jonmedlock

Cheers guys, all useful stuff. Soundy, looked into the dropbox setup. Worked quite well, managed to get a video link out of it as such: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/48421234/53_2011-11-03_175950.3gp That said, we'd eventually be looking at creating some sort of website which would (somehow) be linked to these videos, the idea being that, using a dropdown bar or something, you click the day/time and are taken to a new page within the same website which plays the video. Gets a bit technical all that so not expecting any advice but any you do have would be invaluable! The hard bit would appear to be automating the process. You says that it might be possible to set up a schedule with the Windows Scheduled Tasks and write a batch file or script that would upload the latest file to an FTP server, what is an FTP server? This sounds promising, but then I'd also have to somehow link my website to the videos that are stored in the dropbox, ie. embed videos using http links like the one above but automaticall rather than manually. Hardwired, thanks for the concern but bandwidth is not a problem for us at the moment, just in the experimenting phase. If we stumbled across a setup that worked then we wouldn't mind paying for a dedicated network connection, perhaps even a dedicated fibre optics connection if we were to look at a higher quality image and therefore larger file sizes.

Afternoon guys. Recentlly purchased a Vivotek camera which came recommended from a previous thread I posted, it's working perfectly and really happy with it. I've currently got it setup as I intended to use it, recording 6-7pm daily and being stored on my laptop. However, a friend of mine had an idea (can't divulge into at this moment in time) which needed him to be able to view footage I have taken from his pc or any PC in the world. I know that, if he was to download a copy of the same NVR software, then we could set it up so that he could watch footage back that way, however we were wondering if there is any possible way to achieve this with him not having access to the same software? IE, if Joe Bloggs in Australia wanted to view one of the videos (e.g. 6-7pm from the previous Wednesday), then could he do this? The files on my laptop (which I never turn off, it just acts as a permanent NVR now) are setup to be over-written after 7 days. There will only be one video uploaded per day, so there will only ever be a maximum of 7 videos available to view. It's quite hard to try and explain what we're trying to achieve. For example, in an ideal world, I could sync the videos with a site like YouTube, where they were uploaded as soon as they were recorded then they stayed online for people to view, until the 8th day where the first file would be deleted to make room for the loop to start again. I know this is impossible to setup so I was wondering if anyone knew of any alternatives to what we're trying to achieve? The ideal outcome would be that, in 6 months time (for example) and having not even touched the camera or the setup in ages, I could view one of the videos from any computer anywhere in the world without needing software installed. Oh and it may be helpful to forget the whole concept of CCTV as a means of security. We'd only be using CCTV because of the automatic functions and the software/storage available. Recording the sucject manually with a video camera would have the same result but I was hoping a CCTV camera may be setup to record automatically (which I've already done) and upload somewhere automatically (which I'm trying to do now!). I could do the whole process on my own everyday but it would become very time consuming, as I said I'm looking for a setup that I can go months without touching and for it to still be working fine. Hope that made sense! Just trying to get an idea really, I've spoken with some people who say it must be possible so I thought where better to ask than on here! Cheers guys.

Looking for indoor cameras to start with then once I get the hang of things outdoor as well. Ok, I'll steer clear of ebay. Cheers for the heads up! If I go with a well known retailer such as Axis, will recording software be likely to be included with the camera? Or is this possibly something that I could download?

I've been recommended a network camera before so I think I'll probably go with one of those, thanks for the advice. I'm aware that IP Network cameras offer live streaming but, say I wanted to set my camera(s) up to record from 6-10 every night, would this be possible? I'm aware that storage would mean that data would be overwritten every 30 days or so, but if I wanted to look back on some footage from the previous week and download it, is this easily achieved? I've been recommended Axis as a good place to start, but they seem quite established and a cheap camera would set me back around £150 a go. Whereas I've just had a quick look on ebay and found cameras such as these for half the price: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/CCTV-waterproof-IP-network-Detect-Camera-FOSCAM-FI8904W-/280553022340?pt=UK_CCTV&hash=item4152436384 Given the requirements I have, could this be achieved with both or is there a massive advantage in getting a well-established name such as Axis? Cheers, any advice is much appreciated!

Hi chaps, In the process of purchasing my first CCTV camera but haven't really any clue as to where to start. I really don't mind at all what the first camera I buy is, specs/res are a non issue, I just want to get to grips with the setup. I've been looking into cheap cameras just to get the ball rolling but aren't sure what to do once the camera arrives. Do all cameras come with software? If not then is there software I can download that will work with specific cameras? I'm not bothered about wireless at this stage. I've got an old laptop that I was planning on using for the CCTV. Can I wire the camera straight to my laptop? Or is there a junction in the process that I've missed? Any help would be hugely appreciated! Appologies for the complete lack of any expertise but assumed a CCTV forum would be the logical place to start...