Is there a blizzard out there?

[Cam_curious]

I just installed my first camera, a IPC-HDBW4431R-ZS. It looks great in the day.

At night when it switches to black and white and the IR LEDs come on it looks like there
is a blizzard outside. Great masses of particles floating around as if blown by the wind.
I went out to see if it was snowing or raining but no, nothing. I used a flashlight to see
if anything is floating around in the air but there was nothing.

Sometimes it looks like a blizzard. Then for a few moments the blizzard subsides and
there is nothing, just like the snow stopped. A moment later the blizzard starts again.

What am I seeing? Are there particles in the air that are only visible with IR light?

Pete.

 

[BubbaJoe]

Yes water. Its lite fog. Lower your IR output. Set it to manual.

 

[c hris527]

If they are moving YES, dust and pollen will give that effect, not sure where you live but it is more than likely fog doing it.

 

[Cam_curious]

I tried manual IR. It acted as expected, turned it down and the scene and the snow got darker.
Turned it up and they both got brighter. Making these changes did not really change the effect
of the "snow" in the image.

Pete.

 

[c hris527]

Good examples on the forms here of dust and fog.

Are these really bugs?

 

[c hris527]

I tried manual IR. It acted as expected, turned it down and the scene and the snow got darker.
Turned it up and they both got brighter. Making these changes did not really change the effect
of the "snow" in the image.

Pete.

Post some pics but it sounds like fog, check the link i posted, most all of us suffer from this issue, other than adding outdoor lights and turning the ir off you should expect this from time to time, I usually get it in the spring and fall here in the Northeast. I think I have seen some sort of a defog setting in the firmware on the dahua cams someplace, might have been in a PTZ but perhaps someone has used the feature and has good results with it and can chime in.

 

[Cam_curious]

Here is a clip of what I see:



It looks like the dome is smudged but it appears perfectly clean
when I look at it.

Pete.

 

[BubbaJoe]

Video is not working. Chris527 is right, somethings we have to live with. You can turn your IR off and turn on WDR set to max. The picture will get darker but you can add gamma and brightness along with contrast. Your best bet is to install a external IR and leave the on board ir off. External irs help. No bug, fog or rain issues.

 

[J Sigmo]

I see this very badly a lot of the time here. It's often dry, and often very windy here, so it's mostly dust. Even when the wind isn't Howling, the dust from when it was howling is everywhere, I assume.

Most bullet cameras have an array of IR LEDs mounted to a circuit board that is at the front of the camera directly surrounding the lens. With the illumination coming from so close to the lens, even the tiniest of particles, if they are near the camera, will be very brightly illuminated and show up bright in the image.

For me, at times, my particular bullet cameras are all but useless when their built-in IR is switched on. Some cheap-o cams I have do not allow switching off the IR when they are in auto or b&w modes because the IR illuminator board also holds the light sensor that measures the illumination, and it's feedback signal is part of the LED drive circuit. However, there is a place where I can cut a trace on that board to kill the LEDs and still get auto switching between color and B&W modes.

So now I'm looking for good external IR illuminators to use. Getting the light sources well away from the camera lenses should help enormously with the constant plague of tiny dust around here - not to mention actual snow, which makes for very impressive video, too, of course!

I love the "ghost hunting" shows where the ghost hunters always pretend not to understand the optics/physics of this phenomenon, and invariably attribute this effect, both on their IR video and pocket cameras with built in flash, to "orbs".

By their reckoning, I must live in a house constantly surrounded by millions of spirits who zip around endlessly!

 

[Cam_curious]

I fixed the youtube video. I am a new user there too!

 

[c hris527]

Here is a clip of what I see:



It looks like the dome is smudged but it appears perfectly clean
when I look at it.

Pete.

Looks like fog but more important it looks like you have IR reflection from your eaves, try dropping it down a bit.

 

[BubbaJoe]

You are getting lots of IR reflection. Turn the IR down or you need to move the camera closer to the edge of the eve or point it down more. No need to see anything above 10 feet.