IP CAMERA LEARNING & RESOURCE CENTER

Most professional IP cameras come with inputs and outputs designed so that you can connect additional devices in order to receive inputs or trigger outputs depending on camera events.

For instance, connecting the power source for a light to an IP camera can mean that that light can be controlled through the camera on the event that the camera’s motion detection is triggered by an intruder. Or, perhaps a recording of a barking dog.

Similarly, it is possible, through I/O inputs to send triggers to IP cameras. Connect a PIR (Passive Infrared) sensor to a camera and this can be used to trigger events from places the camera can’t see - perhaps in an alleyway up to a doorway overlooked by the camera.

Input/Output event control can massively increase the flexibility of your alarm system, intruder detection and deterrence and the security of your property.

The majority of IP cameras available today support a feature known as ‘Motion Detection’ or ‘Video Motion Detection’ (VMD). This is a very useful feature for security applications as it will detect when something has moved in a scene and can notify the user in a number of ways including email or activating external alarms or lights etc.

Sometimes though you might find that it triggers when there is very little movement or it triggers when other objects move in the scene such as traffic or plant-life outside a visible window or pets indoors.

Fortunately most IP cameras come with ways to help reduce the number of false alarms such as masking, multi-window detection or sensitivity settings.

What this guide will show is various ways we can configure motion detection in an Axis camera.

This guide will be suitable for all Axis IP camera models with the exception of the Axis 206.

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This guide explains one of the more popular security features found in IP cameras and that is how to have your camera send you an email when it detects motion. I know it’s a question we get asked a lot and it’s very simple so follow this guide for the complete low-down.

This guide is suitable for all Axis cameras except the Axis 206. The Axis 207/W/MW will also look slightly different as it has a basic interface for configuring events. The theory should remain the same but should be a little simpler when setting up.

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Remote access is the term used to describe access to an IP camera or other device on your own network from anywhere in the world. This can provide great peace of mind to home users who are away from home on vacation or business to see that their home and belongings are safe.

As standard, most home and small business networks operate in a Network Address Translation (NAT) configuration. Essentially the devices on your network, such as computers, printers and IP Cameras, do not have any direct access to the internet and instead have to go through a modem or router. This means that the modem or router is the entry point into your home network and as such most connection devices contain extensive security functions to prevent anyone from the internet accessing your devices.

In order to set up remote access you need to instruct your router to allow access to your camera. This can often be performed by means of Port Forwarding and is usually performed on a per-device basis.

When setting up remote access you need to be aware of “ports”. Every network item has over 65,000 ports which data can be transmitted on. You may like to think of your internet connection as a bookcase with many shelves. If a book (data) is sent to the bookcase it needs to be assigned a certain shelf. When accessing a book in a library you need to know which bookcase and which shelf the book is on. In this case the book may be designated as bookcase:shelf. The same is true of the internet but the form is http://address:port.

When accessing the interface on any IP camera you connect to its network address and its port. In order to allow access from within your router you need to know which port your IP camera is on. Once you know this you can instruct your router that any information received from the internet with this port number needs to go to your camera. Two devices cannot share the same port number so it may be necessary to alter it if you have more than one camera. Once your router has been configured you should be able to access your camera from anywhere in the world by typing in “http://your_ip_address:camera_port”.

Cameras which are defined as tamper or vandal resistant either have software which is designed to detect malicious activity around the camera, or incorporate hardware to prevent access to the physical hardware.

Manufacturers who describe their cameras as tamper proof often use tamper proof screws with their housings to prevent anyone other than the installer having access to the main camera body or lens. The housings are most often flush mounted to walls to prevent people manually pulling the camera from its mount. Vital data and power sockets are hidden within the camera to prevent it being simply unplugged. In addition to this, some cameras come with mechanical anti-tamper sensors inside the housing so that should it be opened the camera will notify you accordingly.

Vandal resistant cameras tend to be a bit more robust, often using rugged metal casings and polycarbonate domes to prevent damage to the camera. Software is also used a lot more to detect vandalism. Panasonic’s i-Pro range of cameras offer Scene Change Detection software which detects whether a camera dome has been spray-painted or covered and will notify you should an attack be detected. Mobotix have even taken this a step further making one model of their cameras bomb and bullet proof.

