Highlights are Blown Out - ET IPC-T58IR-SE-2.8MM-S3

[slothman]

Hey guys,

I know that this forum isn't the biggest fan of outdoor 8MP installations. I mostly use 4MP for 3.6 and 6mm installs, but for my 2.8mm installs I ordered 8MP. The image quality is quite good in dusk settings, even in low light, but things get washed out with the slightest bit of sunlight. The camera is installed under a patio/porch so there's the shaded porch then the outdoor / sun exposed area in the frame. I'm a bit confused by this, as I have a Ubiquiti AI Pro in a nearby location which does not have this issue. My understanding is that the 8MP Dahua uses a similar / same sensor as the AI Pro. Likewise, I was also under the impression these 8MP S3s had a fairly good WDR rating, and I believe it matches the Ubiquiti AI Pro.

I'm guessing the Ubiquiti camera manages this with software. I've tried the WDR setting in the ET web management settings but it just made everything look washed out, even at 48.

Does anyone know what could be done to manage this, or is the 8MP really a lost cause for this application? The AI Pro looks so much better here but I'm trying to move to a full ET install.

 

[bigredfish]

A pic would be helpful.
What model# exactly?

WDR sounds like what you need, I run one with it as low as 12 and it makes a difference.

Also you could try SSA (backlight mode SSA NOT SSA AI at the top of the menu)

Are you setting it via the camera's web GUI or trying to set it via the NVR interface?

What Exposure setting?

 

[slothman]

A pic would be helpful.
What model# exactly?

WDR sounds like what you need, I run one with it as low as 12 and it makes a difference.

Also you could try SSA (backlight mode SSA NOT SSA AI at the top of the menu)

Are you setting it via the camera's web GUI or trying to set it via the NVR interface?

What Exposure setting?

Thanks for the fast response!

Yes a pic would probably be nice, I forgot to grab one when it was brighter today and it's not on NVR yet.

I'm using Web GUI.

I left exposure setting default, though reducing it did improve the image. I wanted to try again at night to make sure I wasn't going too low. Really right now everything is back to default.

 

[wittaj]

Yeah running the camera on default is likely a big part of the issue.

In terms of getting the most out of the camera, here is my "standard" post that many use as a start for dialing in day and night that helps get the clean captures and help the camera recognize people and cars.

Every field of view is different, but I have found you need contrast to usually be 6-8 higher than the brightness number at night.

We want the ability to freeze frame capture a clean image from the video at night, and that is only done with a shutter of 1/60 or faster. At night, default/auto may be on 1/12s shutter or worse to make the image bright.

In my opinion, shutter (exposure) and gain are the two most important parameters and then base the others off of it. Shutter is more important than FPS. It is the shutter speed that prevents motion blur, not FPS. 15 FPS is more than enough for surveillance cameras as we are not producing Hollywood movies. Match iframes to FPS. 15FPS is all that is usually needed.

Many people do not realize there is manual shutter that lets you adjust shutter and gain and a shutter priority that only lets you adjust shutter speed but not gain. The higher the gain, the bigger the noise and see-through ghosting start to appear because the noise is amplified. Most people select shutter priority and run a faster shutter than they should because it is likely being done at 100 gain, so it is actually defeating their purpose of a faster shutter.

Go into shutter settings and change to manual shutter and start with custom shutter as ms and change to 0-8.3ms and gain 0-50 (night) and 0-4ms exposure and 0-30 gain (day)for starters. Auto could have a shutter speed of 100ms or more with a gain at 100 and shutter priority could result in gain up at 100 which will contribute to significant ghosting and that blinding white you will get from the infrared or white light.

Now what you will notice immediately at night is that your image gets A LOT darker. That faster the shutter, the more light that is needed. But it is a balance. The nice bright night static image results in Casper blur and ghost during motion LOL. What do we want, a nice static image or a clean image when there is motion introduced to the scene?

In the daytime, if it is still too bright, then drop the 4ms down to 3ms then 2ms, etc. You have to play with it for your field of view.

Then at night, if it is too dark, then start adding ms to the time. Go to 10ms, 12ms, etc. until you find what you feel is acceptable as an image. Then have someone walk around and see if you can get a clean shot. Try not to go above 16.67ms (but certainly not above 30ms) as that tends to be the point where blur starts to occur. Conversely, if it is still bright, then drop down in time to get a faster shutter.

You can also adjust brightness and contrast to improve the image. But try not to go above 70 for anything and try to have contrast be at least 7-10 digits higher than brightness.

You can also add some gain to brighten the image - but the higher the gain, the more ghosting you get. Some cameras can go to 70 or so before it is an issue and some can't go over 50.

