atropine

Hi, I"ve got a panasonic speed dome. It's an outdoor model. But i'm not sure exactly what that means. I"M guessing it would have a heater and a blower but is the actual casing water resistant? This is the scenario. I want to mount one under the eaves of the house in a wooden painted box which will definitely prevent the water seeping into the box, however the camera section of the dome will obviously be strutting it's head out of the bottom of the box. If I mount the camera in the box with the plastic dome section containg the camera jutting out from the box with a very small amount of casing also jutting out, so that the camera is placed well enough that I never se the box it's filming from when moving the camera up to the horizon. So basically i'm asking if the clear dome section should be waterproof, and not allow water in, when an infrequent storm comes along and soaks the exterior of the box and the clear plastic dome camera section?

oh!! thanks for that.

hi, It's a WV-CS850B. I don't need for it to have a heater and fan, i'm not in a cold area, it's just I thought it had one, due to the constant whir'ing noise it makes. It's going under an awning, so it will mostly get rain spray, and in bad storms when the rain is blowing in sideways it will get hit, but other than that it shouldn't have much contact with the weather.

hi CCTV professionals, I've got a use for a PTZ dome camera that would be better suited to an ordinary PTZ camera, but I don't have any spare. I was wondering if I could operate a speed dome on it's side. I have tried it just to test and it works, but I was interested to know how damaging it is to the camera and how much shorter it's life will be until it dies. I don't' understand the mechanics of a speed dome so don't understand why the manuals always say not to be used other than mounted with the dome facing down. If someone knows how they work, maybe you could tell me why the orientation of the camera is so critical, and if I should even bother mounting it on the side. EG. If it's going to die within the month, it's not worth it. If it could get a years life, then that would be ok.

I have a inside speed dome mounted outside under a roof eave. I have it mounted it inside a wooden box, with the dome section sticking it's head out. The wood is vanished to protect it against rain. I have the COM, video and power cable outputting through the top of the wooden box and siliconed around the cable outputs. I've looked at where the dome connects to the main body and it appears weatherproof so I didn't bother siliconing it, but if it doesn't look like a great seal to you , you could seal that as well.

Thanks for the reply. What worrys me is that there's a motor constantly going with speed domes. You can hear the whirring noise when you put your ear to them. I have no idea what that is about, but it could mean even if you're not moving the camera you're damaging it when you have them on their side. Good to hear you had no problems. I"ll see if anyone knows the fundamental reason as to why user manuals always tell you that you will damage the camera if not orientated upside down (dome down)

What dip switches do you use for Pelco D? I didn't even realise it did pelco D, thought only Pelco P, not that I was able to get that to work.

I cant' believe how some big brand name companies quote their figures. I was looking at a pelco camera, quotes a really impressive low light figure and in brackets (at 1.5s). Yeah right, who uses a security camera with a shutter speed of 1.5 seconds. And Samsung Korea quote their low light figures at 32x sens up, which I think is similar to 1.5 seconds.

I think the main use for the camera's built in alarm input/outputs are for PTZ use. The camera has it's home position, which for me is my driveway, in a wide shot. if a person walks up the driveway, the DVR software detects and starts recording, the alarm circuit is not used, but when a person gets to my stairs/verandah. They trigger an external motion detector wired to the camera, which causes the camera to move to that preset position. I don't have any external alarm outputs setup , but they could be used to turn on a surveillance light or set off an audio alarm either for the home owner to gain their attention or external alarm to ward off the trespasser if they were in a location they shouldn't be in. EDIT: I just realised you didn't' ask about alarm inputs/outputs. DVR recorders can be triggered by arlarm inputs from the camera detecting motion. instead of the software detecting motion. How well the on-camera motion detecting works would depend on the manufacturer. I've never used it for triggering a recorder. Could also be used for a buzzer

Air is an insulator though remember, and plenty of people standing under tree's have been killed/injured when the lighening hits the tree passes down through the tree, but arc's out of the tree at the level of the person's head because the person has less resistance than the tree. The lightning than passes through the person to ground, or more likely to the person's feet where the lightning once again arc's to ground due to the insulation provided by a person's rubber shoe sole. I just don't think a plastic box for your camera or conduit for the wiring will protect it from lightning arc'ing across from the tree, as copper wire is a far superior passage to earth. I'm about to do a tree install, I was just going to put a thick earth cable up the opposite side of the tree trunk, and run it about 4feet higher up the tree than my camera. The cable earthed with a earthling peg at the base of the tree. I didn't use a lightning conductor as I don't' actually want to be attracting lightning so close to my camera, but I figured if it was going to hit the tree anyway it would then run along the earth cable to ground and not hurt my camera or DVR. If this doesn't sound logical/ok then maybe someone can say.

With my dome, when you set a preset with the DVR software, the actual camera responds with 'memory set' , so you're actually programming the dome via the DVR software, and the preset data is stored in the dome, only the preset number and description is stored in your DVR software. So number of presets is important Sony make Superhad, if it says sony had it would mean superhad, as everything is superhad these days, unless it's sony exview. Exview has better low light colour performance.

Here's an example of the infra red filter moving into place. I quickly recorded this with my phone cam, so not focussed perfectly.

Yeah I understand what you're saying CameraGimp. Rory, these are all Chubb B&W cameras, standard and high resolution 1/3" CCD. Made in Portual of all places. They only go down to about 0.2 lux and do not have any DSP, so the AGC noise (when turned on) is completely useless with motion activated recorders at night, which indicates how old they must be.

