Advice on front door camera placement

[blakem 0]

I was hoping I could get some advice on good placement of an IP camera for my front door. My goals are to monitor the front door for any activity and hopefully to deter any potential crime. It would be nice to be able to identify or at least recognize someone through this camera, but that is where I am sort of stuck. I already ordered a cheap SD IP camera with a wide but not extreme wide angle lens. It is around 60-70 degrees fov. After reading some on the forum I have found that I really need a 90 degree lens and if I want to id someone I need a higher resolution camera. My budget for now only allows for what I got, but I may want to upgrade in the future to something like an ACTI E12.

 

That is sort of where my question comes in, where is the best place to put the camera I have now and run cables where I can easily install and upgrade later? I will have to run the wires through the ceiling regardless so I think that means I will end up with a ceiling mount but I can run the wires down and paint them if necessary.

 

1. Mount it on the top back right corner of the picture looking down and away from the door. The door would be visible in the very edge of the frame and you could see the top and side of peoples faces.

2. Mount it on the ceiling centered right above the window. This looks more natural since it is not looking from the side but is looking down at the path to the door, but this also leaves a dead area right in front of the door since it is looking at the path to the door.

3. Mount it lower more at eye level. This would help you see someones face but gives even less visability of what is going on around the door.

 

I was not sure if there was a standard positioning or setup for my style of entry. In just about any positioning I think I will be able to meet my goal of notification of someone at my front door. It would just me nice to get the best out of it for future upgrading. My future goal would be a camera or two for the back door and patio area and replacing the front door with a higher resolution camera. Any advice would be appreciated.

[Kawboy12R 0]

You've got a perfect entrance for catching a view of who is coming in. I'm guessing that a camera in position 1 to the right of the door angled towards the chair to the left of the door would give a slightly more useful view of what is going on away from the entranceway than a central "straight out" mounting position and view? If it were my door I'd probably stick it more or less in position 1 but on the wall below the lowest piece of horizontal strapping that is above the door. Preferably something with a fairly wide angle lens though. They'll have to get within probably 4 feet of the lens to get in the door so not much zoom needed. You'll have to play mounting position to get it perfectly the way you want it. You might want to give up the view of what is outside of your entranceway to get a better view of the edge of your door for people touching packages, etc left in your doorway.

 

The lighting will probably be tricky though. A darkish entrance with bright sunlight in the background would benefit from a good camera with WDR. Mounting a cheaper camera higher up and down more at the floor might minimize the dynamic range problems at certain times of the day.

 

Whatever you end up doing, for the first little bit I'd recommend fiddling with mounting location and have people walk up to the door. Make it easy to change the position in case you don't like it.

[blakem 0]

Thank you, I was thinking up high in the corner would be best. I will have to run a network wire temporarily through the door and tape/rig it up the camera in several different places to try it out. I had planned on aiming it more downward to only get part of the entry pathway but mainly in front of the door. That should limit how much sunlight the camera will see(on the ground) since the porch is covered. The door faces north so no direct sunlight on the camera. I will just have to see how the exposure looks since the subject will be in backlighting, hopefully no silhouettes. I will upload a picture of the final position once I get it up. Thanks, Blake.

[MaxIcon 0]

Last time I had to set up a camera in a tricky position, I used a tripod (I have a very tall one) and a ladder to roughly position the camera so I could see how the view would look. It saved me quite a bit of time and hole patches.

 

An extension ladder leaned up against your corners would allow you to set up the camera and roughly position it. I used a towel and bungee cords to hold the cam down while shifting the position and having it stay.

 

You want to make sure everything's stable, of course, so the camera doesn't come crashing down while you're testing.

[blakem 0]

Well I got the camera up and the view is pretty good. I had it pointed more downward in the first pic and then aimed it more at the walkway on the second pic. I knew this dynamic scene would be difficult for my cheap camera, but it does ok. I am hoping to slowly build a system and will relocate this cheap one somewhere else later.

 

So my question is it reasonable to get a 2.5mm lens to replace the 3.6mm I have now? I guess I thought I could get a better view of the ground and path with the wider angle. As it is now it is hard to make out someones face unless they look right up at the camera so I figured the wider angle would be more useful. Any thoughts?

[MaxIcon 0]

The wider angle will give you more of the path, but you'll lose resolution overall, and since you'll be looking at faces further away, recognition/identification will be more difficult. More MP in an IP cam would fix this, but this is a basic trade-off.

 

This is a tricky spot, due to the long, narrow entrance to the door, and the window above the door limits how far down you can put a camera. If you could mount one between the door and window, or just to the right of the top of the door frame, that would be ideal from a face capture perspective, but it's not so aesthetic or wife-friendly. A compact dome would be the most friendly form factor.

 

If your camera doesn't have IR, you'll also have the problem that someone standing close to the door will have their face in partial shadow at night, since the light is a few feet back.

 

You can get pinhole cams that look like viewports or doorbell buttons, but these typically don't have very good low light performance due to the tiny lens, and I'm not sure there are any IP cam versions.

[Kawboy12R 0]

http://www.axis.com/products/cam_p1214/

 

It's not weatherproof but that might not matter that far up a hallway away from the weather. The 1214E isn't a pinhole but it's pretty small and is weatherproof. Excellent wife-friendly doorway cam.

 

It looks like you mounted it way up high in the corner, right? The downward angle of the high mount was the main reason that lower was better. Pointing it higher will give you a better angle for a face shot when they're farther away but they may be too far away in difficult lighting to get a good ID at certain times of the day. I find that just above a doorframe gives me a good balance of angle and

passivity for the camera-sensitive. Most visitors ignore mine and it's mounted on soffit a few feet to the left of my entrance and just above the top of the door.

[MaxIcon 0]

Yeah, that Axis looks pretty awesome, though a bit pricey. I ran an indoor dome under the eaves on my patio for years with no problems, and I'd bet that it would work fine in that protected area. They make an outdoor version, too - the P1214e - that looks like it's the same price range.

 

If you could put that right above the door, and if they support effective backlighting or WDR settings, that could be a perfect solution.

 

Watch out for that slippery slope of IP cams...

[blakem 0]

Well, now I got an ACTi ACM-3701 megapixel minidome. I have this camera taped to the wall just below the top of the door frame. I think it gives a good perspective like what I was wanting. It just was not possible with the other camera. Maybe someday I can buy a true WDR camera to replace this one and move it somewhere else, but I just don't have to budget for it right now. In any case I think this meets my original requirements so I am happy. I just wanted to post this picture to hear some final thoughts on position before I drill the huge hole in my wall to run the ethernet. I will probably install it tomorrow afternoon.

[Kawboy12R 0]

Looks good to me. The sunlit yard is washed out but that's not a big deal when identifying folks coming to the door and it looks like you've got good facial detail with a difficult background. The lens is more than wide enough but that's good for watching packages around the door. You should be able to work the lens around from that location to see the door and all the way out the entranceway if you want.