Link cameras/Synchronize recordings

[NO^DICKHILL]

Hi!

I've been reading this forum a lot and have actually found really great info.
So I've decided to create an account and join you guys!


If this is the wrong place to ask this question, I'm sorry!

But I would like to hear if anyone knows if it is possible to link cameras/synchronize recordings, so when there's motion on one camera, all (or selected) starts recording?

I have four DS-2CD2142FWD cameras, which records directly to my QNAP.
(I use iVMS-4200 to control and view everything.)
This works great and I have setup motiondetection, line-crossing, etc...


The reason why I ask, is because there were a guy who were driving around from house to house on his bycycle for about an hour ago and I sudently noticed that he were behind my car (parked on the road).
(Yeah, I ran out, but as soon I opened the door, he drove away!)

I then looked at the recordings and saw that my cameras didn't record everything. (A lot of "missing" recordings.)

Do I really have to set them to record 24/7, to get everything in (hopefully not) same scenarie next time?


- Thanks in advance!

 

[Philip Gonzales]

I think it's best to record 24x7 because disk space is cheap and I would feel like a dummy if I missed something important because motion detection didn't work as expected. Relying on motion detection is just leaving too much to chance. I know with Blue Iris you can trigger other cameras when one camera is triggered. I think some NVR's can do that. My boss has a DVR with some analog cameras and he said his system can do this, but I'm only really familiar with Blue Iris. I don't think you can do this from the camera itself but okay be wrong.

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

I think it's best to record 24x7 because disk space is cheap and I would feel like a dummy if I missed something important because motion detection didn't work as expected. Relying on motion detection is just leaving too much to chance. I know with Blue Iris you can trigger other cameras when one camera is triggered. I think some NVR's can do that. My boss has a DVR with some analog cameras and he said his system can do this, but I'm only really familiar with Blue Iris. I don't think you can do this from the camera itself but okay be wrong.

Thanks for the really quick reply, Philip!

Yeah, 24/7 recording would probably be best, but would also give plenty of recordings to watch........
So that's actually why I use motion detection, etc... (And also to get emails when someones near the house/cars.)

Over time, I also must admit that Hikvision's motion detection really works! (When sensitivity is adjusted...)

The reason why I didn't cought him all the time, were because he were outside the detection-zones.
(So a quick solution for (hopefully not) next time, is to increase the detection zones and pre/after recording time)


I didn't thought it were possible in the cameras, since I probably already would have found it.
But like you said, it's okay to be wrong and I therefore hoped that I just had missed it...

Or that someone could promise me that a NVR would have the function.
But if you say that Blue Iris can, I will defenitly check that out!

(But okay... Triggering three cameras to record when motion on one, will probably give almost same result as 24/7 recording... )

 

[Philip Gonzales]

The good thing about Blue Iris is that when motion is detected it "marks" the timeline/clip as an alert. What this does is it allows you to easily review the alert in several different ways. If you are logged into the console you can zoom in or out of the timeline and click on each alert icon on the timeline and it will play the video of the alert. So you could do this for each alert icon and see short videos of the motion. This actually let's you playback all cameras at once at the time of the alert. Which is a great benefit, and similar to what You were trying to do. You can also pull up an alert list and scroll up or down the list and watch alerts that way. You can also playback all cameras at any point in time in case the alert missed The motion. The blue iris mobile phone app allows you to see the most recent alert and go backwards by 1 alert at a time for each camera or you can also select the alerts from a list. You can also view your alerts in a list in UI3 (3rd party browser interface made by one of the members on the forum). This is in my opinion the best way, as you can hover over the alert and it pops up and gives you a preview of like 4 or 5 spots in the video and you can tell what is going on in a few seconds tops instead of watching the whole alert.

I like to use UI3 from a computer when I'm at work. For other times I use the android app, and I rarely use the actual Blue Iris Console. I mostly use the console for when I want to export a clip (you can also export clips via the mobile phone app, I think from UI3 also but can't remember at the moment).

I also like that Blue Iris can be setup to send multiple pictures for each alert. I have mine sent to send 5 inline pictures every alert. Lots of times I don't even need to review the alerts unless I see something interesting on the email alerts.

Anyway, sorry if I am diverting from the original question but Blue Iris is definitely the way to go in my opinion. It has so many options that it's not even funny.