The problem is that they lack 'proportinal zoom pan/tilt' , that is the pan/tilt speed is the same no matter weather you're wide angle or zoomed in a 30x. But for $40 i'm sure you could do with out proportional pan/tilt.

Just wanted to comment that my Pelco Esprit was manufactured in June of 2007 was made in Clovis, USA, with Panasonic Camera, and Fujinon Lens made in Japan. I bought this 2nd hand, so can't say with 100% certainly that this is a genuine Peleco setup or weather the camera and/or lens were substituted instead ofr whatever came with the esprit system. I know a lot of people here badmouth Pelco but my Esprit seems like a very good build quality to me.

My B&W box cameras all have IR filters on the CCD. They are old though and meant for use in the same situations as colour cameras. So you would need to filter out the infrared light to gain a sharp picture (assuming non IR lens). Maybe B&W box cameras sold today are sold for the expressed use of low light, not general purpose so come without the filter.

I hate the compromises you have to make with 1/4 inch day/night dome. I think out of low/mid/high gain, Mid gain is really setting you'd want as high gain quality is too bad, and for sens up/slow-shutter/ fram integration, anything more than 2x is useless for evidence gathering material. This means a lot of darkness. If your'e just using the camera for observation and you're infront of a monitor live, I think you can afford to use slower shutter speeds, and higher gain, as at least you'll see something, and can then act. But the mtaerial you've recorded possibly wont' be of much good to you as evidence.

ok that's good to hear, they certainly are ecconomical for a regulated supply I have 3 just sitting there waiting to do something., really you just need to send the 12v to a fused switch board , and run the cameras from that. Should be as good as a super expensive CCTV power supply. No good for long runs ofcourse, but certainly has it's uses.

Computer power supplies aren't just a 12v device, they're 5v and 3.3 too. I think they have to be matched load. This youtube video shows a kid using a computer PSU to power a whole load of 12v things, and at the end he mentions how he also has the 5V going to a light to stop the power supply blowing up. http://youtube.com/watch?v=yd-AKVhmRPM

that's a picture of a 1/2inch camera , but i'll post a picture of the smallest 1/3 inch camera i've got with a 16x motorised lens. The lenses would just be too large & expensive, even if they used miniature cameras like this one in domes. But I doubt you'd get a day/night camera as small as that one in 1/3' 1/6th is useless for low light. I consider 1/4 useless, when trying to observe moving people or anything else at night, as you must use high gain and you must use sens up (frame integration). I cant stand 1/4 inch cameras for day/night useage. This is assuming a dark situation with no infra red illumination.

It's due to the size and the price. Most everyone wants a 22x or higher zoom in a dome, that would be pretty large and expensive at 1/3". I also think that a lot of governments/security people are idiots. I know of a council getting rid of all their PTZ 1/2inch day/night cameras with 30x zoom lenses, and replacing them with 1/4inch domes with 30x zooms. The 1/2 inch cameras have higher resolution and much better low light capabilities even though they're a few years old. I get the feeling domes are 'sexier' and councils/goverments, and everyone else don't want to be seen to be watching people. But yeah basically I think it comes down to keeping a dome compact and affordable. You don't get that with a 30x optical lens and 1/3" CCD cameras Have a look at the size of the 20x zoom lens for my Panasonic. The camera is 12.5cm (5inches). and you can see that the lens is considerably longer. Most people would want 30x zoom lenses buying new on a dome these days. That would be an awfully large and expensive dome.

I was looking at some online axis cameras, and they seem to do what I want the panasonics do do. You probably know this as I think you're actually a CCTV retailer. but with the Axis software you can click on their bar and go to anywhere in the 360 degree pan range, or the full tilt range or full zoom range, or just pan/zoom or tilt at a normal speed. That seems like a pretty good interferace. know you're a programmer and I know i' m not. so I don't know how easy it would be to steal their code and just replace the sent code with rs485 panasonic code.

That would be great! The auto focus in manual mode that i'm trying to explain, is when you're in manual focus mode, and you press a button (not sure weather you keep the button pressed or just press it once on an actual controller) Roba was talking about it up the top of the page, so he should know how that is implemented. ["The "one shot autofocus" is 0021A06 Funnily enough, I was testing that just earlier today "]

I"ll show you the TRUE HORROR! that is a bad panasonic CCD in sens up modes all the way through to 64X. Unfortunately I didn't' turn the gain off and the levels are too high, so the picture is noisy, but you can still see the dots, also I just threw a shirt over the lens, so the picture begins to get light towards 64X as light is creeping through. Ofcourse some of the dots are obscured by the menu, but I couldn't be bothered exiting out each time. Let the horror begin: [/img] [/img] [/img] [/img] [/img] [/img] [/img] [/img]

Hi Zxmtech, Is there any possibility you could upgrade your software in the future? What I would like is variable speed pan/zoom/tilt and 'auto focus button' while in manual focus mode. By variable speed I mean maybe a layout like this for as an example panning (< & > represent buttons) <<< >>> , where the inner button would equal slow pan, while the outer button would equal rapid pan. Also it would be good if you could choose the com port. I can't use com port1 unfortunately. I don't know why. your software works fine on my laptop but not on my main computer. I have no idea how much effort would be involved in improving the interface , so if i'm asking ridiculously much please disreguard. I'd really like a joystick sense when moving the camera , that is move the joystick a little in direction = slow pan, and a lot = fast pan. Helps you keep a target in frame without having to frantically zoom out and pan to increase the pan rate. Same can be said for tilt, though zoom is not such as issue. I'm sure 850 owners are very grateful with your software as is, so no disrespect meant.