But adjusting those two settings will have the biggest impact. The next one is noise reduction. Want to keep that as low as possible. Depending on the amount of light you have, you might be able to get down to 40 or so at night (again camera dependent) and 20-30 during the day, but take it as low as you can before it gets too noisy. Again this one is a balance as well. Too smooth and no noise can result in soft images and contribute to blur.

Do not use backlight features until you have exhausted every other parameter setting. And if you do have to use backlight, take it down as low as possible.

After every setting adjustment, have someone walk around outside and see if you can freeze-frame to get a clean image. If not, keep changing until you do. Clean motion pictures are what we are after, not a clean static image.

 

[slothman]

Yeah running the camera on default is likely a big part of the issue.

In terms of getting the most out of the camera, here is my "standard" post that many use as a start for dialing in day and night that helps get the clean captures and help the camera recognize people and cars.

Every field of view is different, but I have found you need contrast to usually be 6-8 higher than the brightness number at night.

We want the ability to freeze frame capture a clean image from the video at night, and that is only done with a shutter of 1/60 or faster. At night, default/auto may be on 1/12s shutter or worse to make the image bright.

In my opinion, shutter (exposure) and gain are the two most important parameters and then base the others off of it. Shutter is more important than FPS. It is the shutter speed that prevents motion blur, not FPS. 15 FPS is more than enough for surveillance cameras as we are not producing Hollywood movies. Match iframes to FPS. 15FPS is all that is usually needed.

Many people do not realize there is manual shutter that lets you adjust shutter and gain and a shutter priority that only lets you adjust shutter speed but not gain. The higher the gain, the bigger the noise and see-through ghosting start to appear because the noise is amplified. Most people select shutter priority and run a faster shutter than they should because it is likely being done at 100 gain, so it is actually defeating their purpose of a faster shutter.

Go into shutter settings and change to manual shutter and start with custom shutter as ms and change to 0-8.3ms and gain 0-50 (night) and 0-4ms exposure and 0-30 gain (day)for starters. Auto could have a shutter speed of 100ms or more with a gain at 100 and shutter priority could result in gain up at 100 which will contribute to significant ghosting and that blinding white you will get from the infrared or white light.

Now what you will notice immediately at night is that your image gets A LOT darker. That faster the shutter, the more light that is needed. But it is a balance. The nice bright night static image results in Casper blur and ghost during motion LOL. What do we want, a nice static image or a clean image when there is motion introduced to the scene?

In the daytime, if it is still too bright, then drop the 4ms down to 3ms then 2ms, etc. You have to play with it for your field of view.

Then at night, if it is too dark, then start adding ms to the time. Go to 10ms, 12ms, etc. until you find what you feel is acceptable as an image. Then have someone walk around and see if you can get a clean shot. Try not to go above 16.67ms (but certainly not above 30ms) as that tends to be the point where blur starts to occur. Conversely, if it is still bright, then drop down in time to get a faster shutter.

You can also adjust brightness and contrast to improve the image. But try not to go above 70 for anything and try to have contrast be at least 7-10 digits higher than brightness.

You can also add some gain to brighten the image - but the higher the gain, the more ghosting you get. Some cameras can go to 70 or so before it is an issue and some can't go over 50.

But adjusting those two settings will have the biggest impact. The next one is noise reduction. Want to keep that as low as possible. Depending on the amount of light you have, you might be able to get down to 40 or so at night (again camera dependent) and 20-30 during the day, but take it as low as you can before it gets too noisy. Again this one is a balance as well. Too smooth and no noise can result in soft images and contribute to blur.

Do not use backlight features until you have exhausted every other parameter setting. And if you do have to use backlight, take it down as low as possible.

After every setting adjustment, have someone walk around outside and see if you can freeze-frame to get a clean image. If not, keep changing until you do. Clean motion pictures are what we are after, not a clean static image.

Hey thanks a ton for the writeup! I'm going to play with the settings and report back what I find.

I'm noticing the following options: Self-adaptive, Day/Night Switch, Customized Scene. It seems it defaults to selecting customized scene. I would assume Day/Night switch is ideal so I can adjust it for when it's not in IR mode?
View attachment 215746

 

[slothman]

I've given this advice a go and have had excellent results thus far. The primary difference I'm noticing is that the image is so dark at dusk compared to my AI Pro that it switches over to night mode about an hour before the AI Pro. This seems to be due to manual exposure settings. I've also set exposure comp to 0, as it seems to produce the cleanest image with no blowout.

 

[wittaj]

Yeah, the faster the shutter, the more light is needed, so it will go into night mode faster.

Most cameras firmware are designed to favor bright and color images, which comes at the expense of detail as the light gets lower.