Camera Placement

[Red Baron]

The more I realize how much I depend on my cameras, the more I wish I'd have given more thought to them rather than buying cheapies that have poor quality. I just placed an order with Allen Spears' company for much higher quality camera.

My question is, my bays face north/south and most of the sunshine glare comes through the south openings. I'd like my cameras to point to the meterbox, which they do now, but the meterboxes are all on the south end of the walls and thus my cameras face the glare. Should I reposition them to point north to get better quality even though they won't see the meterboxes?

Also, mine are now in the top corners facing catty-corner. Will I get clearer video if I place them right in the middle pointing straight down the middle of the bay so that the cameras looks squarely at the car rather than from an angle?

 

[MEP001]

I have cameras facing catty-corner at the meter boxes too, and the sunlight reflecting off the lot causes glare toubles more than sunlight actually shining in. If your main goal is to see what's going on at the meter box, I'd put them on the opposite wall of the box but at the same end of the bay, and just have the box on the edge of the frame. You'll still see some of what's going on in the bay. I put cameras in the bays to see what's in the bay, and I'm happy with the catty-corner arrangement.

 

[BayWatch]

Most systems are expandable to 16 cameras. Red, how many camers do you have? How many bays do you have? Is it possible to add an extra camera per bay so you can focus on the meter box and still look at the bay at the current angle?

 

[MEP001]

Stand-alone DVRs are not usually expandable. They come with 4, 8, 9 or 16 inputs, and you either add another unit or replace it if you need more. Some PC DVR cards are expandable, I'm even looking at one that will let you install two 16-camera cards in one PC, all encoding is done by hardware on the cards, so the PC basically just sits there and spins the hard drives.

 

[galen]

Glare

There are cameras that will cut the Glare. One is a true day/night camera, and the other is a WDR camera. WDR is Wide Dynamic Range. I prefer the WDR, which gives a really nice image. Like the old saying that holds true, "you get what you pay for". I have 480 TV lines in my bays but I'm testing a 550 TV line camera now. There is not a big difference when looking at the image on a screen. But if you blow it up then the higher res. image holds up better. Like Mep1 said, you could buy two cheap cameras or one nice one. Its still the same money.

 

[JustClean]

Like Mep1 said, you could buy two cheap cameras or one nice one. Its still the same money.

Same story here: Bought cheap cameras. BUT... 2 cheap ones let me see more than one good one.
My idea was to start with as many cheap ones I could afford and then replace them one by one with better ones. I replaced one so far. Triple the price and a bit better. Is it worth it? I am not sure. What I like is that I can see the whole yard with 16 cheap cameras.

 

[MEP001]

Originally Posted by galen
Like Mep1 said, you could buy two cheap cameras or one nice one. Its still the same money.

Y'all quit quoting me, I never even said that.

I did go with cheap cameras - now if I had a really good DVR and needed better detail I'd have gone with high-end cameras, but like JustClean I wanted to see as much of the lot as possible. $55 each got me cameras that far exceed the record ability of the DVR and with .01 lux can see clearly by moonlight. The $500 Samsung has optical zoom and can see which side of a quarter is facing it at 50 feet, but the recordings from the DVR look the same. It all depends on what suits your needs, and the cheap ones suit mine.

 

[Kenny Hicks]

Galen is correct. The best camera to use in this situation would be a Wide Dynamic Range Camera. Repositioning the camera is not needed. Before you spend even a little extra on a camera which is 550 tv lines of resolution be certain your recorder can record that high. Most DVRs on the market today top out recording at about 480. Higher should give you a clearer live image but recorded would be no better. If you DVR is an older model many of those topped out in the 640 range. If you can find 550 comparably priced to a 480 go for it.

 

[Bubbles Galore]

Where is a good place to buy a camera 'bundle'?

 

[rph9168]

Contact Galen.

 

[Red Baron]

Same story here: Bought cheap cameras. BUT... 2 cheap ones let me see more than one good one.
My idea was to start with as many cheap ones I could afford and then replace them one by one with better ones. I replaced one so far. Triple the price and a bit better. Is it worth it? I am not sure. What I like is that I can see the whole yard with 16 cheap cameras.

