Need help with a Camera whiting out

[foxguard 0]

Please forgive me as I am not sure what info you will need so will ask the question and see where it goes.

I had to install a camera looking at a petrol pump at a local garage as when the customer filled up they woulD have to tell the staff the amount.... people soon realised they could lie!

 

So I have a Sanyo dome installed on the wall about 4mtrs away from the pump. Using Luxriot the image is zoomed in so can read how much fuel they have put in.

The customer keeps stating that a few times during the day for periods of any thing upto 30 mins, the LCD display on the pumps goes black. I have asked what the weather is doing at the time as first thought it muct be due to it being bright outside or dark outside and the whole image adjusting but he states it dos not matter what the weather is like outside and just does this at different times of the day.

 

Is there a setting that i am missing? Could it be a faulty camera?

 

If there is info you need but I have not provided, please dont flame me, just let me know and I will find out. Im still really learning with cameras so I will say sorry now as I am sure I will be asking lots more.

[rory 0]

maybe a bad iris or iris control.

 

Physically if the Iris gets stuck, normally it does it the opposite way, so it is stuck open letting in too much light, and causing whiteout during the day but looks fine at night.

 

can you post a photo or video of it?

is it video loss or just a black image?

[Soundy 1]

Is it JUST the LCD display that's going black, and the rest of the image is okay?

[foxguard 0]

I will try and get a screen shot for you, but the rest of the image seems to go bright and the LCD bit goes dark.

[foxguard 0]

Sorry for the long delay in getting back to you. I was at the garage this morning and saw the camera doing what they had been complaining about. What it appears to be is the reflection coming from a car when parked at the pump. The sun rises behind the building and goes from one side to the other side always behind the camera, so I do not know how I can resolve this? it appears no matter where i put the camera the sun will always be behind it and will at points in the day, reflect of cars.

Would putting in a different camera help? One that is not a dome?

Here are some pictures of the garage etc to see if this helps you get a better picture of my problems.

 

This is a screen shot of the monitor, you can see the top left portion is white, due to the people carrier parked the other side of the pump.

 

This is where teh camera is currently positioned.

 

Here you can see where the sun is and through the day it will go from left to right of that pic

 

Also I am still having a couple of problems with the LCD display going black for no reason, for this I have some video footage taken 30 mins apart.

This is at 0730hrs and this is how it should look, when zoomed in you can read the LCD just fine and from this video you can see how you could see it - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2ufuqnUuX0

 

This was taken at 0700hrs and as you can see the lcd is black? This naturally means the zoomed in image you can not read the figures on the display.... why would this happen?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QihRGqHgiGc

 

One last thing.... the dvr is in the office but behind the till i have used a vga over cat5 extender so they can have a 2nd monitor. The video quality is drastically reduced and I assume that ise due tothe extender. What do you mostly use for this purpose?

 

Ok, thank you every one so far.

[Soundy 1]

Sorry for the long delay in getting back to you. I was at the garage this morning and saw the camera doing what they had been complaining about.

 

....

Those first two pics aren't loading:

An HTTP error occurred while getting:

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k580/foxguard/Tunstall%20garage/IMG_0908.jpg

 

Details: "connect timed out to /209.17.69.35:80".

 

 

Also I am still having a couple of problems with the LCD display going black for no reason, for this I have some video footage taken 30 mins apart.

This is at 0730hrs and this is how it should look, when zoomed in you can read the LCD just fine and from this video you can see how you could see it - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2ufuqnUuX0

 

This was taken at 0700hrs and as you can see the lcd is black? This naturally means the zoomed in image you can not read the figures on the display.... why would this happen?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QihRGqHgiGc

My first guess would be it's due to the angle of ambient lighting on the design of the specific LCD. One of the coolest displays I've seen was on a number of car stereo units, years ago when I used to install them: normally, the screen would be black and the numbers would appear in color (orange, on most of them), but if the ambient light was bright enough (ie. if the sun struck it directly), the whole display would go orange with black numbers. I never dug into the design to see if this was a switch triggered by a light sensor, or just a factor of the particular design of the LCD, although it appeared to be the latter, and I wonder if something similar is happening in your case -it may be something intended to improve visibility for users in varying light conditions.

 

One last thing.... the dvr is in the office but behind the till i have used a vga over cat5 extender so they can have a 2nd monitor. The video quality is drastically reduced and I assume that ise due tothe extender. What do you mostly use for this purpose?

I've used VGA baluns for this type of purpose (these, specifically), and find they tend to work well if set up properly, but they do sometimes get finicky at certain resolutions and refresh rates, and don't always handle widescreen resolutions well. Also, how are you splitting the VGA output? You can't use something like a Y-cable; you need either an extender with separate remote/local outputs, or an active VGA splitter.

 

You do have to make sure to use proper ethernet wiring (I've noticed that T-568A tends to work better in most cases than T-568B).

 

 

Ok, thank you every one so far.

[Soundy 1]

Ach, now the first two pics are loading... okay, when you say the sun goes left to right of the pic... do you mean second pic, or third pic?

 

From the first pic, it looks like the problem is just the sun reflecting on the glass on the front of the pump... unfortunately there's not a lot you can do about that. Dome vs. other type of camera has nothing to do with that. Moving the camera higher or lower to get a different angle would be the best bet.

[foxguard 0]

The pics are showing for me? Odd.. here is a direct link

 

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k580/foxguard/Tunstall%20garage/IMG_0908.jpg

 

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k580/foxguard/Tunstall%20garage/IMG_0907.jpg

 

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k580/foxguard/Tunstall%20garage/IMG_0909.jpg

 

http://i1116.photobucket.com/albums/k580/foxguard/Tunstall%20garage/IMG_0910.jpg

 

These are the extenders that we use...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/VGA-Audio-Cat5-Extender-/180740661320?pt=UK_Computing_CablesConnectors_RL&hash=item2a14fba048#ht_500wt_1156

[foxguard 0]

Cheers for help so far )

 

ok, pic 3, the one looking direct at the Garage, the sun rises from the left and sets in the right. The sun does not go directly onto the camera or the pumps, the problem is with it reflecting off a car when it stops to fill up.

 

So with the LCD going black is there nothing we can do about that as well then?

 

Also one other side note, not seen my self, but the customer has said when it rains again you cannot read the LCD, would this just be the rain actually getting in the way of the camera?

[Soundy 1]

Cheers for help so far )

 

ok, pic 3, the one looking direct at the Garage, the sun rises from the left and sets in the right. The sun does not go directly onto the camera or the pumps, the problem is with it reflecting off a car when it stops to fill up.

Got it. Yeah, aside from maybe adding a polarizing filter to the lens (which would cause all kinds of other issues, even IF you could find one that fits it), there's not much you can do about reflections off cars. Of course, as the height of the sun changes through the seasons, the angle of car glass that causes a reflection will change too. Only other thing would be to put a huge three-story-tall wall up behind the building to block the sun...

 

So with the LCD going black is there nothing we can do about that as well then?

Hard to say, without being able to determine exactly what's causing it (remember, I'm just guessing so far). If you use your digital camera from the same angle in the same conditions, does the LCD appear black to that as well? Can you move that camera around to look at the pump from different angles?

 

Also one other side note, not seen my self, but the customer has said when it rains again you cannot read the LCD, would this just be the rain actually getting in the way of the camera?

Again, hard to say without a picture of the issue... could be the water on the pump glass causing a problem.

[foxguard 0]

Yeah what you have said has confirmed every thing i was thinking.

Ok thank you mate, youve been a real help.