what you said about this camera now Let's see a reolink pull off what you did (you won't LOL).

 

[blocksog]

I found out what was the problem with illuminator. It is not respecting the profile, so whatever you choose in Illuminator settings stays there for all profiles. The profile does not apply to illuminator...

 

[wittaj]

I found out what was the problem with illuminator. It is not respecting the profile, so whatever you choose in Illuminator settings stays there for all profiles. The profile does not apply to illuminator...

It is a weird quark or something with this and the profiles.

Many of us have noticed it doesn't like a 12-hour clock, so change it to 24-hour if you changed it.

Set it to customized scene and then change the schedule for this month to be the night profile right now.

Make the change and hit save and refresh a few times. Then fix the schedule to make right now the day profile.

Or wait until tonight and then just change to customized scene and turn on the illuminator and hit save and refresh a few times.

 

[blocksog]

I guess you take back what you said about this camera now Let's see a reolink pull off what you did (you won't LOL).

I did not say anything bad yet (I still have problems with tracking after I mounted it, worked great from the window). All I pointed out is that even a good expensive camera can miss limbs and ghost people. By itself the problem does not mean much without the technical context. Thanks for your help @wittaj I will play with the settings further tonight. The illuminator not respecting profiles might be a bug.

 

[flatface]

My reolink doorbell occasionally decides snowflakes or insects at 2 or 3 AM are people. My Dahua cameras haven't done that.

Is reolink better than Ring, Nest, Wyze, or Arlo? Perhaps, perhaps not. There are certainly products on the market that are worst than reolink just as there are better products.

My setup is entirely Empiretech (15 cams) and I have had them give me plenty of false triggers, from flying and crawling insects, snowflakes, heavy rain (less than snowflakes) and most commonly, squirrels.

The false triggers from snow are much worse on cameras that are not protected from above (not covered by soffit overhang) as the flakes can get much closer to the lens. The ones hanging from soffit get almost no false triggers from weather.

Not saying that other brands would handle those situations better though.

 

[wittaj]

I did not say anything bad yet (I still have problems with tracking after I mounted it, worked great from the window). All I pointed out is that even a good expensive camera can miss limbs and ghost people. By itself the problem does not mean much without the technical context. Thanks for your help @wittaj I will play with the settings further tonight. The illuminator not respecting profiles might be a bug.

True, but since you said you like evidence and trust and belief is for religious people and you admitted you led the start of this thread about Reolink to bait us with what turned out to be your wrong initial thoughts on this PTZ, and we pointed out the EVERY camera on default settings will result in ghost people with low light and that you have to dial them in to your setting, you have proven our statement to be correct LOL (just yanking your chain a bit LOL)

But I am glad you were not trolling and not a reolink plant like we have seen over the years LOL.

And we are glad to see you listened to us and have seen some great progress just in one night and didn't become one of the many that simply returned it to Amazon with a negative review LOL.

And yeah, they aren't perfect either. We find quirks like the day/night doesn't work like we think it should, need to use 24-hour time, etc.

Let's see your Reolink capture plates of a moving vehicle LOL.

As you will learn and find out, tracking PTZs are not plug-n-play.

Most of us have spent HOURS dialing it in to our scene.

Even PTZs I have had for years I still make minor tweaks on.

A neighbor removes a tree or plants a tree and it whacks out the tracking, so I had to tweak it.

Keeping the settings on auto/default settings is a recipe for poor tracking, especially at night.

You can't setting out every instance, but there are ways to minimize it.

Something as simple as having contrast 8 higher than brightness can make a big difference in whether the camera continues to follow the person or lock onto something else

I have a yard lamp post that more times than not autotrack would get stuck on it as someone was walking and the autotrack would only go so far as it decided to track the lamp post. Because my image has soo much contrast (bright white concrete a third, blacktop road a third, grass a third), knocking down the gamma made the lamp post not be so "trackable" lol, and along with that I turned of PFA and that gave it just enough time to retrack the person walking past the lamp post.

So you have to try the different settings and see which works best for you. PFA may need to be off, autofocus may need to be on semi, etc. Tracking size will be a big factor as well.

 

[wittaj]

My setup is entirely Empiretech (15 cams) and I have had them give me plenty of false triggers, from flying and crawling insects, snowflakes, heavy rain (less than snowflakes) and most commonly, squirrels.

The false triggers from snow are much worse on cameras that are not protected from above (not covered by soffit overhang) as the flakes can get much closer to the lens. The ones hanging from soffit get almost no false triggers from weather.

Not saying that other brands would handle those situations better though.

Do you have Empiretech cameras with AI and if so are you using only IVS rules and not MD/SMD?

MD/SMD will result in false triggers.

The true test....I have found the AI of the cameras to work even in a freakin blizzard. My only trigger on that camera that night was for the person and not the snow.

Or another camera and not one false trigger by the snow.

View attachment Snowstorm.mp4

Most of us here rarely got a false trigger using AI with IVS rules.