JC,

I bought the cheapies that were supposed to be weatherproof and after just 2 months one of them filled half up with water and quit working

I replaced it, 30 minutes ago, with a WDR purchased from Allen Spears and man what a difference! I've never hooked up any electronic device and had it working the first time and in only 30 minutes, but this install was straight forward. Jenniffer at Car Wash Cameras was very helpful with the 2 dumb questions I had, which was 6 dumb questions fewer than usual.

I agree, ya get what ya pay for and if your time spent replacing cruddy cameras is worth anything...

I will be ordering 3 more in short order.

 

[JMMUSTANG]

Where is a good place to buy a camera 'bundle'?

I bought my camera system 6 yrs. ago from Digicapture and they've worked great.
Twice I've had a problem with my computer, had nothing to do with the cameras.
I had some computer guys come in and they couldn't fix it so I called Tommy at Digicapture for some help and he said to send the computer to him and he would take a look at it.
I sent it to him and a week later I got it back all fixed. Can't ask for any more than that. Been working great ever since.

 

[Red Baron]

http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2086594420101691298MxZEwq

The really hard part was hanging by the gutter by my toes in order to adjust my new camera wearing reading glasses that everythign beyond 18" blurry.

 

[Red Baron]

Btw, I didn't flip the pic, I had the camera upside down initially...promtign Dumb Question #1 to Jennifer.

 

[JustClean]

One thing I should have done was to go with better housing. All my cameras are under the eave but if there is strong wind they tend to move which is annoying. Every 3-4 months I have to adjust them.

 

[Greg Pack]

JC,

I bought the cheapies that were supposed to be weatherproof and after just 2 months one of them filled half up with water and quit working

I replaced it, 30 minutes ago, with a WDR purchased from Allen Spears and man what a difference! I've never hooked up any electronic device and had it working the first time and in only 30 minutes, but this install was straight forward. Jenniffer at Car Wash Cameras was very helpful with the 2 dumb questions I had, which was 6 dumb questions fewer than usual.

I agree, ya get what ya pay for and if your time spent replacing cruddy cameras is worth anything...

I will be ordering 3 more in short order.

You must have gotten REALLY crappy cameras before.......

I purchased cheap color bullets 5-7 years ago. Going rate was about $85 dollars then. I was told I need to pay 2-3X as much for special cameras built for the "harsh carwash environment". 85% of them are still working.

 

[Red Baron]

You must have gotten REALLY crappy cameras before.......

I purchased cheap color bullets 5-7 years ago. Going rate was about $85 dollars then. I was told I need to pay 2-3X as much for special cameras built for the "harsh carwash environment". 85% of them are still working.

Given my 8 cameras and rusty math, that means I'd be replacing 1.2 cameras per year. Given all the things that break at my car wash that I can't control, I'd rather pay a little more now and forget about cameras. But, that's just me -- I don't think there's a right and wrong.

You're right, though, I bought really cheap cameras the first go 'round. $450 for 4 cameras, wires, and DVR setup on eBay.

 

[Twodose]

Stand-alone DVRs are not usually expandable. They come with 4, 8, 9 or 16 inputs, and you either add another unit or replace it if you need more. Some PC DVR cards are expandable, I'm even looking at one that will let you install two 16-camera cards in one PC, all encoding is done by hardware on the cards, so the PC basically just sits there and spins the hard drives.

Mep, whose card will let you install 2 16's in a single computer. I am testing Geovision cards and they will only allow one card per computer, I'd be interested to know.

 

[MEP001]

I don't recall, but I saw one somewhere. For what it's worth, Geovision is pretty crummy for recording. If I remember correctly, there's only one that records at better that 320 x 240, and you can't get much detail at that size. I have several Sabrent PVS-1 cards (discontinued) that can do 640 x 480 and give a very sharp image.

 

[MEP001]

http://www.dvrsystems.net/32480card.htm

http://www.edigitaldeals.com/shop/surveillance/dvr-cards/-32ch/d1-32.html

http://www.matco.com/DVRCBoard.htm The second line down, the card in the middle, is the one I had seen first.