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

The good thing about Blue Iris is that when motion is detected it "marks" the timeline/clip as an alert. What this does is it allows you to easily review the alert in several different ways. If you are logged into the console you can zoom in or out of the timeline and click on each alert icon on the timeline and it will play the video of the alert. So you could do this for each alert icon and see short videos of the motion. This actually let's you playback all cameras at once at the time of the alert. Which is a great benefit, and similar to what You were trying to do. You can also pull up an alert list and scroll up or down the list and watch alerts that way. You can also playback all cameras at any point in time in case the alert missed The motion. The blue iris mobile phone app allows you to see the most recent alert and go backwards by 1 alert at a time for each camera or you can also select the alerts from a list. You can also view your alerts in a list in UI3 (3rd party browser interface made by one of the members on the forum). This is in my opinion the best way, as you can hover over the alert and it pops up and gives you a preview of like 4 or 5 spots in the video and you can tell what is going on in a few seconds tops instead of watching the whole alert.

I like to use UI3 from a computer when I'm at work. For other times I use the android app, and I rarely use the actual Blue Iris Console. I mostly use the console for when I want to export a clip (you can also export clips via the mobile phone app, I think from UI3 also but can't remember at the moment).

I also like that Blue Iris can be setup to send multiple pictures for each alert. I have mine sent to send 5 inline pictures every alert. Lots of times I don't even need to review the alerts unless I see something interesting on the email alerts.

Anyway, sorry if I am diverting from the original question but Blue Iris is definitely the way to go in my opinion. It has so many options that it's not even funny.

Don't worry... You are not diverting from the original question.
I looked for at solution to link/sync/trigger recordings on multiple cameras, which you definitly gave me!
Even more detailed than I've ever thought would be possible...

I did hoped it would be possible on the cameras. (Since I don't use a server)
But it doesn't matter if the solution is an NVR or a program.
Before my QNAP, I had a VM running with GeniousVision on my ESXi box. - So it can't get worse...


Blue Iris really seems to have absolutely everything! - So I will definitly give it a try!
But after you mentioned the alart marks, I now remember that Hikvision MAYBE have something similar.
I know they can record 24/7 and I remember something about "recording types", but I don't remember if it's just for schedule recording.
So of course, I will try out the possibilities with Hikvision before I at least buy anything.

 

[Trax95008]

My opinion is that you need a proper NVR. The job of the NVR is to manage all these settings that you want. With an NVR, you can easily control what happens with motion. Any camera can trigger any other cameras to record. Also, I agree that recording 24/7 is the way to go. Why not? Storage is cheap. I get WD purple 6TB on amazon for $200. I have two of those in my NVR. I have 14 cameras with maxed out bitrate and get about 9 days of footage. Plenty!

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

My opinion is that you need a proper NVR. The job of the NVR is to manage all these settings that you want. With an NVR, you can easily control what happens with motion. Any camera can trigger any other cameras to record. Also, I agree that recording 24/7 is the way to go. Why not? Storage is cheap. I get WD purple 6TB on amazon for $200. I have two of those in my NVR. I have 14 cameras with maxed out bitrate and get about 9 days of footage. Plenty!

9 days when recording 24/7 on 14 cameras??
Okay... Thats waaay better than I thought!

At the moment i just have a bunch of old/used (found and almost dead) 360GBs I run in RAID1 on my QNAP 2-Bay.
Which also is the reason why I only use detections.
My plan was to buy 2TBs (around $93 - 6TBs costs around $240 in local shop w/ 2 year drop-in warranty)
(Which is almost same price at Amazon.co.uk + shipment.)


Okay, so a NVR can do the job, but of course not anyone.
But what is a "proper" NVR, then?
I have of course looked for Hikvision, where they cost from around $231 (8 channel) and $297 (16 channel) (Both DS-76XXNI-K2)
So they are "quite expensive", if 8+ channels are needed and even a higher end model.

But okay... If the features are needed, you'll have to pay what it costs... (o:

 

[Trax95008]

Exactly! It costs what it costs. And doing it correctly is always going to cost more upfront, but save you the headache in the end. If your using Hikvision cameras, then stick with a Hikvision NVR so the protocol matches. And only use surveillance rated hard drives. Desktop drives are not rated for 24/7 use. And they have other firmware tweaks to tune them for surveillance.

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

I know about the hard drives.
The ones I use now were 15 I got for free. So why not use them and just replace them when they die? (o:
But when I run out and/or it's time for proper and larger disks, I will buy WD Purples...

