New Dahua Set-up - I have a lot of questions ! :)

[Rudysio]

Hello everyone,

We bought a house last May, and since then, we've been doing some renovations. That's why I started getting interested in a camera system because the house wasn’t equipped.
After reading a lot of different topics, I took the plunge and bought three cameras along with an NVR.

The cameras:

• HDW5442TM-ASE (For inside the house)
• HFW5442-ZE (For the front yard)
• HFW5442T-ASE (For the backyard)

The NVR:

• NVR5208-EI

All components were manufactured in August 2024 (according to the label on the box).
I hope I made the right choice...

The entire system was installed a little over a month ago, and overall, I’m satisfied with the image quality. However, I’m having difficulties with the settings. When I look at older topics about configuring cameras and the NVR, there are options and settings mentioned that I can't find in my menus (probably due to software version differences).

The goal of my cameras is simply to record when motion is detected—whether it’s a human, a vehicle, OR an animal (I have a cat that I let outside, and when he comes back to my door, I’d like to receive a notification letting me know he’s back... ).

At the moment, I’m quite dissatisfied with the automatic detection function because I get a lot of false alerts (cloud movements, birds, and even mosquitoes or gnats flying in front of the lens at night).

I have several questions, please, regarding both the settings and the DMSS mobile app.

1. Image settings​

What are the best standard image settings to apply? I understand that image settings are unique based on the lighting conditions and the desired objective. I found this very interesting post with Wittaj’s recommendations:
Dahua recommended settings and education needed
However, for example, I can’t adjust the Shutter setting (I don’t see this option).

Here are the available options. To start with a solid base, can you tell me which settings to enable/disable?

Image Settings:​

• AI-SSA => Enable / Disable?
• Brightness?
• Contrast?
• Saturation?
• Sharpness?
• Gamma?
• Should the profile be set to Day, Night, or General? I assume it should be adjusted for each profile?

Exposure Settings:​

• The only option available is 3D NR => Enable or Disable?
• There's also Auto Iris, but it's only for the ZE Model.

White Balance (WB) Settings:​

(I don’t know what this is...) => Auto / Outdoor / Natural / Street Lamp / Manual / Custom Area

Day/Night Mode:​

Color / Auto / B&W?

Auto Focus (only for the ZE model)​

Encoding Settings:​

• Should I activate the Sub Stream?
• Compression is set to H.264
• 15 FPS
• CBR
• 8192

2. Events settings​

Smart Plan:​

There are two categories in the Smart Plan: Camera and Recorder.

• Camera: Should I activate AcuPick?
• Recorder: Same question—AcuPick or AI Mode?

Also, in the Camera Section, there are different icons (Face Detection, Heat Map, IVS, People Counting, Video Metadata, and Smart Object Detection). Only IVS and Video Metadata are highlighted in blue, while the others are grayed out, and I can’t enable them.

SMD (Smart Motion Detection):​

I assume that if AcuPick is enabled, then SMD should be disabled, right?

IVS Section:​

I understand that you need to add your own rule. First, should Self Auto Learning be enabled in the settings?

Also, how exactly should I configure the rule if I want alerts for human, vehicle, and animal (cat) detection in the front and backyard?
I live in a dead-end street, so there shouldn't be any unnecessary alerts (it’s not like I live downtown…).

• I suppose I need to draw a detection zone—should I cover the entire screen in my case? Or should I define a specific area?
• What about the Min/Max Target Size?
• Then, I assume I need to enable the Human, Motor Vehicle, and Animal detection boxes?
• What about sensitivity?

Face Detection:​

I haven’t had time to test this option yet, but I prefer to fine-tune the previous settings before diving into this.
To be honest, I don’t know the difference between Face Detection and Face Recognition.

Video Metadata:​

What’s the purpose of this category?

ANPR (Automatic Number Plate Recognition):​

Same question…

For the rest (Heat Map, Vehicle Density…), I don’t need to go further as it's not my use case

3. DMSS Mobile App​

Let’s assume I have correctly configured everything in Parts 1 and 2, what settings should I apply within DMSS?

Also, in the DMSS app, I have two views of the cameras:

• From the Camera
• From the NVR

The difference I noticed is that in the camera view, I don’t have the playback option, but I do have it in the NVR view.

• Which notifications should I activateto receive alerts on my phone for a human, vehicle, or cat?
  • Actions?
  • SMD? (Only options are human and vehicle)
  • Intrusion?
  • Tripwire?

There’s also another setting: Video Reading Flux => Primary or Secondary?

I think that’s it! I know it’s a huge list of questions, but I haven’t seen such a detailed summary in any forum…
This would be extremely helpful.

Thanks a lot again in advance.

Cheers from Europe !

 

[bigredfish]

You're going to need to read and educate yourself a bit. It would take literally all day to go through all of that with you via a forum or even a phone call.

All of #1
You need to login to the camera GUI itself. Sounds like you're trying to make camera settings on the NVR interface which will lead to frustration and more problems. ALL settings should be made on the individual camera web GUI. The NVR is for settings the record schedule and that about it.

#2
NO to Acupick, NO to SMD. NO Motion Detection. Turn them OFF
Enable IVS only
Forget Face Detection and ANPR
To begin start out using AI on CAMERA not by NVR
Again this needs to all be done within the camera GUI not the NVR

#3 Add the NVR as a profile in DMSS, no need or benefit to adding the cameras individually.
Setting up DMSS for alerts will be based on what you set on the camera itself. It has to first be acted upon by the camera. DMSS doesnt inherently have ANY capability for detection

 

[bigredfish]

How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. You're trying to shove the whole animal in your mouth at once.

• Start by setting the record Schedule and time on the NVR. Dont mess with anything else on the NVR
• Then choose ONE camera and learn the interface and what each control does. Two basic groups. 1) image controls 2) detection controls
• Only after you fully understand that should you move to understanding the DMSS app

 

[Rudysio]

Hi,

Thanks a lot for your messages. Well the simple fact of doing settings on Cameras instead of NVR => What a simple but so important point that I did not paid attention to all the YTube vids I've watched...
Since then, I've made quite a lot of progress.
Regarding NVR, only settings to do are related to Recording and Schedule : OK, thanks a lot as well.
Yet, I have seen that when doing any modifications on Camera GUI, it implements the same parameters on the Cams wihtin the NVR Portal/GUI. Hope it does not interfere.

Now in the DMSS (even though I did not made all the modifications yet), I have way more precise and intelligent alerts (Trigerring). But still need to make few adjustments.
Still, one question pending : I suppose that I need to activate the alerts on DMSS on the Cameras Profile (i.e. Set-up Alert on Dahua Camera GUI - IVS with Trigerring => then activate the Trigerring Option in DMSS), however to watch any Playback, I need to get back on NVR Profile right ?

Thanks

 

[bigredfish]

Yes. The NVR is where the video is recorded and stored (assuming you're not recording on the camera to an SD card)

There is NO reason to have BOTH a NVR profile AND an individual camera profile in DMSS if that camera is being recorded by the NVR