Network Security Camera System Plugin?

Been checking around the forum but am not finding anything in the works
for a plugin that could control any of the network security camera packages,
like the Lorex LH108321C8B 8-Camera Network Video Surveillance System,
or similar systems.

Seems it would be a big plus to have a separate box do all the heavy lifting,
video recording etc. and just have Indigo controlling/viewing it.

Be happy to donate to that cause if it's something anyone is up
to taking on.

Thanks,

Carl

I am using bensoftware security spy. they are able to read and drive many camera systems.
did you look at them?

karl

I use SS myself but my older Mac mini really bogs down running even two cams.
If I'm also streaming iTunes it barely works at all.
Just seems like a much cleaner solution to let a separate system handle it.

Thanks,

Carl

Agree a plugin for an integrated system would be a great addition. But re the airport bogging down, can you hardwire any of your cameras with a direct Ethernet link to a gigabit switch? I believe hat would drop bandwidth needs.

Agree a plugin for an integrated system would be a great addition. But re the airport bogging down, can you hardwire any of your cameras with a direct Ethernet link to a gigabit switch? I believe hat would drop bandwidth needs.

Unfortunately it would be difficult to hard wire them. We live
in a log home making most wiring visible. I'm sure that would help
quite a bit here on the local network if we could.

Thanks,

Carl

What about home plug devices? Not something i’d usually recommend but would likely be more efficient for video streaming than wifi

Seems it would be a big plus to have a separate box do all the heavy lifting,
video recording etc. and just have Indigo controlling/viewing it.

Carl

Mobotix cameras do this plus more. Video can be viewed via Security spy or an Indigo refreshing URL.
I have experimented with updating Indigo variable whenever there is an event - motion etc. Works well
Expensive though.

Thanks, have to look into the possibilities.

Carl

I've been using security spy running on the same mac mini as indigo, but I have a heap of errors from security spy about network issues. I also use a Synology DiskStation (DS415+) that can run Sinology's Surveillance Station app for network cameras. I would love to see integration between this and indigo!

Thanks

Greg

I've been looking for the same thing and tinkering with a few things.

I like the NVR route and keep everything on a separate box. I thought about the Security Spy thing.... but I have 12 cameras on 2 different 8 channel NVRs. Security Spy would be about $400 for 16 channels and they recommend a 12 core Mac Pro ($7,800).

Look for an NVR with a published API. Then you should be able to pull a JPG off the NVR to put into a control page. If that doesn't work (like my NVR... the URL for an image isn't supported by safari?) Then you could access the camera directly for the JPG to put onto a control page and then view your cameras in different pages.

As for getting indigo to react to a NVR event.... Between my two NVRs, I have a total of 6 alarm outputs (NO/NC) that I can direct wire to my alarm panel which is monitored by Indigo via Envisalink.

For additional areas... I just use other stuff to trigger... like a motion detector in a room covered by a camera.

I would love it if there was a physical NVR out there built with the hobbyist in mind.... but I haven't found it yet.

I have seen / heard of a few NVRs that have a "Network Alarm" output or similar.... but I haven't found anything anywhere on how to use / apply that to anything.

I would be wary of turnkey hardware NVR systems. Most are proprietary and since they are from hardware-centric vendors, the software features are limited, infrequently updated, and the UI is crude or very "old school". They also do not support a lot of 3rd party IP cameras other than their own brand.

I am currently using SecuritySpy on a Mac (not the Mac running Indigo) and have been very happy with it. It has URL commands that can be used for integration (not a true REST API, but just get/put URL syntax that can be used). Performance so far with 4 cameras has been very good.

Important performance tip (for any system): If you can let the hardware IP Cameras generate an H.264 stream and the NVR software application can record this to disk without re-encoding, you will have much more capacity and lower overhead on the Mac (or PC) running the NVR software. Most good IP Cameras let you twiddle the settings for frame rate, VBR versus CBR, resolution, etc. Bandwidth is a pipeline! The more you control the point of origin, the less bandwidth everything else (network, host computer, hard disk subsystem), etc. will see and be able to handle more.

The SecuritySpy is the nicest native-Mac app I have found so far and the $$ cost is reasonable - even with a fair number of cameras.

Another option, and one that until recently I used, is Blue Iris. The unlimited camera license is only $50, but it only runs on a PC. This package is extremely flexible, there are tons of options and it fully supports direct-to-disk recording. The only downside is you must use a PC and it is traditional PC-style nerdy UI with lots of options scattered through a lot of different dialog boxes that interact with each other and overlap in what they do. I was running in on my iMac using VirtualBox and I was able to do 4 cameras ok, but I decided I wanted to go native on the Mac instead of buying a standalone PC to run it as my needs are growing. (It is simply a personal desire to not re-introduce PC's into my home/office setup as I have spent the last few years getting rid of all those horrible Windows boxes.)

For cameras, I have been having good luck with Amcrest 1080P HD camera (motorized pan/tilt) and Phylink (pinhole security/covert cameras). Not trying to start a flame-war on "favorite" IP cameras, as there already are thousands of forum posts on which is the "best" IP camera!

I have also re-purposed old iPhones as IP cameras with free or low-cost iOS apps - definitely useful for evaluation and testing of NVR software, but not practical for production use.

If you have any questions about Blue Iris or SecuritySpy that I can help with, just let me know.

I'm in the midst of evaluating indigo, coming from vera. So far easy TTS, better hue integration, and better variable support have almost opened my wallet up. I keep reading posts stating easy Blue Iris Trigger integration. I suppose this could be done via Email but theres a mild delay and I try to keep everything "in house" and don't want to rely on someone else email servers.

I've tried HTTPd with very limited success and instead of googling for a few more hours I was wondering if you could offer any advice?

I just want a motion trigger to set a variable, if not create a device. Not the best for trigger but if you set up the audio trigger in Blue Iris it makes for reliable presence detection.

Thanks for any input!

Although you stated you did not want to introduce 3rd party solutions, I have found that using Stringify (more powerful than IFTTT) and Pushover with Indigo has given me a lot of flexibility in "gluing@ things together.

Since both of these tools are Internet/cloud-based, I use them for convenience and insure I have alternate methods (less conenient) available should I lose Internet access.

Shameless plug - take a look at the Security Camera plugin. Does not do sound but will work with almost any device that has a refreshing image URL.

It does video recording and motion detection. It also creates several different versions of the images that can be controlled via actions. Makes setting up more complex control pages easier.

One warning: I'm not sure how well it will work on older hardware. However, the smaller you create image the less CPU cycles it takes.






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Curious whether anyone has bridged the gap between Indigo and an IP-based NVR like the Lorex LNR416S series (https://www.lorextechnology.com/hd-nvr- ... Series-1-p)

It would be interesting to catch motion triggers from a camera and then program a response. Might even save me the need for some motion sensors if I can use the cameras to do that.
Any thoughts?