New Member, long distance application

Keltipin

n3wb
Apr 6, 2024
1
2
USA
Hello all,

I'm a new member here, been reading for two months. There is a string of B+E's in my neighborhood, police came to my house looking for footage and my wyze camera footage is not good enough. I'm looking for a camera that will identify individuals, at night on the street, about -40 yards away.

I'm unsure of the legality of a "flag pole" with a ptz camera in my area, I have been reading up on it.

Attaching a camera to my soffiting, will an illuminator LED, and a camera do the trick? There is so much to learn and consider I have cold feet.

My recommendation: Camera: Empiretech IPC-T58IR-ZE S3

Thank you all.
 
Welcome.

The T58IR-ZE would not be a good choice. In additon to that camera sports a less than ideal MP/sensor ratio, it would only IDENTIFY at most 40 feet at night.

At 40 yards you will need the Z12E or a PTZ.

See this thread for the commonly recommended cameras (along with Amazon links) based on distance to IDENTIFY that represent the overall best value in terms of price and performance day and night.

The Importance of Focal Length over MP in camera selection
 
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Or more than one camera. one camera cannot be asked to do multiple jobs well. I have found that at my previous Condo Mgmnt job, that each camera performs best when it's setup for 1 job. Then it performs its task well. Yes you will get some secondary information from it, but it really needs to be allowed to do 1 job stunningly.
i would look at at least 1 of each of these models to get it covered. I love my 2 IPC-B54IR-Z4E-S3 cameras. They can see some shit at 40 yards. ( 6 pontoon boats away in Wisconsin math) but If thats the real distance then @wittj is right about the IPC-B52IR-Z12E-S2
but if your going up a flag pole, then a PTZ wont require any revisits to get it aimed properly.
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40 yards? Not sure but it's at least 100 feet or more from camera to the middle of the intersection.
I really like the Z4 cams. they do a marvelous job on the west side of the house. I havent switched back to Summer settings yet, so my night color wasnt so crisp...

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You see my Cameras motherfucker dontcha? :) Yeah see how he led his dogs to piss and or shit on the Townhouse grass. Yeah he doesnt want the ding dong Dogshit ditch treatment... ( oh yes I will )
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I don't know what you have for a flag pole, but the top of the 20' flag pole in my front yard will easily move 3" in the wind and would be a horrible idea for mounting a camera.


One camera cannot do it all.

You cannot see everything and still see details. Getting good details does not allow you to see everything; it is a give and take.

This is why a good system will have cameras that complement each other. This is also why a PTZ is a complement to a good, already established system and should not be heavily relied on by itself.

When planning your system and layout start by focusing on choke points and set up fields of view to capture details and give the ability to ID. This means all this camera will be able to do/see is the very narrow scope of its job. You can then deploy a more general overview cam to give context to the details. This overview cam can support one or more of your choke point ID cams.

For instance, as an extreme example. I am deploying this camera. It's only job is to see people walking down the path behind my house. This is what I see 99% of the time when I look at the feed.
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However, this is what I see when someone walks down the path, 95' feet away.
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I then have these two cameras I can use to get a better idea/context of what they were doing and where they may have come from or gone to. The kill zone is between the green lines and the camera is on the fence at the bottom, center of the picture. You can see someone just entering the KZ and the 3.6mm focal length of this cam gives absolutely no details other than it might be a person.
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This is the person in the above wide angle shot, and there is no way you would have been able to tell it was a male, in a red, flannel shirt, with sunglasses, and a receding hairline. Also, keep in mind, this is during the day. I am still working on dialing in the night time settings since there is absolutely no light and I muse rely on the IR from the camera to give me a usable image at 95' away.
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Below are a couple links to some of my threads which you might find helpful. I have learned a lot since joining and try to pay it forward when possible.

This is my on-going "build" thread.

This is one I put together with images from my journey showing the differences between focal lengths, install heights, changing fields of view, etc.