New to PoE IP Cams with Blue Iris with AI

[geobrick]

I've been wanting to setup home automation for years but haven't done much yet other than add an Eyze-On ethernet adaptor board to my DSC alarm. I haven't tried any HA software yet.
Related to that, I decided to set up some security cameras at home and bought 2 Reolink PoE cameras (an 830A and an E1 Outdoor - I realize now Reolink is not popular here but I can try out the recommended cameras once I'm set-up and have more understanding of what the system can do and what I want it to do).

I've got far enough along where the cameras are set up and recording to Blue Iris 5.8.x.x (in demo mode for now) but to get that far I relied on some youtube tutorials. At some point I realized the videos were outdated because they were using older versions of Blue Iris and using deepstack. I later found some tutorial that were updated for Code Project but even in those, they were using BI 5.7 which is different in many ways than 5.8 when it comes to the setup interface.

Is there a basic setup tutorial for BI 5.8 you can recommend? Something that also covers Code Project AI using the latest BI 5.8 version. A video is preferred but written tutorial works too. Something that shows the newer BI 5.8 settings (with the newer names of parameters and the updated settings tabs like the AI settings so they match what I have).

My goal is to have several cameras around the house that are recording 24/7 to local windows PC running BI and Code Project.
One older tutorial, I saw explained how to record only the lower res sub-stream 24/7 then only record the higher res stream when something was detected. This seems like logical thing to do but I'm not sure how to set it up with the newer BI 5.8 settings interface. It's too different than what the tutorial showed. The new BI 5.8 seems to be able to use both streams in a single camera setup and through triggers or alerts do things like record the higher res stream when triggered or alerted. A newer tutorial would help explain all that.

Thanks. I'm sure I'll have many more questions.

 

[looney2ns]

Study the getting started chapter in the included BI help file.
It will also behove you to take time to study the entire BI help file....it's helpful.
This is all explained there.

 

[Mike A.]

Haven't used 5.8 so don't know how it's changed. It's kind of beta at this point. I usually wait for a while before updating. Maybe step back to 5.7. You can download it here:

Blue Iris Update (64 bit)

(9/12/2023) FTP updates including TLS 1.3 and SFTP server support Reolink dual-streaming using RTSP + FLV Abandoned and missing object detection ONVIF GetEvents revamp including detailed status and actions Timelapse for timeline video export...

ipcamtalk.com

In 5.7 you can select Continuous sub + Triggered as below to do as you describe. You'll need to have substreams set up in the cam and in BI (obviously).

 

[geobrick]

Haven't used 5.8 so don't know how it's changed. It's kind of beta at this point. I usually wait for a while before updating. Maybe step back to 5.7. You can download it here:

Blue Iris Update (64 bit)

(9/12/2023) FTP updates including TLS 1.3 and SFTP server support Reolink dual-streaming using RTSP + FLV Abandoned and missing object detection ONVIF GetEvents revamp including detailed status and actions Timelapse for timeline video export...

ipcamtalk.com

In 5.7 you can select Continuous sub + Triggered as below to do as you describe. You'll need to have substreams set up in the cam and in BI (obviously).

View attachment 174961

Thanks. Starting with 5.7 would have helped with following the tutorials but I started with 5.8 because that's what was offered when I went to the Blue Iris web page. I didn't occur to me to look for an older version for the demo period.

Thanks for the information on the record settings. I'll compare it to what I have.

 

[geobrick]

Study the getting started chapter in the included BI help file.
It will also behove you to take time to study the entire BI help file....it's helpful.
This is all explained there.

Thanks, I scanned it a bit but I'll do a deeper dive.

 

[Swampledge]

I’d also recommend that you spend some time getting familiar with Blue Iris and tuning motion detection settings before jumping into the complexity of CodeProject AI. CPAI analyzes what BI sends it, so a good understanding of BI tuning is groundwork for the refinement of AI. Also, if you are purchasing a new camera or two, consider getting cameras with built-in AI. (These work great for detecting people and cars, not so much if you want to detect animals.)

 

[geobrick]

I’d also recommend that you spend some time getting familiar with Blue Iris and tuning motion detection settings before jumping into the complexity of CodeProject AI. CPAI analyzes what BI sends it, so a good understanding of BI tuning is groundwork for the refinement of AI. Also, if you are purchasing a new camera or two, consider getting cameras with built-in AI. (These work great for detecting people and cars, not so much if you want to detect animals.)

