Ezviz DB1C - ONVIF, ZoneMinder, and Blue Iris - questions

[Kaiyne]

Hi All,

New to all this surveillance stuff and I have some questions about onvif features and how this Ezviz DB1C works with Blue Iris and/or Zoneminder.

I've done some research over the past couple weeks, and confusion on onvif is growing. I now know it's for cross vendor support, allowing multiple brands to integrate, but what else does it do?

My main requirements:
Video surveillance with motion detection triggering the cam to record to my server, along with sending an alert to my phone.

I got my feet wet by installing ZoneMinder and connecting a basic web cam to it. I found that I could set up multiple monitoring zones and a motion trigger to capture short videos to the hard drive. Since it's a crappy low def cam, I was surprised that it worked, and at this point I thought only onvif cams could do motion detection, but it seems to work through the software.
How does the onboard Image Change/Human Detection work with Blue Iris or zoneminder? I'm guessing the Blue Iris/Zoneminder have their own algorithms for motion detecting and only use the raw feed from the rtsp link? So having the AI on the camera would be redundant?

I've read the review post by silencery here: https://ipcamtalk.com/threads/review-ezviz-db1c.52789/ which was very informative, but I have a question about this:

If EZVIZ ever did bring ONVIF event capability to the DB1C, AI detection would be useful for NVR users to trigger recordings

I'm really not sure what you mean about triggering the recordings? Do you mean that the db1c would send a trigger to Blue Iris to start recording? But this leads to another question, why does my cheap webcam work with motion detection recording? It's certainly not onvif capable! I'm really confused.

What do I really need onvif for?

Sorry for all the newb questions! Appreciate any advice.

Cheers

 

[David L]

I think his statement is because not all NVRs has AI, if the DBC1 had ONVIF support, it would send the triggered AI motion detection from the DBC1 to the NVR via ONVIF which would trigger the NVR to record the event.

I have a DB1 variant, LaView, and it detects motion via PIR, being that it supports ONVIF, it's PIR motion detection is sent to Blue Iris (or to a NVR) to trigger recording. I have done it both ways in BI, set up zones in BI so when BI detects a change in the zone it would trigger a recording. The zoning/range in BI is much more detailed compared to setting up motion zones in the Doorbell App, which is very limited. But being that the Doorbell PIR or AI is independent and records to it's SD-Card, it is a nice Backup incase it loses connection to the NVR (BI). I think as long as you have consistent detection and very few or no false alerts (trucks/cars, etc. passing by), then everything is doing it's job. DeepStack got implemented in the latest BI upgrade, it is a nice opensource AI which detects by person, car, truck, dog, cat, etc.

HTH

 

[The Automation Guy]

What do I really need onvif for?

You have pretty much stated it.
1) ONVIF can make setting up the camera in BI easier because they software will communicate with the camera and pretty much set up the correct settings itself.
2) The camera may provide "extra" features that utilize ONVIF to communicate with the NVR/DVR/software that is recording the feed. The most common "extra" feature is motion detection (including onboard AI algorithms). If a camera doesn't support ONVIF, then these types of features are not going to be available and motion detection/AI will need to be handled at the NVR/DVR/software level instead of being handled in the camera hardware.

I have a mixture of both ONVIF and non-ONVIF cameras in my setup - including the DB1C. I use ONVIF when it is available, but I don't limit my camera selection based on ONVIF support. The non-ONVIF cameras work fine in BI as well. As noted, I have the DB1C and the older DB1 camera. I actually like the DB1C camera better because it has better picture quality. I could care less that it doesn't have ONVIF support. I simply have BI handle the motion detection for any camera that doesn't have ONVIF.

 

[Kaiyne]

I think his statement is because not all NVRs has AI, if the DBC1 had ONVIF support, it would send the triggered AI motion detection from the DBC1 to the NVR via ONVIF which would trigger the NVR to record the event.

The camera may provide "extra" features that utilize ONVIF to communicate with the NVR/DVR/software that is recording the feed. The most common "extra" feature is motion detection (including onboard AI algorithms). If a camera doesn't support ONVIF, then these types of features are not going to be available and motion detection/AI will need to be handled at the NVR/DVR/software level instead of being handled in the camera hardware.

Awesome Guys! That's it right there, the missing piece of the puzzle! I don't really know much about NVRs, but this makes sense now. I was kinda putting it together and now you just confirmed it with more details, thanks!

I pulled the trigger last night and got the DB1C off the shelf at Best Buy and set it up in a few hours... longest part was changing out my chime transformer.

I only had time to set up the ezviz app, but it was pretty easy and it seems to work okay. Both the Image Change and Human Shape detection settings work, but the image change setting could detect me beside my car (about 20' away at night) whereas the human detection couldn't, although the image change change gives more false positives (I figure I just need to tweak the sensitivity and area settings).

So if I understand correctly- if I have a smart AI NVR, I don't really need onvif compliant cameras (at least for my basic demands).

And now I'm understanding that I can use both the Ezviz app and stream the rtsp feed to my zoneminder system at the same time (I think)... (guess I'll be doing some tweaking this weekend). I'm curious to see the differences. I'm also going to install the BI trial and mess around with that and find out which works best for me, might just buy it seeing it's on sale; I'm just not a windows fan lol.

Thanks for the feedback! And now I know where to go for advice, lots of info in these forums!

Cheers all!

 

[looney2ns]

Be sure to study this> Cliff Notes.

 

[The Automation Guy]

And now I'm understanding that I can use both the Ezviz app and stream the rtsp feed to my zoneminder system at the same time (I think)... (guess I'll be doing some tweaking this weekend). I'm curious to see the differences. I'm also going to install the BI trial and mess around with that and find out which works best for me, might just buy it seeing it's on sale; I'm just not a windows fan lol.

That is correct - you can use both at the same time.

That being said, you have to understand that the EZViz app uses the internet to work. This means your doorbell has two way communication with the entire internet -it can reach devices on the internet and devices on the internet can reach it. There is some security surrounding this (id and password), but anytime you have a device connected to the internet, it is exposed to potential hacks and IOT devices have a history of poor security measures. On the other hand, your Zoneminder system is hopefully closed - meaning no part of it is exposed to the internet - and should only be accessible on your local network (and a VPN connection if you need to access it remotely).

Personally I blocked my EZViz doorbell camera (and all other cameras) from accessing the internet. This means that my EXViz app does not work reliably. It shows a connection for a day or two, and then the cameras all go offline. I assume when the cameras fail to connect to the EZViz servers, they eventually stop connecting to the app. If I reboot the cameras, they will show up again in my EZViz app for a few days before "going offline" again. The feeds are always available in BlueIris however. It's only the app that stops working. This means I can only access my feeds via BlueIris which is what I use to record my cameras. I can also only access my system locally or via a VPN connection that I have set up in my firewall appliance.

So long story short, you can use the EZ-Viz app and Zoneminder at the same time, but I would suggest that you don't use the EZ-Viz app at all and actually block the camera from accessing the internet which will cause the app to eventually fail anyway.

 

[Kaiyne]

Be sure to study this> Cliff Notes.

Nice, I hadn't noticed that yet, thanks!

So long story short, you can use the EZ-Viz app and Zoneminder at the same time, but I would suggest that you don't use the EZ-Viz app at all and actually block the camera from accessing the internet.

Good point! If I choose to use this remotely, I'll keep that in mind, appreciate the advice