Reolink E Series E560 8MP Outdoor Wi-Fi PTZ

An 8MP (4K) camera with a 1/2.8" sensor suitable for 2MP will provide dismal nighttime or reduced lighting performance, especially if there's motion. Reolink manipulates their firmware to slow shutter to let in light to compensate so motion is blurred. I would not buy or install a Reolink camera except their fine video doorbell.

I'd invest intead in an overview camera (non-PTZ) of perhaps 4MP and a 1/1.8" sensor.

Do you have a budget?

How do you intend to store videos?

Ideal-sensor-size-to-megapixel.png
 
Even with a good wifi signal, these cameras do not buffer like a streaming service like Netflix does, so every lost packet is tried again and sometimes it can cripple a router quickly.
 
If you have good LOS (Line Of Sight) from house to barn, I'd go with with either a pair of Ubiquiti Nanostation 5AC Locos or a pair of TP-LINK CPE-510's.

Unlike a link between Wi-Fi devices, extenders, repeaters, etc. the radios I linked both use proprietary protocol, channel widths and more to provide fast, reliable connections between the 2 devices, creating a wireless layer 2 transparent bridge much like a straight Ethernet cable as far as data is concerned.

You configure them with unique, static IP's in the same subnet as your LAN (but outside of your router's DHCP pool); no port forwarding required OR advised. The configuration instructions found in the Ubiquiti link covers the terminology and methods for both the older "M" devices (as in my schematic below) and for the newer "AC" devices as in my recommendation.


Ubiquiti_layer2_bridge-cams.jpg
 
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Line of sight is good. I have a secondary AP in the garage that is about 120’ from the barn. PTZ is preferred but can do without if the video quality is too poor. I want to watch for nocturnal activity in the field behind the barn and or at times move it inside for the young animals.

At some point I may consider running fiber in ground.

I would be using blue iris for the NVR, would not be recording 24/7 just on movement.
 
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I have a secondary AP in the garage that is about 120’ from the barn.
If it is a standard access point, unlike one of the pairs I mentioned in post #4, its lack of proprietary protocol and specific channel width will limit its transmission quality, throughput and reliability.

At some point I may consider running fiber in ground.
This would be the ideal choice, IMO. It does, however, take more time and likely at more expense. The wireless bridge can be up and running in a couple of days after receipt of equipment.
 
I'd rather invest the money in the fiber if I were to get more serious about this. The APs are not the UI but am fairly confident that there should not be any issues with transmission- I have a pretty robust network set up at home. APs are not set up as wireless bridges or backbones as you typically see in cheaper consumer mesh networks. Channel width is 40Hz enabled as well.

I'm having a difficult time finding a "good" wifi camera for this use, I realize properly wiring about the barn opens up my choices but am not there yet.

here's another that I found.

I'd like this one but can't find it online: DS-2CV1F43G2-LIDW(F)(B)
 
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I am trying to find the thread, but years ago there was someone that came here with a wifi reolink PTZ on a separate building like you are proposing and it was always unresponsive and slow to move/navigate etc. But it would be the same regardless of the wifi camera.

You may think you have a robust wifi system, and maybe you do, but experience here has shown that cameras connected to Wifi routers (whether wifi or not) are problematic for surveillance cameras because they are always streaming and passing data. And the data demands go up with motion and then you lose signal. A lost packet and it has to resend. It can bring the whole network down if trying to send cameras through a wifi router. At the very least it can slow down your entire system.

Unlike Netflix and other streaming services that buffer a movie, these cameras do not buffer up part of the video, so drop outs are frequent, especially once you start adding distance. You would be amazed how much streaming services buffer - don't believe me, start watching something and unplug your router and watch how much longer you can watch NetFlix before it freezes - mine goes 45 seconds. Now do the same with a camera connected to a router and it is fairly instantaneous (within the latency of the stream itself)...

The same issue applies even with the hard-wired cameras trying to send all this non-buffer video stream through a router. Most consumer grade wifi routers are not designed to pass the constant video stream data of cameras, and since they do not buffer, you get these issues. The consumer routers are just not designed for this kind of traffic, even a GB speed router.

And BI is "sensitive" to signal, so expect to see lots of no signal errors.
 
I do appreciate the advice on the WiFi but want to give it a try, if it doesn’t work I can just send the camera back. I, interested to see how my Netgate appliance running pfsense will handle the traffic load.

Do you know where this camera could be purchased? DS-2CV1F43G2-LIDW(F)(B)

edit: I'm assuming that in the camera, I can have the system send BI an onvif alert on movement and have BI start to record at that time? Or is BI still constantly receiving a stream?
 
Yep, BI is constantly receiving the stream and that is part of the issue and why it will jam up the wifi pretty quick. The camera has to be active in BI in order to receive the alert.

That is how the consumer based cameras "gets" away with wifi cams because they only stream when recording because if they were 24/7 it would cause even more phone calls to the 1-800 numbers.

But we have a whole thread dedicated to the wifi crap quality of wifi cameras because they cannot keep up with the bandwidth demands of increased bitrate during motion.

With motion of only a 2MP camera:

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Without motion:

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Shoot, was hoping to not have to run fiber out there. I have a 30x PTZ Dahau I bought from Andy that monitors the backyard / barn but would like to get behind the barn and or inside as well.