A useful security feature found in every Sony IP camera is the ability to have live snapshot images sent to your email address when the camera detections motion.

This is ideal for monitoring your business or property and provides you evidence from potential intruders which remains safe and in your possession even if the camera is discovered.

This guide will explain in step-by-step fashion the process of configuring the camera to send an email when it detects movement.

We have based this guide on the Sony SNC-P5 but this should be relevant to most IP cameras in the Sony range.

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Video Motion Detection (VMD) is a feature found in IP cameras, recording software and network video recorders and is used to trigger alarms by sensing physical movement in a given area.

Software driven, Video Motion Detection works by using a simple algorithm which continually analyses current live image data against a reference image from a previous frame. Any significant changes will trigger an alert from the camera. This alert can be used to initiate many actions such as emailing the current live image, moving a pan-tilt-zoom camera to a specified point, operating an external device such as turning on a light or sounding an alarm etc.

Sensitivity adjustment

The motion detection algorithm used by most cameras is very simple. It works by counting the number of pixels which change from one scene to another and if the number exceeds a set threshold it will trigger a positive result.

The downside of using such a simple method is that images can differ naturally throughout the course of a day due to factors such as varying lighting conditions, JPEG artifacts/image noise, movement from plants/trees etc. All of these factors can contribute to false alarm activity by the camera.

Luckily most cameras come with tools to help you adjust the sensitivity of motion detection. At their simplest they allow you to adjust threshold settings so that the speed or size of a moving target can be adjusted. Other tools allow the masking of areas from calculation, multi-window VMD gives a number of unique windows in which to base activity calculations or high-end intelligent video analytics found in DEPA supported Sony cameras provide far better motion detection algorithms which use many more reference frames in the calculation to reduce false alerts.

Motion detection settings in a Panasonic BL-C111 (firmware version: 3.10R02)

Multi-window motion detection settings in an Axis 207W (firmware version: 4.40)

One of the fundamental security features found in almost every IP camera is the ability to send images to the camera’s owner when an alarm has been triggered. This is known as ‘image transfer’ and is associated with the camera’s alarm management features.

How does it work?

When setting up image transfer the following have to be configured:

1. Where the images are transferred to:

Typically images can be sent by email to a number of specified email addresses, sent to an FTP server for storage and in some cameras sent using HTTP.

2. What makes the images transfer?

How the images are transferred is dependent on the triggering features found in the camera. Typical alarm triggers would be: motion detection, audio detection, thermal (heat) detection, external sensor input (such as a window sensor or doorbell etc.), manual trigger (using an on-screen button), while more advanced cameras can contain triggers such as tampering detection, object detection, temperature detection, variation in illumination, etc.

Note that images can also be transferred based on a timed schedule/periodic transfer.

Typical uses:

Security

Image transfer is commonly used as a security feature for keeping an eye on small businesses or property. For example, the camera can be configured to transfer an image to an email address when it detects motion. This allows an image of a potential intruder to be captured and emailed to a specified address allowing the evidence to remain secure even if the camera is discovered.

A running archive of material from the camera can also be kept by transferring an image at a set time period to an FTP server using a schedule/periodic transfer function. This would create an archive of images from the camera which could be browsed through at a later date acting like a simple recording solution without the need for expensive software or having a PC constantly running.

Live Webcam

Another use for image transfer is to set up a rudimentary live image on a website. To do this the camera would be configured to transfer an image by FTP to a web server at a set time interval, the key difference in this application is that the image would use the same filename and be overwritten by the camera each time. At the front-end of the website a simple viewing application would then call the image and refresh it over and over to create the illusion of a live stream.

A feature unique to the Axis 207 family of cameras is the ability to send full MPEG-4 video clips by email or upload them to an FTP server based on motion/audio detection, external sensor input or triggered manually.

There are very few cameras which support this, even higher-end Axis cameras do not support this feature making it a very much worth doing a guide for.

This guide is suitable for the following cameras:

Axis 207
Axis 207W
Axis 207MW

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