Searching for cam to monitor front of stage in theater

[schizo 0]

Hi everybody,

 

first of all: Sorry for my English (as I come from Germany).

 

For our private theatre-group (few money) I´m searching for a cam to monitor the front of our stage for the director and technicians who stay backstage and need to see whats going on in front of the stage. Stage width is about 11 m. We very rarely have dark scenes with low light on stage, so we don´t need a cam which delivers best pictures in darkness.

 

At the moment I´ve had a closer look at these cams:

 

1. Vivotek IP7139 (I´ve seen a sample pic in this forum which was okay I think, and it´s price would also be right.)

2. Allnet 2290 (It doesn´t have WiFi while the othr one do, but if this cam is still better, I should think about wiring, even if WiFi is more comfortable, of course.)

3. Allnet 2282 (It has P/T/Z, but I couldn´t find any sample-pictures.)

4. Levelone WCS-0020g (It has also P/T/Z, also no cample-pictures found.)

 

Do you think the cams I mentioned are suitable for our needs, or are there other ones you would prefer? P/T/Z is not required in the first place, but if possible, it´s quite nice

Many thanks for your help,

 

Sebastian

[Baylab 0]

Hi everybody,

 

first of all: Sorry for my English (as I come from Germany).

 

For our private theatre-group (few money) I´m searching for a cam to monitor the front of our stage for the director and technicians who stay backstage and need to see whats going on in front of the stage. Stage width is about 11 m. We very rarely have dark scenes with low light on stage, so we don´t need a cam which delivers best pictures in darkness.

 

At the moment I´ve had a closer look at these cams:

 

1. Vivotek IP7139 (I´ve seen a sample pic in this forum which was okay I think, and it´s price would also be right.)

2. Allnet 2290 (It doesn´t have WiFi while the othr one do, but if this cam is still better, I should think about wiring, even if WiFi is more comfortable, of course.)

3. Allnet 2282 (It has P/T/Z, but I couldn´t find any sample-pictures.)

4. Levelone WCS-0020g (It has also P/T/Z, also no cample-pictures found.)

 

Do you think the cams I mentioned are suitable for our needs, or are there other ones you would prefer? P/T/Z is not required in the first place, but if possible, it´s quite nice

Many thanks for your help,

 

Sebastian

 

If you don't need to recording the video why not just choose a nice analog camera+a nice analog monitor?

[schizo 0]

Thanks for your answer.

We´d like to use IP-cams because there´s less efford then to wire the cam and to stream the pictures to several technicians with their notebooks and other monitors.

And if we find a nice cam we will think about additional ones from different directions or maybe to watch the audience to know when the doors can be closed and so on.

[Baylab 0]

For your application, you need to pay extra attention to the delay of video. even for the camera still support MJPEG, the minimum delay is the time for 2 frame ( encoding + decoding), for the one use MPEG4 or H.264, the delay could be longer. Unfortunately, before you get touch the camera, it is very difficult to get the information of video delay from distributor or manufacture.

[schizo 0]

Well, there can be a delay of some frames, that´s not important for us. We don´t have to start cues, effects aso. exact to the second. It´s just to see which scene is played at the moment (and how advanced it is to know when the next actors have to be ready, for example) and to know whats going on outside the stage.

And, I grant, there´s also a "fun-factor" for the other actors behind the stage to see what the other ones are doing right now on stage

We´re just a private theatre-group with hobby-actors.

[Soundy 1]

I'd probably go with the option that best fits the budget and has the features I need, and not be so concerned with image quality. You're not recording the video, you don't need it for forensic identification or anything, so super-high quality isn't really a concern. You say you have good lighting, so low-light or day/night performance shouldn't be an issue.

 

PTZ is a neat toy, but maybe not something you want either, as you don't need one clown deciding to drive the camera around while everyone else is watching something different... unless it's a feature you can lock out with user permissions.

 

Just another thought too, you might want to consider recording anyway, just so the actors can go back and watch their performances, whether to look for places to improve, or just for their own vanity.

[schizo 0]

Thank you!

 

As you mentioned, P/T is a neat toy, so I did a little research on cams with this feature, and now I´d like to decide between these cams:

 

1. Trendnet TV-IP422W (Livedemo: http://www.trendnet.com/demo/default.asp?model=150_TV-IP422)

2. Allnet ALL2282 (no Livedemo found)

3. Vivotek PT7137 (Livedemo: http://campratteln7.vivotek.ch/ demo/demo)

 

The Trendnet seems to be equivalent to the Allnet with the difference, that Trendnet seems to publish new firmwares more often.

The Vivotek could be a nice one, too, as I read a lot of good about Vivotek´s products.

 

Hm... which one would you choose?

[buellwinkle 0]

Check out Stardot. They make camera of different resolutions from 1 to 5MP. They also have analog out, so you can have a monitor backstage and then use PoE Cat5 to a computers on the network. From what I've seen of network cameras, Stardot is up there with German made Mobotix in terms of image quality, but they take CS mount lenses, so you can get a nice zoom lens to frame the stage the way you want and they tend to be considerably less expensive.

 

Another consideration would be Arecont, close in price and image quality, uses CS mount lenses, but no analog out. I have one I'm selling that I used for a few days for testing on ebay for cheap if you are interested, search ebay.com for Arecont AV3100DN and I'm the one for $369 which is about half price. I also have an Arecont 4-10mm lens for $100. 3MP 1/2" CMOS sensor will give you a nice crisp picture.

 

So why not Mobitix, there's a premium on these cameras for unique features that suits the surveillance market and outdoor use, so paying the extra money may not be a benefit to you. They are very good though.

 

So why not #1 Axis from Sweden, not crazy about their image quality and to me, if you are going to be looking at a screen for hours, you want a nice crisp picture with little to no noise and good metering.

 

The ones you noted, mostly made in China are not going to have the image quality for the money they cost. Don't waste money on PTZ, just get a variable focal length lens, manually zoom it to the image you want and leave it there. If you have to have PTZ, consider the Panasonic BB-HCM581, good value for the money.