Got it. Tune the BI detection first so it prevents sending false detections to the AI. To do that, I'd turn off the AI in the main settings until I've got everything working properly.

Both of my cameras have the ability to track people. Is that considered built-in AI in the camera or is that something else. I've only tested the person tracking on the RLC-830A so far. It seems to work well. The camera pans to follow me when I walk past it. It even follows me as I walk through a gate with a high wall where only my head is visible to the camera until I'm past the wall and the camera has a fuller view. Should I turn off the camera detection and let BL do all the detections or does BI need the motion detection provided by the camera?

The system with my current settings seems to be detecting people and cars correctly. When I look at the timeline, I can see the car or person symbol then go to the clips and find the cars and the person (so far, it's only been me). I'm impressed with the car detection because the street can only be seen through waving tree branches.

 

[Swampledge]

If you’ve got cameras that are detecting and tracking people well, and that’s what you want, you’re all set and don’t need AICP analyzing images from those cameras. I use on a cheap cameras without those smarts to differentiate between shadow movements and people and cars. I also use it on a couple cameras after dark because the AI in the camera doesn’t alert on animals and I want to know when a bear passes by. On those same cameras, Blue Iris alone can’t tell if the movement is an animal or a spider web fluttering in front of the camera. Those are the situations where CPAI seems to be most useful. By the way, in my experience, CPAI frequently confuses rabbits for birds, and a night ago told me a deer was in my driveway. It was a neighbor’s cat.

 

[wittaj]

Giving the issues with Reolink and BI for motion detection that could completely miss motion, if the AI in the camera is sufficient for your needs, then use it.

Depending on your needs and the camera you buy determines if you need the BI AI.

The camera AI is useful to many people, but BI has way more motion setting granularity than the cameras, and some people need that additional detail, especially if wanting AI for more than a car or person. For folks that want AI and alerts on animals or specifically a UPS truck then they need the additional AI that comes from CodeProject. An NVR doesn't have that capability.

There isn't really a best practice because every field of view is different and use case and needs are different.

To many here, BI motion without AI is more than adequate for what they do.

To many here, camera AI is more than adequate for what they do.

To many here, using the BI AI adds additional functionality that the above alone can not do.

It comes down to testing with each field of view and which one gives you the most consistent results.


While some of that third party stuff is cool like tagging was it a dog or a bear, I don't need all that fancy stuff. If my camera triggers BI to tag an alert for human or vehicle and BI can accomplish what I need by way of a text or email or push or whatever, that is sufficient for my needs. I just want to be alerted if a person or vehicle is on my property and the camera AI does a fine job with that.

However, I do run BI AI on one camera so that it knocks out headlight shine so that the alert image includes the vehicle. The camera AI will trigger for a car, but the alert image was always just the headlights.

The true test....I have found the AI of the cameras to work even in a freakin blizzard....imagine how much the CPU would be maxing out sending all the snow pictures for analysis to CodeProject LOL. My non-AI cams in BI were triggering all night. This picture was ran through Deepstack (without the IVS or red lines on it) and it failed to recognize a person in the picture, but the camera AI did. This pic says it all and the video had the red box over it even in complete white out on the screen:

See this thread on how using just the camera AI may be sufficient for your needs:

Who uses Dahua AI capable cameras? Reliable AI for triggering events? Pro's/con's?

 

[geobrick]

Wittaj, Yes BI seems to be very powerful and flexible and because of that, we can all mold it to our own needs.
I pared back my settings so I can build them back step by step and learn more about what they all do.

I turned off the AI under the main settings and then set each camera's AI settings to "None" for now. The first thing I noticed was the timeline no longer showed car and person symbols and now shows only lightning bolts (sometimes with shaded blur after the bolt or between the bolts). I still need to read up on the various symbols and learn more about the detections and what part of the system is performing the detection. For example, the cameras have their own detection capability. Do they communicate their detections to BI over the RTSP stream or is only video being provided to BI? Once I understand that, I'll start to get a better idea of how I want to set up detection within BI and whether I want the CPAI to verify the detections beyond what the cameras or BI can do on their own. I'll also figure out how the camera's internal person tracking effects BI detections. If the camera starts moving to follow someone, I'd assume BI will flag that as motion. I'll need to experiment and learn if I want auto-tracking on or off and if it's better to buy good but more basic cameras and rely on BI and CPAI for detections or buy cameras with better built in detection capabilities and only rely on BI to record (or some combination of the two). There seem to be endless ways to use BI and when I eventually get the hang of it and start triggering actions using something like Home Assistant, the options will become even bigger.

