Dahua IP-HFW5231E-Z5 LPR settings

barrypilger

barrypilger

n3wb
Mar 9, 2015
16
22
Have been tweaking my HFW5231E-Z5 over the past few days and am sharing the settings I have found to optimize plate reading. Cam is mounted in a tree about 15 feet above road and 20 degrees or so off to the side. Road itself is a 30 degree uphill climb, so no vehicle is going much faster than 25 mph. I am using Sighthound.com software on a Windows 10 laptop.

Backlight is set to HLC for night. All other settings are default.

Here are settings for day and night:
day.png night.png

Here is a day shot and a night shot of plates. Getting near 100% reads. If a car has a plate, it's captured.

day plate.png night plate.png
 
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Sighthound Pro license. Dedicated laptop with NAS for storage.
 
I have been toying around with Sighthound and it is cool. can Sighthound only ID "cars" and "people?" for example is there a "dog" ID option or bike option?
 
I use only people, objects and objects crossing a line detection. Dogs are usually detected as people in my experience.
 
ok, i was not sure if Sighthound offered other "objects" as an option. with my trial version i am only given the option of cras, objects, and people....i think
 
My report will not be definitive. I discovered Blue Iris long after I began using Vitamin D Video (Sighthound's original incarnation). Because I do community workshops on installation of home surveillance systems I felt I should be conversant with BI in case someone asked about it in a workshop. I bought it a year or two ago. I installed it and added cameras and noticed (mind you well over a year ago) that it was just as much a CPU hog as Sighthound and was a bit geeky to install/connect cameras to. Its chief attraction at the time was its price. SH is $60 for 2 cameras and $250 for unlimited cams. BI is $30 for one cam and $60 for more.

It could be that BI has changed its software in the recent past to be less of a CPU hog (and perhaps better in many ways...) or made it more intuitive but I can't speak to that.

What continues to sell me on SH (in spite of the price) is that an update in the past year has created an 80% reduction in CPU usage (yes, you read that correctly, it now uses 20% of the CPU power it used previously.) And it is completely intuitive. I just helped a retiree with no tech skills install SH to replace her now discontinued Logitech Alert system (on of the Logitech cams had died, so we replaced it with a 2 MP Dahua). I added her two cams to SH, showed her where to click to view motion activated videos and she was on her own. In the past year SH also adopted ONVIF compatibility which now makes identifying and installing cams a matter of a few clicks whereas before one needed to research the RTSP parameters for every individual camera.

So, not definitive, but a summary of what I like about SH. Also, their tech support has been quite wonderful. There is a small annual fee to maintain tech support and receive software updates, too.
 
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barrypilger said:
My report will not be definitive. I discovered Blue Iris long after I began using Vitamin D Video (Sighthound's original incarnation). Because I do community workshops on installation of home surveillance systems I felt I should be conversant with BI in case someone asked about it in a workshop. I bought it a year or two ago. I installed it and added cameras and noticed (mind you well over a year ago) that it was just as much a CPU hog as Sighthound and was a bit geeky to install/connect cameras to. Its chief attraction at the time was its price. SH is $60 for 2 cameras and $250 for unlimited cams. BI is $30 for one cam and $60 for more.

It could be that BI has changed its software in the recent past to be less of a CPU hog (and perhaps better in many ways...) or made it more intuitive but I can't speak to that.

What continues to sell me on SH (in spite of the price) is that an update in the past year has created an 80% reduction in CPU usage (yes, you read that correctly, it now uses 20% of the CPU power it used previously.) And it is completely intuitive. I just helped a retiree with no tech skills install SH to replace her now discontinued Logitech Alert system (on of the Logitech cams had died, so we replaced it with a 2 MP Dahua). I added her two cams to SH, showed her where to click to view motion activated videos and she was on her own. In the past year SH also adopted ONVIF compatibility which now makes identifying and installing cams a matter of a few clicks whereas before one needed to research the RTSP parameters for every individual camera.

So, not definitive, but a summary of what I like about SH. Also, their tech support has been quite wonderful. There is a small annual fee to maintain tech support and receive software updates, too.
Click to expand...
Does the Software automatically extract license plate data and store it in a database?
 
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No. I review motion activated saved videos any time I need to identify a vehicle or its plate.
 
Till now, which cam is the best for the license plate model? HFW5431E-Z5 or HFW5231E-Z5 or HFW5231E-Z12? @nayr before said the HFW5431E-Z5 any guys have more testing pics? Because some guys ask me for this. So i need some of your guys' support for this.
 
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I just unliked this so I could like it again. Thanks for the info! Just got this camera for license plate reading and you saved me a ton of time.
 
barrypilger said:
Have been tweaking my HFW5231E-Z5 over the past few days and am sharing the settings I have found to optimize plate reading. Cam is mounted in a tree about 15 feet above road and 20 degrees or so off to the side. Road itself is a 30 degree uphill climb, so no vehicle is going much faster than 25 mph. I am using Sighthound.com software on a Windows 10 laptop.

