Recognition, License Plate Reading aka AI

[MonitorMyHome]

Hello

I'm really confused by this point. Is it the camera or the software or a combination thereof that give you the "AI" capabilities such as Identification, Recognition, License Plate Reading?

I thought this was mostly a camera configuration and software thing not something built into a specific model but then I see that certain cameras have AI capabilities. Even the wiki seems to indicate that it's more to do with ppf which seems to be pretty configurable for per camera so what am I missing?

I'm trying to pick cameras for my house so I'd love to understand this better.

Thanks
Sam

 

[john-ipvm]

For license plates, there are 2 fundamental elements:
- the ability to capture the license plates, that is to see the characters clearly in various conditions, dark, headlights, angles, etc. (i.e. a human can now see the plate's characters is ABC-123)
- the ability to recognize what all the specific characters are and generate that as text / data (i.e., the computer / system records the plate's characters as ABC-123)

Most cameras are not set up to do either of them but sometimes you can configure 'regular' cameras to capture license plates (IR, shorter shutter, etc.). A minority of cameras are designed and shipped to capture license plates by default. A minority of those cameras that can capture can also do recognition.

In terms of your house, if you want the camera to generate alerts when a specific license plate appears, you want a true LPR (license plate recognition) camera. If you just want to be able to make it out later, you can try a regular camera or a LPC (capture) camera.

 

[MonitorMyHome]

Ah so it’s Partially a hardware thing. Makes sense now. What about facial recognition?

 

[john-ipvm]

Facial recognition is somewhat similar structurally. In practice, there are 2 parts - capturing a face and then recognizing a face. Some cameras can capture a face (i.e., 'know' and mark where a face is), a smaller number can actually capture and recognize a face (i.e., attempt to match a captured face to a known list of faces).

For both LPR and facial recognition, you can do the recognition part in software or a server but that still requires the camera is properly positioned to capture the licsen plate or face clearly and in high enough detail to do recognition elsewhere.

 

[MonitorMyHome]

Interesting. I’m not in love with bullet cams from an aesthetics point of view but I believe the dahua cameras that do LPR are bullets. I’d much rather have a eyeball cam but such is life.

 

[john-ipvm]

Usually, LPR cameras are bullet or box format to better accommodate the lensing and IR illuminators to optimize capture/recognition performance. There might be some that are bullets, that I don't know.

 

[MonitorMyHome]

I’ll live with it. One bullet in the back of the driveway isn’t the worst thing on earth.

That’s basically what I have in this layout:

Please critique my camera placement/selection