 

[wittaj]

Yes, the car and person symbols only are available if you use the BI AI.

So depending on your setup, needs, number of cameras, etc. determines if you need to use the BI AI.

If you use the camera AI or BI motion (without AI), then it will only be the lightning bolts. The "blur" you mentioned is the recording time, so you must be set to record on trigger/motion only.

Best practice is to record 24/7 because no matter how good the AI gets, it can still miss motion. You record continuous + triggers and it will record substream 24/7, then switch to mainstream during the trigger, then back to substream.

BI simply takes whatever video is being fed to it, so if you have a tracking PTZ camera, BI doesn't care that the camera is moving it simply records the video being sent to it. But yeah once there is motion, then BI will trigger if you set it up that way.

 

[looney2ns]

All explained in the BI help file.

 

[geobrick]

All explained in the BI help file.

I'm up to page 47. It's very thorough so far.

 

[geobrick]

If you use the camera AI or BI motion (without AI), then it will only be the lightning bolts. The "blur" you mentioned is the recording time, so you must be set to record on trigger/motion only.

Best practice is to record 24/7 because no matter how good the AI gets, it can still miss motion. You record continuous + triggers and it will record substream 24/7, then switch to mainstream during the trigger, then back to substream.

I'm currently set to 'Continuous + Alerts' so I'm getting the 24/7 recording. I didn't change that setting when I turned off AI but when I get to that section of the help file, I'll know how to set it for my situation.

 

[Mike A.]

Better to change that to Continuous+triggered without AI running.

ETA: Doh... reading too fast. Didn't see wittaj's answer. That's the way.

 

[geobrick]

Better to change that to Continuous+triggered without AI running.

Makes sense since AI was in the Alert section and I turned AI off for now. I'll make that change now and get the detailed understanding later when I get to that section of the help file.

 

[geobrick]

When I went back to a basic setup to learn more about the settings through the help file, I thought I disabled the AI service when I unticked "Use AI Server On IP/Port" and selected "none" in the Artificial Intelligence menu under the Alerts tab of the camera settings. It seems Code Project and Python are still running in the background (even after a reboot). They are using memory but not the CPU. Do I need to uninstall it or can I stop the service from starting at boot? I may come around to using the CPAI once I'm familiar with Blue Iris.

 

[Swampledge]

In the General AI Settings under “Use AI Server…” there is also a checkbox to stop/stop the AI server. Did you uncheck that?

 

[geobrick]

In the General AI Settings under “Use AI Server…” there is also a checkbox to stop/stop the AI server. Did you uncheck that?

Thanks. After reading your suggestion I was going to write back, "now I did" but I can't. The General AI settings are grayed when "Use AI Server On IP/Port" is unticked.
I don't know why but I no longer see Code Project and Python running in Task Manager. It could be that I had clicked the button under "Open AI Dashboard" (I'm running 5.8.0.1). The button currently shows a grayed out "Start Now". Maybe it toggles to "Stop" when it's actually running. I could experiment to find out or leave it as is and continue reading the help file (it may be covered in there).

 

[Evroul]

Haven't used 5.8 so don't know how it's changed. It's kind of beta at this point. I usually wait for a while before updating. Maybe step back to 5.7. You can download it here:

Blue Iris Update (64 bit)

(9/12/2023) FTP updates including TLS 1.3 and SFTP server support Reolink dual-streaming using RTSP + FLV Abandoned and missing object detection ONVIF GetEvents revamp including detailed status and actions Timelapse for timeline video export...

ipcamtalk.com

In 5.7 you can select Continuous sub + Triggered as below to do as you describe. You'll need to have substreams set up in the cam and in BI (obviously).

View attachment 174961

If I set continuous + triggered my pc goes bananas Ok fixed with correct substream setup!
Its an I7-9700K , 3,6GHz 16GM Ram

Substream set to 15 fps and 512 br.

Secondly about BI. I've set tripwires on the Dahuas, but in BI it only records if under "Sources" Motion sensor is ticked off.
However that also results in it records everything. I was under the impression if ONVIF / Camera events was ticked off alone it did the trick?