Capture still images and upload via FTP - best solution?

[rhorne 0]

My boss flies a small aircraft from a private airfield. We have some very basic analogue cameras pointing at the windsock and landing strip so he can easily check conditions remotely. He wants the other pilots to be able to view these images on a web-page, so we are looking for a solution that uploads images from multiple cameras at regular intervals (say every 90 seconds) via FTP. FTP is essential so we can view the images from the website.

We have a NVR system with ethernet cameras but it has no FTP option or wireless capabilities. The other limitation is there is no fixed broadband. We use mobile 3/4G.

My current solution is a small micro PC setup with cameras connected to it via USB Video grabbers and we use EyeSpy to upload the images. The PC has a mobile internet dongle connected to it to provide internet. When it works, this solution works great, but the problem is the USB grabbers are temperamental as hell, don't seem to last very long and as soon as I try to use more than 2, seem to encounter all manner of issues. I'm also finding EyeSpy to be unreliable. I regularly have to go up and restart the software and sometimes even completely reconfigure the FTP services as it just seems to randomly lose its settings.

I can't find any other better solution but wondered if anyone could recommend anything?