I wasn't impressed with the motion detection in my Reolink cameras. The main problem I had was that I couldn't keep them from triggering endlessly from blowing snow, blowing dirt, etc.
But since setting up
Blue Iris, I don't bother at all with the built-in motion detection in the Reolinks. The motion detection in Blue Iris is far more sophisticated and customizable.
I'm doing what
@dragoneggs proposes. I use my existing Reolinks, but am slowly replacing them with better cameras as the time and motivation hits me.
You get a month, I believe, to return stuff to Amazon. I had all of mine longer than that before realizing that they weren't all that great. I hadn't even installed them by then.
While they may not be what I'd choose now, they have worked fine under BI for me so far, other than having fairly poor performance at night, and because they're all bullet types, having bad spiderweb issues. Fortunately, they're all mounted where I can reach them quite easily, so I can brush off the webs a few times a day.
I won't ever get bullet-style cameras again. The spiders spin their webs across the field of view, and because of the little "shades", the webs end up spaced out just far enough from the lens and the built-in IR illuminators that the camera can see them AND they are well illuminated by the IR LEDs.
Thus, they show up brightly in the images and breezes make them move constantly. As a result, the motion detection is triggered continuously.
The spiders won't usually spin a web across a solid surface...what would be the point? But from the shades down to the bottom edges of the camera enclosures is an attractive place for a web. The spiders may well see the
IR light and instinctively build webs there because light usually attracts their prey.
If you never enable the built-in IR illuminators, the spiders might not build as many webs there, and even if they did, they wouldn't show up the way they do when illuminated by the LEDs in the camera.
So you might do better with bullet style cameras if you installed separate IR illuminators and disabled the built-in IR lights in the cameras.
Unfortunately, the Reolinks I have do not have an option to disable their internal illuminators and have them switch to Black and White mode (which moves the IR filter out of the way). So there's no way to use them with separate IR illuminators with their internal illuminators disabled.
I did open one up and traced out the front PC board, and there is a place you can make a foil cut to disable the built-in IR LEDs. I did this on that one, but that's something you shouldn't have to do.
Another thought I had was to just cut off the protruding shade so the spiders couldn't build their webs in that critical area. A few seconds on a band saw would make quick work of the shades! They're part of the Aluminum casting, but would cut off easily.
But that is why a lot of us recommend getting the eyeball/turret style cams. Their flat faces don't provide that convenient spider web location.
You still see snow, rain, blowing dust, flying insects, etc. very brightly when you use the built-in IR, though. So really, separate IR illuminators or plain white lighting mounted so it's not too close to the camera is far better than any built-in illuminators.
Having the light source right next to the camera lens is a recipe for seeing really exaggerated images of anything floating or flying near the cameras. I can't help but think people who have some experience with security cameras would love it if a manufacturer sold cameras that come with separate IR illuminators with a three or four foot cable coming out of the main camera body so you could easily mount the illuminator a few feet away from.the camera, but not need to install any separate wiring. Plus, the camera could control that illuminator just the way they usually control their internal LEDs. I'd buy cameras like that for sure!
It would be convenient to install, and so much better than built-in LEDs.
Anyhow, as my Reolinks die, give me problems, or I just have the time and want to spend the money for the upgrade, I'll replace them.
