Stacker 0 Posted April 30, 2010 Hey guys, great forum! I'm an electrician looking to setup a single surveillance camera at my home. This camera will be right outside the wall that my iMac is on. Since I have 500+GB of free space I'd like to connect the camera directly to the iMac to record and view. So what I need is a good camera that could connect via USB or FireWire 800. The camera needs to be able to view about 20-70 foot. The area is lit at night, but it's not super bright so a camera with those IR emitters or whatever they are called might benefit me. Any recommendations? Thanks a lot for your help! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bpzle 0 Posted May 1, 2010 There are a handful of CCTV products that support viewing on a Mac (client), but I couldn't even name one that supports recording on a Mac (server). Much less one that supports directly attached USB/ firewire cameras. Maybe fleebay has a crappy USB capture stick for Macs? Don't expect good results... will be choppy, unstable, poor video quality, and horrible user interface. The only thing I can think is to get a cheap webcam that comes with time-lapse recording software. Don't expect very good images or low light capability with webcams though... LuxRiot is CCTV software that can record from a huge variety of cheap USB webcams. but again it requires Windows. Maybe you can run a dual OS? Really not a lot of options bud... Plus I think most of the solutions that would work for this wouldn't save you any money, which is obviosuly what you're tring to do. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bpzle 0 Posted May 1, 2010 A quick Google search for "CCTV software Mac" pulled up a product called EvoCam. It's an advanced webcam recording software designed for Mac that also advertises compatability with a handful of IP cameras including Vivotek and Axis. Looks like most of the cameras it supports are "indoor" cameras but outdoor CCTV camera housings can be found for pretty cheap. EvoCam is cheap (red flag) but it may be worth looking into... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Stacker 0 Posted May 1, 2010 Alright, I guess it's not going to work then. I was looking for a nice, simple solution, but I guess I am going to have to go full tilt. I appreciate you taking the time to help me, this is something that I would have spent hours looking into just to find out it wouldn't work. Thanks! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
DKtucson 0 Posted May 2, 2010 check out BTVPro--british company--has a single license for 20 british pounds (about 40 bucks) and it does motion detection recording From the website: BTV Pro is an application for the Macintosh that allows you to view, capture and edit video, and create stop-motion animations. It also has advanced capture features such as time lapse, motion detection, and DV input/output. It works with any Macintosh compatible video input source such as video input cards, TV cards, built-in video, USB, DV, and FireWire video sources. BTV Pro is available as a classic application for Mac OS 8 and 9, and also a Carbonized application that runs natively under Mac OSX (the Carbon version also runs under Mac OS 8.6 or later with CarbonLib). You could get a TV capture card with RCA input or a decent USB cam and pipe it in Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rory 0 Posted May 2, 2010 here are a few .. most not free but hey .. http://www.pure-mac.com/webcam.html If not perhaps check out one of the simple 1 or 4 channel stand alone DVRs. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