I will try to look deeper into Hikvision's NVRs and see which can do what I want/need.
But when prices starts with $231/$297, I really think I'll continue to use iVMS, go with larger hard drives and record 24/7. (Larger hard drives may anyway be needed...)


I will of course (as "promised" to Philip Gonzales) still try out Blue Iris.
But after about only 30 minutes earlier today, I don't think its gonna happend!
I found it too complicated just when I tried to add one camera. (Couldn't figure out to add more, but maybe it's due to the demo-version?)

 

[Trax95008]

Your asking why not continue using the wrong drive? Why would you want to find out the hard way? The purpose of the hard drives is to store video footage. WHEN the drive fails, you won’t have footage, making the “system” as a whole pointless. Are you going to discover the dead drive when you go to see who broke into your car? Or robbed your house? The time to replace the drive is BEFORE you need it replaced

 

[Tolting Colt Acres]

I've never had a problem w/ Hikvision's motion detection. Detection zone s critical, and I am also sure to use a good lead-in and lead-out time. Some of my cameras give me upwards of 6 months of recordings (on the least-busy cameras). Recording 24/7 is overkill, IMO, given you've already identified part of your problem was your detection zones were inadequate.

 

[Trax95008]

About a year ago, my 10 year old son told me he hit a car on his bike. I wanted to know the details of what happened so I referred to my footage. The incident happened about half a block away. Too far for my camera to be triggered by motion. Good thing I record 24/7. You can always skip over the footage that you don’t need, but you can never obtain the footage that doesn’t exist

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

Your asking why not continue using the wrong drive? Why would you want to find out the hard way? The purpose of the hard drives is to store video footage. WHEN the drive fails, you won’t have footage, making the “system” as a whole pointless. Are you going to discover the dead drive when you go to see who broke into your car? Or robbed your house? The time to replace the drive is BEFORE you need it replaced

I know it's stupid and I fully agree with you!
But I do run RAID1 and I'm "pretty sure" that both drives won't fail at the same time. (If it happens, the 32GB MicroSDs will take over)
Also, no one knows when a drive fails, so it can rather be a brand new, than a 3 year old drive.
(The chance of a 3 year old fails, is of course higher.)

But when I know which system (QNAP, NVR, etc.) I end up with, I will buy proper hard drives.
For now I'm just testing and my recordings are only "for fun". (Nice to have, but not necessary.)
I just like to play with things like this.

I've never had a problem w/ Hikvision's motion detection. Detection zone s critical, and I am also sure to use a good lead-in and lead-out time. Some of my cameras give me upwards of 6 months of recordings (on the least-busy cameras). Recording 24/7 is overkill, IMO, given you've already identified part of your problem was your detection zones were inadequate.

Hikvision's detection works absolutely perfect!
So I think I just will increase the zones. (And pre/post-record time, which I actually had forgotten.....)

I see the benefits when recording 24/7, but with a "perfect" detection setup, it will probably give the same.
All my cameras are faced toward the road and with 46GB quota per camera, I can go about 6½ days back.

About a year ago, my 10 year old son told me he hit a car on his bike. I wanted to know the details of what happened so I referred to my footage. The incident happened about half a block away. Too far for my camera to be triggered by motion. Good thing I record 24/7. You can always skip over the footage that you don’t need, but you can never obtain the footage that doesn’t exist

I see your point and yes, thank god for 24/7 recording.
I would also have appreciated it when I saw the guy behind my car. (So I really see the benefits there!)
(No damage by the way. - I just think he tried to see if it was unlocked or maybe he were the one who wrote in the dirt. (Haven't been washed for over a year )

But for a start, I have now marked almost the entire road and sidewalk (a bit overkill) and changed the pre/post-record time.
Which, of course, will give too many detections, but that's the only way I can keep it as close to my original (and known) setup.
I will later try to "pull out" a camera to test Hikvision's 24/7 recording without a NVR, or if I find a used NVR, I will see what it can do.

 

[Trax95008]

FYI, when you get yourself a proper NVR, you can setup email alerts and be alerted if a drive fails

 

[NO^DICKHILL]

FYI, when you get yourself a proper NVR, you can setup email alerts and be alerted if a drive fails

Thanks, nice to know!
I guess they also can alert if cameras gets disconnected or tampered? (iVMS-4200 can, if I had that running 24/7.)

The cameras themself do alert on drive/SD failure, tampering and detections, but can't (of course) alert if one gets disconnected.
(The QNAP do only alert on drive failure, since I only use it as Samba/NFS-Share.)