How to Resolve Dahua Night Vision Issues

[mousemouse]

Hi,

I have a IPC-HDW5231R-ZE that I recently setup.
I'm having issues with the night vision however.
Here is the image with IR on SmartIR:

Here is the image with IR off:

As you can see, I can see much more with the IR sensor completely off.


I have tried playing around with the IR setting and just setting it to lower, but only when I completely turn it off am I able to see the cyclone fence.

I also tried adjusting the exposure, but it didn't change anything.

Any suggestions?

 

[gabe323]

Can you raise it? I think the IR hitting the ground is causing your issues.

 

[pozzello]

the IR appears to be narrower than the the field of view (looks like you have the cam zoomed out wide.)
that's a common issue with vari-focals. the IR angle doesn't change with the zoom.
some cams have a 'near' & 'far' setting for IR led's, but i dunno if that one does (don't have that one myself).

either leave IR off, as in your second shot, or add an external IR illuminator with a wider throw,
is all i can suggest...

 

[pozzello]

oh, you might try enabling WDR (at the lowest helpful level) for that night shot.
usually used only in the daytime, but you clearly have a 'wide dynamic range' from dark to light
with the IR spot in the middle. WDR (under conditions/backlight/mode) may help in this case...

also, it may help to pan right a bit and get that AC condenser out of the frame, as it
reflects IR back at the cam and throws off the balance...

 

[Mike A.]

Try under Backlighting > HLC - Adjust to reduce the bright spot in the grass. Unfortunately Dahua, at least the version of the firmware that I have, doesn't let you adjust the compensation for center-weighted vs left, right, etc. If yours does use center.

Under IR - Try setting it to manual and taking it down some.

Under Exposure - Try setting to manual and adjusting to see if you can balance things out better vs auto.

Cam seems to be mounted very low? The camera is adjusting the overall image to the bright area directly in front. That's made worse by having it closer. Moving the cam up would probably help in two ways - getting it away from that surface more and projecting the IR farther out.

 

[bigredfish]

Try walking back and forth in front of it both ways and see the difference in clarity...

Agree with suggestions to mount it a bit higher, and/or use an external illuminator. While the IR focus does tend to create a hotspot with VF cams, mounted that low and pointing at the ground directly in front of it is making it worse.

 

[mousemouse]

Here is an image with the camera mounted higher:

As you can see, it is still very not good looking

 

[nbstl68]

The non IR still image looks much better but what about video each way? I would imagine it would be grainy, blurry without the IR and very difficult to make out anyone in motion. So while you have less clear range with the IR, video of someone I'd expect would be better. Neither situation would you be able to identify a person out at the fence line I imagine, so unless you were strictly only concerned about motion in general, the extra view provided with no IR setting may not be helpful anyway.

 

[mousemouse]

I agree. I'm just confused why the image looks so poor. I've been trying to see if there are some kind of settings i should set it to.
So far I've been several days playing around with the settings to see if anything else, but to no avail.
I've tried searching other posts but haven't found anything that worked.

 

[nbstl68]

I think it is a decent clear image near view, which is what will get you the detail you need when someone walks by closer to the camera. The ground is so bri b there from the IR spot though, like already mentioned maybe raise the camera hei b there or angle it up from the same location so it is not burning a hole in the ground with the IR. Probably the best fix as many talk about around here is external IR lighting that throws a broader pattern with less center burn...that's my untested thought. I have a similar problem with the varifocals, one in particular Tha the has a big bush rib t at center view I can't do much about.

 

[bigredfish]

Can you post the rest of your settings? Exposure, DNR, image settings.. bitrate..etc

 

[looney2ns]

What exactly is your goal? It really doesn't look that bad.
That's snow on the ground, correct? That's exaggerating the problem, reflecting the IR.
Most likely, you will need to add additional IR to improve.
Turn down the DNR as low as you can stand it.
This little guy works very well: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01MTXSJP9/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
But a still picture does not tell the tale, it's all about how well motion is captured without blurring.

 

[looney2ns]

This may help.
Courtesy of www.IPVM.com
Shutter Speed / Exposure Tutorial

 

[mousemouse]

What exactly is your goal? It really doesn't look that bad.
That's snow on the ground, correct? That's exaggerating the problem, reflecting the IR.
Most likely, you will need to add additional IR to improve.
Turn down the DNR as low as you can stand it.
This little guy works very well: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01MTXSJP9/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
But a still picture does not tell the tale, it's all about how well motion is captured without blurring.

You'd think it was snow, but no, that is grass, the image was so blurry that it made it look like snow.
Thank you for sending me the tutorial page, I'll look into that and see what I can configure well.
I would like to get this working without adding additional IR lights, I wanted a 'contained' solution, and less visible security 'stuff' on the outside of the house (my spouse will only tolerate so much ), but I appreciate you sending me that link.

From what I've been reading on IPCAMTALK, it seems that most people should steer away from bullet cameras, because of spider web issues?
I'm wondering if the bullet cameras (which typically have many small IR lights) diffuse the IR light more, whereas the dome cameras (with 1-2 large IR lights) are steering it in one direction and the camera isn't compensated for the contrast in high and low areas properly?
What is odd is that even if I lower the IR light to very very low, I still am having this issue. Only when I disable the IR completely does it get better. It's as either i) if by simply enabling the IR light, the camera switches modes to anticipate the need to compensate or 2) even on the lowest IR light setting, the spotlight effect happens.

 

[pmcross]

I had issues with a varifocal Amcrest 4 MP camera with IR. When I would walk in front of it my face would be washed out, even with smart IR enabled. It seemed to me that the IR was too powerful. Even turning the IR power down didn't help. I temporarily fixed this by covering 2 of the 4 IR lights with tape and enabled smart IR. This helped tremendously. I also set my exposure to 1/30 (half of my FPS) and turned down 3DNR as @looney2ns mentioned, which let more ambient light in, which also helped. In the end I installed LED white lights and I now run in forced color mode. I can ID someone at the end of my driveway now at night (which is about 25-30 feet away from the camera). The true test is to walk around in front of the camera at night to see what gives you the clearest image for ID.

 

[1fxman]

I agree with pmcross. Add led outdoor lighting. Problem solved.