Backlight is set to HLC for night. All other settings are default.

Here are settings for day and night:
View attachment 18700 View attachment 18701

Here is a day shot and a night shot of plates. Getting near 100% reads. If a car has a plate, it's captured.

View attachment 18702 View attachment 18703
Click to expand...
One question, which is potentially a dumb one: once you've set the different parameters for day and night, will the camera select the correct mode based on ambient light, or do you have to schedule it? I saw there was a schedule option, but that seems less accurate than letting the camera decide based on ambient light. Thanks!
 
barrypilger said:
My report will not be definitive. I discovered Blue Iris long after I began using Vitamin D Video (Sighthound's original incarnation). Because I do community workshops on installation of home surveillance systems I felt I should be conversant with BI in case someone asked about it in a workshop. I bought it a year or two ago. I installed it and added cameras and noticed (mind you well over a year ago) that it was just as much a CPU hog as Sighthound and was a bit geeky to install/connect cameras to. Its chief attraction at the time was its price. SH is $60 for 2 cameras and $250 for unlimited cams. BI is $30 for one cam and $60 for more.

It could be that BI has changed its software in the recent past to be less of a CPU hog (and perhaps better in many ways...) or made it more intuitive but I can't speak to that.

What continues to sell me on SH (in spite of the price) is that an update in the past year has created an 80% reduction in CPU usage (yes, you read that correctly, it now uses 20% of the CPU power it used previously.) And it is completely intuitive. I just helped a retiree with no tech skills install SH to replace her now discontinued Logitech Alert system (on of the Logitech cams had died, so we replaced it with a 2 MP Dahua). I added her two cams to SH, showed her where to click to view motion activated videos and she was on her own. In the past year SH also adopted ONVIF compatibility which now makes identifying and installing cams a matter of a few clicks whereas before one needed to research the RTSP parameters for every individual camera.

So, not definitive, but a summary of what I like about SH. Also, their tech support has been quite wonderful. There is a small annual fee to maintain tech support and receive software updates, too.
Click to expand...
BI is less cpu intensive..you do need to set it up properly...that includes entering the licensee key (this is required for direct to disk), enabling direct to disk recording for EACH camera and enabling hardware acceleration if you have intel cpu with quicksync...HA with intel hd alone reduces cpu consumption by 20-30 percent.
one of the biggest problems with sighthound and correct me if they have fixed this is that you cannot view the cameras in martix view live the cameras appear in tiny boxes on the right...this is a basic function of any vms. This is done to lower cpu. It is unacceptable for many applications that need proper live view.
The storage options as well as scheduling is basically non existent when compared to blue iris.
 
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fenderman said:
BI is less cpu intensive..you do need to set it up properly...that includes entering the licensee key (this is required for direct to disk), enabling direct to disk recording for EACH camera and enabling hardware acceleration if you have intel cpu with quicksync...HA with intel hd alone reduces cpu consumption by 20-30 percent.
one of the biggest problems with sighthound and correct me if they have fixed this is that you cannot view the cameras in martix view live the cameras appear in tiny boxes on the right...this is a basic function of any vms. This is done to lower cpu. It is unacceptable for many applications that need proper live view.
The storage options as well as scheduling is basically non existent when compared to blue iris.
Click to expand...

Correct on the lack of matrix view. Thumbnails appear on the right. Storage options include local or network drive or FTP. Mine goes to an NAS. No scheduling, but a number of options for motion detection (area, people only, trip wire one or both directions.)
 
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RJF said:
One question, which is potentially a dumb one: once you've set the different parameters for day and night, will the camera select the correct mode based on ambient light, or do you have to schedule it? I saw there was a schedule option, but that seems less accurate than letting the camera decide based on ambient light. Thanks!
Click to expand...

I let the camera do it automatically. Haven't missed a plate yet.
 
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barrypilger said:
Correct on the lack of matrix view. Thumbnails appear on the right. Storage options include local or network drive or FTP. Mine goes to an NAS. No scheduling, but a number of options for motion detection (area, people only, trip wire one or both directions.)
Click to expand...
Yeah you can set one location only, no ability to use more than one or move files...no schedule is a significant limitations...
 
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fenderman said:
BI is less cpu intensive..you do need to set it up properly...that includes entering the licensee key (this is required for direct to disk), enabling direct to disk recording for EACH camera and enabling hardware acceleration if you have intel cpu with quicksync...HA with intel hd alone reduces cpu consumption by 20-30 percent.
one of the biggest problems with sighthound and correct me if they have fixed this is that you cannot view the cameras in martix view live the cameras appear in tiny boxes on the right...this is a basic function of any vms. This is done to lower cpu. It is unacceptable for many applications that need proper live view.
The storage options as well as scheduling is basically non existent when compared to blue iris.
Click to expand...

Most recent Sighthound update includes a matrix live view.
 
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