Which camera placement? (pics included)

[Mr_D]

This is the side of the house with the only gate to the back yard. The red lines represent an interior wall and the ceiling. I'd rather put holes in the attic space above the living room or the garage wall. The top of the Window is about 7' from the ground with the ceiling line being about 15" above that. The wall and gate are 6' tall.

I took both sample pictures with a 35mm lens which I believe equates to about 6mm on the Dauha 2MP Starlights. The shot with all 3 trash cans visible is from the green location. Is there a reason to go with one location over the other? Yes, the blue location is lower, but the angle to the top of the gate is similar.

 

[smoothie]

Both locations have their benefits but I think the right camera in the Green Location is the superior choice.

The Blue Location affords you greater facial detail for someone looking over or climbing over the fence/gate, ergo more likely to be able to identify the individual to the police should the need ever arise.

The Green Location affords you a view of your window in addition to the gate/fence. Having camera coverage of all entry points to the home is certainly worthwhile and beneficial.

As others have noted extensively on this site varifocal cameras are worth the slight increase in price as they afford the greatest flexibility for installation. A varifocal camera at the Green Location would give you the greatest number of options for installation. You could opt to have it at a lower zoom and thus a wider overview of the area including the window or set it to a higher zoom level to achieve the same result as putting a fixed camera at the Blue Location. If you don't know varifocal cameras are not meant to be zoomed in or out during regular use, instead they are meant to be zoomed to the appropriate level for the install site and thereafter treated as a fixed camera. While you can change the zoom on a varifocal camera anytime, and often electronically via the camera web interface, changing the zoom is a slow process and so not recommended to do on the fly.

You could certainly install a camera at the Green Location above the interior ceiling line as you desire, the Green Location being further from the gate/fence will make the increased height and angle of the camera negligible for capturing faces.

Ideally the camera should have everything in frame you wish to monitor and nothing you don't. It is nearly impossible to have a truly perfect frame like that, but trying to minimize the amount of irrelevant in the frame is best. For example the sample photo of your Green Location shows a significant amount of your exterior wall between the camera and the window, this would be the kind of irrelevant footage you would want to avoid when installing the camera permanently.

These 3 varifocal Dahua are well liked on this site and would be worth considering in my opinion:
5231 Turret
5231 Bullet
8232 Turret

Hope this helps

(edit=changed a word because I used the wrong homonym)

 

[PapaBill]

I know it sounds crazy, but have ya got something to cover the rest of the side between you and your neighbors house and the back?
I have seen situations where the bad guy would use a neighbors yard to get access to your because they might have a better entry point.
So just because ya have houses all around you, doesn't mean they are safe zones.
I had some kids jump in my neighbors yard and try to jump into mine not visible from the street, and I luckily saw them when I was in my back room, so i am putting camera around my house to cover every inch of space.
If this were the 80's then no biggie, but now a days with scumbags moving into my neighborhood I am covering everything.

 

[Mr_D]

I know it sounds crazy, but have ya got something to cover the rest of the side between you and your neighbors house and the back?
I have seen situations where the bad guy would use a neighbors yard to get access to your because they might have a better entry point.
So just because ya have houses all around you, doesn't mean they are safe zones.
I had some kids jump in my neighbors yard and try to jump into mine not visible from the street, and I luckily saw them when I was in my back room, so i am putting camera around my house to cover every inch of space.
If this were the 80's then no biggie, but now a days with scumbags moving into my neighborhood I am covering everything.

I'm still in the planning stages, but I do plan on having another camera farther back and another to watch the patio and back doors. I posted some layouts here:

How do these camera locations look? (diagram attached)

 

[PapaBill]

Your house is setup pretty much the same as mine in foundation appearance not camera, when we bought it while it was in excros 13 years ago someone went on the side of the house by your gate and broke into the bedroom from the outside door, so this is why I am gonna say ya might want to cover the two naked spot at some time in the future, I cant say you live in a bad area or state, but here in central calif all the bay area people are moving to the central valley and bringing the scumbags with them since our cost of living is lower, 30 years ago, this city rolled up the carpet at 5pm and it was a ghosttown with a pop around 45k at the time and only had 3 local kids who thought they were gangbangers fighting with the kids in the next city, now its over 75k and we went from one city cop per night to about 8 or more, our city is also a major thoroughfare for people going toi Yosemite. So ya will understand why i talk about good coverage.
I worked security armed and unarmed for 9 years and was also housing police and then retired/disabled as a truck driver. I have seen alot of stuff happen, and learned alot of things watching and listening,my ols neighbor at one house I lived was a known thief and he loved talking about stuff, learned some from him also.
But your main setup does look good.

 

[Mr_D]

In the first diagram on the other thread, camera 5 is the subject of this thread. There's an identical tall window on the other side of the chimney. Someone actually tried to break into the house through that window recently. I'm planning to put a camera on the back corner of the patio cover, aimed toward the front, to cover the whole side of the house except for the window by the gate. Unfortunately the chimney prevents one camera from seeing that entire side of the house. I live in a nice area but its being overrun by thieving, drug zombies so anything I want to do what I can to deter or prosecute.

 

[PapaBill]

You did good on the setup and sad to hear about about its getting bad there also.