Improving Night Quality

[Raj Shah]

Good Morning everyone

I have a HDW4321-AS-S4, which I use in the front of my property.

I currently have it on forced colour mode - and have changed some settings on it from previous threads I have read, eg from @Kawboy12R shutter speed reccomendation

However, there is still significant ghosting at night.

Please find below the camera settings and a video snapshot






Is there anything else I should do? Or just run camera in B&W?

Thank you for your suggestions!

 

[biggen]

Lower the upper shutter limit to 10ms and then lower the 3DNR to something around 30ish.

Is back lighting turned off?

 

[bigredfish]

I see the problem, those cars are all driving on the wrong side of the road

Seriously running full color at night without blur/ghosting or to much noise requires a shit ton of light, most scenes just dont have enough.

Another thing that folks dont understand right away is that the direction of the light makes a big difference. For instance in your scene, the subjects in the foreground are effectively backlit from the brighter street lights. This makes the foreground blur/ghost more .

I've found you need 1/120 (8.33ms) or better and a lot of white light to really freeze crisp clean motion at night. Try manual 1/120

Agree with @biggen reduce exposure, and DNR which is causing the trails, and make sure you dont have WDR on as it also introduces blur in low light.

 

[Raj Shah]

@biggen @bigredfish

Thank you for your suggestions! Yes BLC is turned off. I raised the gamma slightly so it helps brighten the image at night

And ahhaah RHD

I will try what you have said, and get back to you in due course.

Regards

 

[biggen]

You can raise the gain some instead of the gamma.

Increasing the shutter speed will darken the image but that's the only way to truly freeze motion video without blurring. Cameras are useless if you can't pause video and ID a person. If you find the image too dark with an upper shutter of 8 - 10ms then your options are to run IR and BW at night OR add more lighting to keep it in color.

 

[Raj Shah]

You can raise the gain some instead of the gamma.

Increasing the shutter speed will darken the image but that's the only way to truly freeze motion video without blurring. Cameras are useless if you can't pause video and ID a person. If you find the image too dark with an upper shutter of 8 - 10ms then your options are to run IR and BW at night OR add more lighting to keep it in color.

@biggen

Okay, I will do this. I will feedback once I have obtained pictures from today night.

To raise the gain, do it put it into full manual? Currently it says the gain is 50, would I rise it?

Regards

 

[bigredfish]

Yes, you have to use Manual to adjust Gain

 

[Wildcat_1]

Use manual, no auto. Also don’t raise gamma (leave at 50 max, ideally you drop this a little in most cases) and if you do raise gain then no more than 60 on top end. Try running at 1/120 (minimum for slow vehicles, you really need 1/250 for regular speed vehicle to get a decent chance of still cap and higher still for faster vehicles) for exposure as a test, if still too dark then call it at that point and either install more light (if you must have color) or switch to B&W for that location.

At the point that you introduce so much artificial processing to compensate for light in a location, you’ve lost the battle and to be honest the chance of a good, blur free cap. Also remember the higher you raise gain and gamma the more noise you introduce into the image and that is never good. Better to go B&W, dial in for your location and grab caps that you can use if needed.

@biggen

Okay, I will do this. I will feedback once I have obtained pictures from today night.

To raise the gain, do it put it into full manual? Currently it says the gain is 50, would I rise it?

Regards

 

[Raj Shah]

Use manual, no auto. Also don’t raise gamma (leave at 50 max, ideally you drop this a little in most cases) and if you do raise gain then no more than 60 on top end. Try running at 1/120 (minimum for slow vehicles, you really need 1/250 for regular speed vehicle to get a decent chance of still cap and higher still for faster vehicles) for exposure as a test, if still too dark then call it at that point and either install more light (if you must have color) or switch to B&W for that location.

At the point that you introduce so much artificial processing to compensate for light in a location, you’ve lost the battle and to be honest the chance of a good, blur free cap. Also remember the higher you raise gain and gamma the more noise you introduce into the image and that is never good. Better to go B&W, dial in for your location and grab caps that you can use if needed.

@bigredfish
@Wildcat_1

Hi guys After reviewing the footage - I decided it is best to be run on B&W.

Should I still run it on Aperature Priority @ 1/120?

Regards

 

[biggen]

Try 1/100 and see if the blur is acceptable.

 

[bigredfish]

Depends on whether you have motion blur or not. You’ll have to test at different shutter speeds to know. If you can get a good bright image at 120 and no blur, I’d call it good.

 

[Raj Shah]

@bigredfish @biggen

Thank you guys

Regards

 

[Raj Shah]

@bigredfish

I had one more question if that is okay.

My cameras are set to record 24/7 + Motion via IVS.

The current IVS records the motion event - which I use in SmartPSS to view.

However, I do not want it to record as an event - rather - if it shows the orange line - it is enough.

If I turn off 'Record Channel', the orange line no longer shows.

Is it possible to have it show, without recording the event , so I can save some HDD space? As NVR only has 1tb


Regards

 

[bigredfish]

The actual event recording is insignificant to your HD space.... but to your question Im not aware of a way to have the timeline hash and not record the event...

 

[Raj Shah]

The actual event recording is insignificant to your HD space.... but to your question Im not aware of a way to have the timeline hash and not record the event...

Okay, thank you!

Regards