See this thread on how using just Dahua AI may be sufficient for your needs (and other cameras with AI would perform similar):

Who uses Dahua AI capable cameras? Reliable AI for triggering events? Pro's/con's?

 

[flatface]

Do you have Empiretech cameras with AI and if so are you using only IVS rules and not MD/SMD?

MD/SMD will result in false triggers.

Yes I have everything set up using IVS only. I don't get a ton of weather related triggers, but every snowstorm will false trigger my 4 of my 5 unprotected cameras 0-3 times. This doesn't happen on my unprotected T180 with white LEDs. I also don't think this happens in day mode without IR LEDs

Side question, when using ONVIF triggers in Blue Iris, should I be unchecking the MD related ONVIF triggers? I don't know if it's necessary, but I was finding that I was receiving Ismotion=true triggers and recordings on BI even though MD was not turned on in the camera. I leave on the line detection and intrusion triggers, but turn off ones like metadata and motion. IVS still seems to work fine in the majority of cases. Thanks!

 

[wittaj]

Yeah I would turn those off. We have seen some cameras will have MD turned on by BI and the user thinks it is the IVS tripping the false triggers when actually it is MD.

A hack many of us have done is gone into MD and SMD and set the sensitivity to the lowest, make the trigger area one block in the corner, and set the schedule to the bare minimum (some cameras will take 0 but some need a min time).

I guess there is always a field of view where IVS could trigger falsely. I will get one every once in awhile, probably under 3 for the year, but it certainly isn't every storm or leaf blow.

 

[mat200]

I have not bought any Reolink IP cameras. Just slowly getting ready to find the right cameras to upgrade. As for the Synology, I have not spent anything either. The NAS was mine and turned out to work as NVR very well. As for the camera licenses, I have not spent anything yet, thanks to alternative solutions out there. Maybe I will spend the money when Synology stops asking more money on software than on hardware You see @mat200 I did the opposite, I took the money and threw it to a decent PTZ

I am attempting to follow your logic based on your postings, and seems to be a conflict here of what I expect based on what you have posted.

How did you get past the Synology Surveillance Station license requirements ?

"My experience and current setup:
My cameras are on a separate network with no access to internet. NVR is Synology's Surveillance Station (any camera model is fine). I have to upgrade at least 3-4 cameras to get human/vehicle detection at key points (driveway, front lawn, entry points), but I have 15 upgradable cameras in total.

I have used a couple Reolink and Amcrest indoor cameras in the past, but not for surveillance. Reolink still works after 5-7 years; Amcrest too, but the camera model is too cheap. Both Reolink and Amcrest have a crappy microphone that produces noise (too much gain I guess). Another recent experience with Reolink is to upgrade the firmware of a camera they sent me for free years ago (RLC410-5MP). I never used it, but now I am consider to put it on to replace one of the broken surveillance cameras. The RLC410-5MP firmware was too old to upgrade with newest firmware, but Reolink support provided the files for step wise upgrades and I managed to bring it up to date. So, Reolink's support seem to work fine."

 

[blocksog]

How did you get past the Synology Surveillance Station license requirements ?

Through a publicly available hack.

 

[mat200]

Through a publicly available hack.

ah ..

Reolink, affordable components, manipulated firmware, manipulated promotions ( astroturfing ), deceptive business practices, deceptive reviews .. optimized for still images, issues with holding settings and compatibility.

Get better hardware from Dahua OEM or Hikvision OEM sources imho.

 

[blocksog]

ah ..

Reolink, affordable components, manipulated firmware, manipulated promotions ( astroturfing ), deceptive business practices, deceptive reviews .. optimized for still images, issues with holding settings and compatibility.

Get better hardware from Dahua OEM or Hikvision OEM sources imho.

As I said, The only Reolink cameras I have are not used much for surveillance. One is an old indoor PTZ I bought, and the other is a PoE camera they sent for free and I have never turned it on until last week. But, I did see Reolink surveillance systems at Costco which made me wonder if they are really as bad if they made it to the retail market. Hence this thread

For my needs, I like to install quality devices that are versatile. So I might go slowly all Empiretech. This is the benefit if Synology, just like BI you can mix the cameras easily. The first issue was to resolve the NVR system, and to be honest I am very happy with how versatile and easy is Synology's Surveillance Station. I might even buy their licenses in the future if they bring down the prices. It makes little sense though. An open box DVA1622 on Amazon costs $445, and comes with 8 camera licenses. Meanwhile, 8 camera licenses alone costs $380. Why buy the license if you can by hardware. N.b. Synology has a great feature where you can cameras on different systems, connect the systems together, and manage the cameras from a single interface just like you had a single bigger NVR.

 

[samplenhold]

I am thinking that if I had an IR illuminator by the mailbox, night reading of licenses would still be possible.

You might consider getting a good cam for dedicated LPR rather than trying to force the PTZ to do night LPR, which it is not really a good match for. Yes some folks have had some luck with that, but the money and time you spend on off-cam IR and trying to get this to work might be best spent on say a 5442 Z4E or a 5241 Z12E which have a proven track record of great night LPR capture.