born2dive Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 Apologies if this has been asked and answered before (I couldn't find it). I am setting up IP cameras around my house with a DVR/NVR. I'd like to create an ISY program that when motion is sensed and certain condition apply (e.g. not at home), in addition to recording the video, takes images of the scene and email or text them to me. Is that possible? Do I use the motion sensing in the camera or should I add a dedicated motion sensor? Any setup instructions would be appreciated. Thanks.
larryllix Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 If the camera doesn't have that feature I don't see another method.
apostolakisl Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 Typically those features would be built into the camera's firmware. For foscam they are. The only thing is that you would want ISY to turn the feature on and off. With foscam you can send REST commands to the camera which ISY network module should be able to do (I haven't done it but I am pretty sure others have). But as far as emailing the image, ISY can't do that. The foscam units will do that or you can run a dedicated camera monitoring application on your computer and it can do all the motion detection, emailing, etc. I don't now how you could have ISY tell an application running on a computer to turn the features on and off though. The software would need to be controllable via scripts and you would need to set up some software that receives ISY commands and triggers the scripts.
born2dive Posted June 23, 2015 Author Posted June 23, 2015 Which specific camera? Which DVR? I have not bought any of the hardware yet. Still looking and evaluating options. Any recommendations? Seems like the Q-See IP system does the trick but there are others too. Thanks.
elvisimprsntr Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 I have SecureCams from TrendNet. The units I bought have built in motion detection and a GPIO interface which I have wired up to an IOLinc or my Elk. The cameras have a web interface and you can send HTTP commands, but I use the GPIO.
apostolakisl Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 Here is a link to the foscam CGI commands. http://www.ipcamcontrol.net/files/Foscam%20IPCamera%20CGI%20User%20Guide-V1.0.4.pdf I think it includes just about everything and perhaps then some. ISY should be able to execute those commands via the network module. Of course the camera can not send any commands to ISY. Not sure about this, but perhaps the 5.0 firmware would let a camera response cause a variable to be set? Probably not, but 5.0 is allowing a lot of things to set variables so perhaps a network module reply as well.
larryllix Posted June 23, 2015 Posted June 23, 2015 I have SecureCams from TrendNet. The units I bought have built in motion detection and a GPIO interface which I have wired up to an IOLinc or my Elk. The cameras have a web interface and you can send HTTP commands, but I use the GPIO. Did you mean "SecureView"? Does this mean the cam can trigger a variable in ISY via REST? Model number please?
apostolakisl Posted June 24, 2015 Posted June 24, 2015 (edited) I was just looking over the 5.0 firmware stuff. I think this sort of camera control would best be accomplished using the new node server in 5.x. The node could then be implemented into programs giving ISY full control of the camera and having the ability to respond to various states the camera may be in. I don't see any chance that ISY will be able to directly email a snapshot, but it certainly could instruct the camera to do so, assuming the camera has a published API. I would love to see someone write the node server for foscam since I have a bunch of them. Edited June 24, 2015 by apostolakisl
born2dive Posted June 24, 2015 Author Posted June 24, 2015 Thank you all for you comment and suggestions. After doing a bunch of reading here what I am going to try: 1. Setup is Insteon motion sensor to cover the target area that the camera is monitoring 2. Once the motion sensor is triggered, I will have the ISY trigger an I/O Linc to close the circuit which will be connected to the NVR's alarm block 3. I have checked 4 different NVRs and they all have the capability to take still shots (you can configure how many and how much time in between) on input from the alarm block 4. Have te NVR email/text the images On paper it should work....will see if it does in real life.
apostolakisl Posted June 25, 2015 Posted June 25, 2015 Typically IP cameras have the motion detection built into them. You really don't need to use an Insteon motion detector. Even if you camera doesn't have that as part of the firmware, there are applications that monitor the cameras that will do it. Purchase one program and it can monitor dozens of cameras, rather than purchasing dozens of insteon motion detectors.
Xathros Posted June 25, 2015 Posted June 25, 2015 (edited) Typically IP cameras have the motion detection built into them. You really don't need to use an Insteon motion detector. Even if you camera doesn't have that as part of the firmware, there are applications that monitor the cameras that will do it. Purchase one program and it can monitor dozens of cameras, rather than purchasing dozens of insteon motion detectors. I have found that image motion detection is problematic as the cameras will detect changes in light level as motion. I use Insteon PIRs to handle the motion detect and ISY instructs my foscams to point in the right direction and enable uploading to FTP hosted on an RPi that then uploads them to an off site storage system assuming my internet is up and running. No more images of nothing triggered by a change in cloud cover or a car passing the house reflecting the sun through the front window. -Xathros Edited June 25, 2015 by Xathros
apostolakisl Posted June 25, 2015 Posted June 25, 2015 I have found that image motion detection is problematic as the cameras will detect changes in light level as motion. I use Insteon PIRs to handle the motion detect and ISY instructs my foscams to point in the right direction and enable uploading to FTP hosted on an RPi that then uploads them to an off site storage system assuming my internet is up and running. No more images of nothing triggered by a change in cloud cover or a car passing the house reflecting the sun through the front window. -Xathros The PIR's on my alarm system trigger on clouds and stuff too. I had to disable them because of so many false alarms.
builderb Posted June 26, 2015 Posted June 26, 2015 Not sure if it's useful to anyone, but after much trial and many errors, I've just recently gotten my TrendNet Pan/Tilt IP camera responding to the ISY, via a php script on a Pi (no Digest authorization on the ISY). I've got it pointing at the back or front door based on Insteon open/close sensors now. I'll probably add motion sensing soon. Then I'll get to work on sending me pix on command... Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
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