How Can I Easily Playback SD Card Recordings?

[ilovecoffee]

I'm trying to set up a low resource intensive 2-camera setup at my inlaws where they could access recorded footage via iOS. I am a Blue-Iris user however, I feel that it overkill here and would require me to purchase a PC.

Currently the 2 Dahua cameras I have, record motion to a micro SD card, and post images to an FTP running on a raspberry pi (for a smart alert system I set up)

gDMSS or iDMSS is quite frankly useless for playing back recordings (it works 10% of the time, and the app does not list motion events in any intuitive way).

I'd even write the video files to a NAS running on the pi, but I'm not aware of any app that serves video files in a neat and orderly way via an iOS app. I could also buy some cheap aliexpress NVR but again I'm not sure how good those associated apps are for video file playback.

Any suggestions?

 

[civic17]

I can only see the motion marked as orange lines on the timeline scrolling only. It works most the time when I have a good wifi signal to my phone. Would be nice if it can show a list of time events like I can when logging into the camera through the IP on a browser.

 

[The North Face]

If it’s not a problem moving away from the RPi, I would consider a Synology DS118j with Surveillance Station. Has an app that works great. The DS118j is $100 + a HDD. I’m using its predecessor DS115j with a single Dahua camera while using it as NAS with a bunch of servers on it. That takes it to its limits, but for your use case I think the DS118j would do a great job.

Edit: Surveillance Station includes a license for up to two cameras. If you want to extend beyond that, I understand people feel the license are expensive for home users.

(No, I don’t get paid for recommending Synology and I haven’t tried QNAP or other NASes. I have however been a Linux user since 1992 and I’m really impressed with how Synology combines enough power and user friendliness in one and the same package, without me having to be sysadmin all the time. I run a RPi on the side for some home automation and other tasks that was easier to get going in a “pure” Linux environment rather than on the Synology)

 

[ilovecoffee]

If it’s not a problem moving away from the RPi, I would consider a Synology DS118j with Surveillance Station. Has an app that works great. The DS118j is $100 + a HDD. I’m using its predecessor DS115j with a single Dahua camera while using it as NAS with a bunch of servers on it. That takes it to its limits, but for your use case I think the DS118j would do a great job.

Edit: Surveillance Station includes a license for up to two cameras. If you want to extend beyond that, I understand people feel the license are expensive for home users.

(No, I don’t get paid for recommending Synology and I haven’t tried QNAP or other NASes. I have however been a Linux user since 1992 and I’m really impressed with how Synology combines enough power and user friendliness in one and the same package, without me having to be sysadmin all the time. I run a RPi on the side for some home automation and other tasks that was easier to get going in a “pure” Linux environment rather than on the Synology)

Interesting. The DS118j doesn't seem to be available in Canada anymore, but the DS119j is available, and certainly cost effective. I just used the PI to run object detection on a neural net to only get alerts about people (when their phones are away from home)... That wouldn't be possible at least quick enough on the Synology...but this is still an interesting piece of kit I've never considered. Thanks

 

[The North Face]

Sorry, I confused DS118 with DS119j. The j model is lower end/budget but very capable imho. I’m upgrading to a DS118 because I need more processor power without paying too much. At hardware prices above the DS118 I would go cloud based instead of on-premise.

I have considered doing the same as you but Surveillance Station is very competent to be included free of charge with the hardware. Now I’m using IVS on the Dahua camera and have a python script (on a RPi, in fact) polling the camera and triggering recording/push notifications in Surveillance Station. Also triggers a floodlight. I’m 99% on mobile devices so the app functionality was crucial to me.

 

[jack7]

One way might be to use Tinycam Pro for android. It supports in-camera motion and stores motion detect files. I suggest using one of the devices in
Android TV devices recommended for tinyCam Monitor PRO w/ background mode and web server
To see how files are presented to user in IOS browser, try the demo link which is in the links provided here.
I have tested Tinycam before running on my Android pad, and an ipad using web server. Motion files seemed to presented to IOS user in a simple manner. I have not used it extensively yet for motion detect recordings.
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