House Camera Setup and LPR Advice

[wittaj]

@schunter1969 - welcome to the world of "oh I only need two cameras"...turns into more than a dozen LOL...

All looks great. You could tighten the shot up a bit more on the LPR if you see you start missing plates. I have mine zoomed from curb to curb - no lawns are seen in my images.

 

[schunter1969]

On the IPC-HFW5241E-Z12E for LPR the trigger doesn't happen fast enough and sometimes vehicles are almost out of view before it starts recording. The picture I attached of the UPS truck is the first frame for example. Also when I type in the static IP of the camera and go into the camera web settings it will not allow me to go past 25fps but this camera should be able to go to 30fps. Whats going on with the frames and how can I get the camera to record faster?

 

[wittaj]

@schunter1969 - you need to match your FPS with I-frame - so if you go with 25 FPS, then I-Frame is 25.

Most on here go with under 10FPS for LPR. I run at 6 FPS and 6 I-frame. We don't need a smooth video, just a good capture of the plates.

In Blue Iris, do not use the advanced motion sensor options for LPR - you will miss things. Uncheck object detection and zone hotspot. Since we zoom in so far into the street, Blue Iris needs to see the image first for those options to work the best. Simple record any motion. I also changed my algorithm to simple.

Go into the next screen and change the time after the event to a really low number - mine is like 1 second. That way you get two clips if two vehicles come by close together.

 

[bigredfish]

I run 30 FPS on Dahua NVRs for LPR. More frames the better. Iframe match FPS

I also record both motion AND Motion/IVS for this very reason

 

[schunter1969]

My I frame interval was at 30. I tried changing to a higher number and it still won't let me go past 25fps. I updated my settings I'll let you know.

 

[wittaj]

The i-frame needs to match FPS, so whatever number you can get it to stick to. Sometimes these cameras are a little wonky, so set the numbers, hit save, then hit refresh. If they change, try again until you can hit save and refresh and the numbers hold. Maybe try 20 FPS and 20 I-frame?

OR - have the pre-buffer be a second or two to catch what is being missed because of the I-frame/FPS mismatch. But, it might be good to have a little pre-buffer anyway, especially if you do not record continuous.

 

[schunter1969]

I matched the I-frame and FPS to 25 and then added 2 seconds of pre-buffer and that fixed it! The video starts recording right before the car came into frame so I backed it down to 1 second pre-buffer and its perfect! Thanks for that quick help

 

[dfhawk]

Also, From the KIA screenshot to the UPS truck it appears you zoomed in (which is great) with that said as you zoom in the field of view shifts down and a manual adjustment upwards may be warranted.

 

[wittaj]

I matched the I-frame and FPS to 25 and then added 2 seconds of pre-buffer and that fixed it! The video starts recording right before the car came into frame so I backed it down to 1 second pre-buffer and its perfect! Thanks for that quick help

You are welcome! It looks great!

 

[schunter1969]

I completely agree. I need to move the camera up slightly, adjust the shield, and I was also thinking about rotating the camera a little bit so that more of the road is in view.

 

[dfhawk]

You have the best vantage point but I agree I would (guess based on photos) likely move camera to capture more in this area (see black rectangle).

 

[schunter1969]

Ok I manually adjusted the camera angle and think I got it in the sweet spot

 

[schunter1969]

I need some more help! Thanks to other cameras around the house I see that the IPC-HFW5241E-Z12E setup for LPR is not triggering every time at night. How can I fix this? I zoomed out two clicks to see if that makes a difference I will see tonight but I has hoping I could get some input on my settings if y'all think that is the problem. Pictures attached of blue iris settings and here are my night profile settings:

Pictures: Style Standard
Brightness 50
Contrast 40
Saturation 50
Sharpness 60
Gamma 50
Mirror Off
EIS off

Exposure: Antiflicker Outdoor
Mode Manual
Shutter 1/2000
Gain 0 - 30
Iris 40
3D NR ON
Grade 12

Backlight: OFF

WB: Outdoor

Day/night: B/W

IR Light: Manual
Nearlight 100
Farlight 100

 

[wittaj]

@schunter1969 - those are almost identical to mine, but at night in BI, I'm running 100 min object size and 20 minimum contrast at night.

Do you have an SD card in the camera that you could pull a few night pics from and post here?

With BI there is some "calibrating" for LPR because the screen is so dark at night. I run two settings and the night setting I run the min object size and contrast different than the day settings. I suspect that you will have to run a smaller min object size and maybe less for contrast.

At night, all the camera will probably see is headlight/tailight and a plate, so the min object size needs to be small, like the size of the headlight. What I did was had a family member take a car out to the spot and had them stop long enough that when I pull up the motion configuration setting menu I could size it to the headlight.

I also suspect because it is such a dark image at night, you can take that min object size down really low because the camera will not see anything else. Obviously need it larger during the day so that every leaf doesn't send it off.

 

[schunter1969]

I do not have an sd card in the camera. The video file is recorded to hard drive, see attached. My follow up question was going to be what settings should I change to get the license plate white background to stand out more so that the plate is more legible? I do not have an sd card in the camera. The video file is recorded to hard drive.

 

[wittaj]

@schunter1969 - wow looking at those, I am surprised your setting didn't pick them up, but it would certainly pick them up if you make the min object size smaller.

As far as the plates, it is a balance. I think those picture are good and can be read. You plug those images into a computer reader like OpenALPR - Automatic License Plate Recognition for Security and Automation or ANPRonline.Net™ and it will read them.

You could try a slower shutter speed and see if that helps - keep backing down until it is fuzzy. Add an external IR. Try the various backlight options. Up the noise value. I have made mine pop off the screen, but it came at a price of ghosting in the image and depending on the speed of the car, at my angle sometimes the plate then got washed out in the ghosting by the headlight in the ghosting.

Biggest issue with adjusting the night image is make an adjustment and then having to wait for a vehicle to go by LOL. I figure if an automated reader can read it, then it is good enough.

 

[schunter1969]

I know! Because of the Corona virus I have a lot less traffic and have barely any cars at night. I am going to have my wife drive back and forth tonight! Do you think I should have a back light on? Which one?

 

[wittaj]

@schunter1969 - my one LPR doesn't use any and my other uses HLC at 50. It is so site specific that you will have your wife drive by quite a few times LOL!

 

[schunter1969]

Hey just wanted to follow up and share a video. Camera system is working great and I recently added the 3MP doorbell camera sold on this website. A few months ago 3 houses down a car was broken into and caught just about everything on video.