IP CAMERA LEARNING & RESOURCE CENTER

Perhaps a little known fact about Panasonic’s BB-HNP15 Network Camera Recorder software is its ability to be accessed remotely. By remotely we mean that you can install the software on the main PC (server) and then use another PC (client) to access the software. This can be done on the local network, or even across the Internet.

Here are a couple of points to note before we start.

1. You can only ever have 1 remote connection to the server at any one time. This means multiple people cannot all view the cameras/recordings simultaneously. However, you can still view the cameras/recordings on the actual server while someone is viewing them remotely but some functions may be limited when 2 people are viewing in the way.

2. To set up either a server or a client requires 1 license of the software, so, if you want to set up remote access you will need to buy 2 copies of BB-HNP15, 1 for the server and 1 for the client. For each further client you would require another copy of the software (but remember only 1 remote client can connect at the same time)

The procedure for setting this up is very simple. Here’s how it’s done:

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How do you connect to Panasonic’s BB-HNP15 recordings remotely? We are asked this question a great deal and it has a simple answer.

BB-HNP15 does not have a built in remote client, or ‘Smart Client’ like some other IP surveillance recording software. You need an additional license and install BB-HNP15 on the remote PC.

In effect, you install the primary BB-HNP15 normally (consider it as the ’server’) and the remote BB-HNP15 normally (considered as a ‘remote client’). The client BB-HNP15 has full access to the live and recorded footage from the server BB-HNP15.

Panasonic explain the Remote Client Function like this.

We will post more information on setting up a remote client for Panasonic BB-HNP15 later.

Another way to achieve essentially the same thing, of course, is to use your PC’s built in Remote Desktop facility or any of the freely available remote PC access systems like VNC, GoToMyPC etc.

For a complete step-by-step walkthrough see our article: HOWTO: Set up Panasonic BB-HNP15 Network Camera Recorder Software for Remote Access

Continuing our series, this article focuses on the consumer range of Panasonic IP cameras, specifically the cameras which have a BL or BB prefix.

These ranges of Panasonic cameras are very popular and sell very well. They cover a wide range of uses from entry-level (BL-C1/C20) up to a professional pan-tilt-zoom model (BB-HCM581) and this guide will work with them all.

This guide is suitable for the following Panasonic cameras:

BL-C1, BL-C20, BL-C101, BL-C121, BL-C10, BL-C30, BL-C111, BL-C131, BL-C140, BL-C160
BB-HCM3xx Series, BB-HCM5xx Series, BB-HCE481

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Mobotix cameras, while amazingly flexible can sometimes be a little tricky to operate, especially for the non-technical user.

This guide will show you the simple steps required if you want to send an image by FTP on a periodic basis from your Mobotix camera. In this example we will configure the camera to send an image every 30 minutes but we will explain how you can adjust the time to suit your requirements.

We are using an Mobotix M22 camera in this example but it should be valid for all Mobotix IP cameras in their range.

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See our handy cheat-sheet below which notes the key differences between the 1st and 2nd-generation models and also the difference between the Y-cam White, Black and Knight IP cameras.

Note there is no change in the camera’s physical outer appearance between 1st and 2nd generation models.

Introduction

H.264 is an open video compression standard. Uniquely, H.264 is the first compression format to be formed by collaboration between members of both the IT and telecommunications industries and each have their own name for it. H.264 is the name used by the ITU-T (International Telecommunication Union) and MPEG-4 Part 10 AVC (Advanced Video Coding) is the name used by the ISO (International Organization for Standardization). The video surveillance industry has adopted the term H.264 and this has become the primary reference to the standard. This is also the term we use.

H.264 is fast becoming the standard video compression format for the video surveillance world and if we look at the claims it makes we can see why. We hear bold statements about low bandwidth usage, reduced storage requirements, higher resolution monitoring and better quality images and it all sounds too good to be true… doesn’t it?

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A feature which is not activated as standard in the new Axis M10 series is video clip creation. This guide will show you how to set up your M10 camera to record video clips manually from the live image page and store them to the hard disk drive.

This guide will work for the following:

Axis M1011
Axis M1011-W
Axis M1031-W

This feature uses Axis Media Control which is Axis’ name for their ActiveX plug-in for Internet Explorer. This means that this feature will only run using Internet Explorer.

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