The camera I suggested will get you the plates. Many of us use the Z12E. And with the Z12E having way more zoom than your current camera, you could probably angle it further down the street to get a more straight on shot (unless there are trees blocking LOL).
NEVER make a setting for a camera in the NVR. You need to do it in the camera. Try this and see if you get access to more stuff. Your screen will look a little different since this is a a Dahua NVR, but Lorex is made by Dahua so it basically looks similar.
To get into the camera GUI from the NVR, you need to first access the NVR GUI by going to a computer and opening up a browser (preferably Internet Explorer but Pale Moon will work as well) and type in the IP address of the NVR and login that way. Next go into the camera settings page on the NVR and look for the Microsoft e Web Browser and select it and it will go to the camera GUI (photo credit bigredfish from his PSA thread). Your screen may look a little different to get into the camera gui and see if doing it this way gets you access to some other features the NVR is blocking - do not worry about the Port number and circle as that was from another issue someone posted.
Simply select the blue IE icon and it will go to the camera GUI and from there you can set the camera parameters.
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