IP Camera made to look like monitor/TV top webcam?

[alkizmo]

I want to put a camera in the livingroom, but your typical dome/bullet camera would look horrible.

An idea I had was to put a camera on top of my TV, but the camera would have to look like one of those webcams you put on top of a computer monitor.

I know Logitech makes a webcam that can operate by WiFi, but it costs a fortune.
Browsing through aliexpress is intensive especially since I don't know if such IP camera exists.

Anyone knows of such product? It just has to be a generic 720p H264 IP wired camera, as long as it looks like a monitor-top black webcam.

 

[bp2008]

I don't think you will find one exactly like that, but there certainly are similar ones.

Hikvision makes a few indoor cams that might fit. There is also this also this cheap one from some other company: http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php/1812-Review-TOP-201-Super-Mini-720P-HD-IP-Cam-(The-Cheapest-IP-Cam-So-Far-!!)

You could build one yourself out of a raspberry pi + raspberry pi camera. There is a special "covert camera" version of the pi cam that is greatly reduced in size without compromising on features.

If the goal is to make the camera go unnoticed, and the raspberry pi option is not desirable, then maybe one of Hikvision's covert cameras.

 

[bp2008]

http://www.adafruit.com/products/1937?gclid=CjwKEAjwxMetBRDJx6Sz2p7DsQ0SJADJHAqNzrCN6T8qVkwF7mvt_oFNjR3WE7DRmiu9kvtUaysItRoCIerw_wcB

That is the smaller version of the raspberry pi camera in case you are interested.

 

[alkizmo]

If the goal is to make the camera go unnoticed, and the raspberry pi option is not desirable, then maybe one of Hikvision's covert cameras.

It's not to go unnoticed, it's to mix in with the decor. A slim webcam on top of an HDTV looks natural compared to a security camera screwed to a wall with a cable running to it.
I'd have went for one of those flat webcam looking IP cameras if it wasn't for the fact that my TV is wall mounted with the cables hidden in the wall. So I can't rest such a camera on top of furniture without ruining the look.

If there is no such IP camera, I'll consider something else. I can't even use an actual webcam on the HTPC that's mounted on the back of the TV. I tried that with a cheap VGA camera and the software that turned it into an IP cam used 25% of the CPU power. I can't imagine what a 1MP or 2MP camera would do.

 

[bp2008]

LOL yeah if your HTPC is not very fast, that will happen. The real benefit of the raspberry pi cameras is that you can rig it into whatever enclosure you like. You could even take apart a USB webcam and cut a notch in the enclosure large enough for the ribbon cable for the raspberry pi camera, and glue the raspberry pi spy camera module inside it. it is a lot of work but you can make it look however you want as long as you have a nearby spot to hide the raspberry pi. Those ribbon cables are not very long.

Here is a writeup of my latest pi camera tinkering: http://www.ipcamtalk.com/showthread.php/3770-Raspberry-Pi-camera-long-exposure-night-samples

 

[Razer]

I'd personally use one of these:

http://www.ltsecurityinc.com/ip-camera/ip-cube/cmip8932-w.html

Hikvision 3mp camera a little larger than a deck of cards. You'd only have to have the gray portion showing and that even would only be the lens part, that is grey part in total is roughly as tall as my house key, so 2 inches or less. Set the camera just behind the TV and it would be fine though it might look better if you painted the rest of the case black. If you need better photos of one I have one setting on my workbench. Great picture quality needless to say.


EDIT - Actually I snapped a couple of pics to demonstrate the size better:

With objects for size comparison.

Here is is beside my Logitech 910 webcam on my monitors, set as I imagine would look best behind a TV. I just propped it here real quick for the photo, not my normal location lol!

 

[alkizmo]

Hikvision 3mp camera a little larger than a deck of cards. You'd only have to have the gray portion showing and that even would only be the lens part, that is grey part in total is roughly as tall as my house key, so 2 inches or less. Set the camera just behind the TV and it would be fine though it might look better if you painted the rest of the case black. If you need better photos of one I have one setting on my workbench. Great picture quality needless to say.

I am considering that camera format as the Raspberry Pi + ribbon camera is a bit too much effort and it would look messy behind the TV (It's on a swivel wall mount so we sometimes get to expose the back).

However, considering the size of the room, I'd probably go for a cheap generic 720p camera as anything/anyone standing in front of it will be 10 feet or less away. I love my Hikvision cameras, but I save my "surveillance" budget for locations where quality matters a lot

 

[bp2008]

Makes sense. It is a lot of work to make a raspberry pi cam not look like something more suited for a hardware hacker's workshop than a living room.

 

[alkizmo]

Makes sense. It is a lot of work to make a raspberry pi cam not look like something more suited for a hardware hacker's workshop than a living room.

I like the idea though, maybe for another application.

What was the budget for the whole thing? Minus the case and power supply?

Here is is beside my Logitech 910 webcam on my monitors, set as I imagine would look best behind a TV. I just propped it here real quick for the photo, not my normal location lol!

Wow that's the type of comparison that really fits my situation!
A box camera is indeed going to look okay if it's black. I was actually planning to put it next to one of the speakers for the sound system, but behind the TV, even if not made to fit on top, would look okay, some tie wraps will take care of it.

 

[bp2008]

I like the idea though, maybe for another application.

What was the budget for the whole thing? Minus the case and power supply?

It was $136.56 total for me, though I included a lot of things you might not need. Case, power supply, microSD card, camera mounting arm (which likely would not work with the small spy camera module I linked earlier). You can only feed one camera into the raspberry pi at a time but I got both of the standard camera modules so I could test their low light capabilities. The NoIR version won easily in low light, by the way.

It is also worth noting that the Raspberry Pi 2 is much better suited for the camera than the older Pi models. The guy who wrote the IP camera interface was actually surprised I could pull a 5 megapixel video stream at all, because he had not been able to with his older Pi model. The Pi 2 can provide the 5 megapixel video stream at a fairly good frame rate, 5 to 10 FPS I would say, with plenty of CPU time to spare.