Using Indigo to Toggle Sighthound Video Rules

Posted on
Sun Sep 29, 2019 11:00 pm
hamw offline
Posts: 1212
Joined: Mar 31, 2008

Re: Using Indigo to Toggle Sighthound Video Rules

What did you move your cameras to? An NVR of some kind? Any particular brand? I have nine or 10 cameras that are several of which are high-resolution.

Also, I’m a little bit concerned about notifications based on they built in detection from the cameras… Would think that that would generate a lot of false notifications.

Posted on
Mon Sep 30, 2019 10:39 am
whmoorejr offline
User avatar
Posts: 762
Joined: Jan 15, 2013
Location: Houston, TX

Re: Using Indigo to Toggle Sighthound Video Rules

I was using Foscam.... switched to Amcrest. I've been very happy with their products and since I was a little nervous when I first got into using CCTV, I picked a company that was local to me so I could physically go there if there were any issues. (Their physical store is in Houston).

I paired my NVRs with the Cameras (Amcrest cameras, Amcrest NVRs). Technically, any ONVIF Camera/NVR combo will work with each other, but I have found that by matching brand, they play better with each other. (Like easily adjusting camera settings from the NVR instead of logging into each camera separately.)

For better control, you can also use the Smart PSS application by Dahua https://us.dahuasecurity.com/product/smartpss/ or Amcrest Surveillance Pro https://support.amcrest.com/hc/en-us/articles/213713737-Amcrest-Surveillance-Pro. (They are basically the same program)

As for notifications, I use a combination of things. I receive "notifications" in three flavors. On the low end, I get a logged image saved to my indigo server with a filename (YYYY-MM-DD_HH-MM_CameraName.jpg) and a script that runs nightly to delete any file in that folder that is greater than 30 days old. Then I have a "Rotation" image where whatever event will trigger a script to save an image (a current camera image or a static image) as "R.jpg". I have several control pages that use "R.jpg" as a refreshing URL image. For static, as an example, if my wife uses her code to open the front door, a static picture of her overwrites the "R.jpg" which updates all my control pages with a picture of her... So I'll hear the door open (chime) and I can look at any of my displays which will show her picture. (So things don't get stale, I also incorporate timers... so whenever a script updates the "R.jpg", it also updates a text variable "RCAM_Text" with a text description of the image and a time stamp. A trigger watches that variable and restarts a "no-motion" timer whenever the variable changes. If the timer expires, then another script fires to load a "No activity.jpg" and updates the variable with "No current activity".

For notifications that actually get pushed out to my phone, I'm only using actual sensors. A couple Z-Wave door sensors but most are tied to my DSC Alarm via Envisalink and the DSC Plugin. By adding expansion zones to the alarm panel and programming automation zones, I've added outdoor motion sensors to my alarm panel. An Automation zone won't set off the alarm when armed and doesn't need to be bypassed, but you can monitor it and trigger off it from within indigo.

For example, I have a Zone12 trigger (front patio motion detector). When the trigger fires, it saves a log image, saves a "R.jpg" image, sends me an image, then it disables itself for 15 minutes. Likewise, if my front door opens, the trigger is disabled for 15 minutes. This way, if I'm unloading groceries, getting ready to go somewhere, etc., I'm not getting notification after notification on my phone. If I'm doing yard work, I'll get a notification, but only once every 15 minutes. When I was using Sighthound, I would get 50+ notifications every time I mowed the front yard.

To sum-up... Video Motion Detection will log an image and update control pages. Actual sensors will push out notifications.

Oh, last tidbit... the reason I have multiple NVRs.... a couple are connected to TLC Roku TVs. I have scripts that can turn on the TV and switch to the HDMI port attached to the NVR (Roku Plugin). For me, that is much much faster than any of the TV camera app solutions I've tried than have to crank away to load a HD camera image. I would prefer to have a modulator that puts an HDMI signal over COAX as a TV channel, but I can buy 5 NVRs for the cost of one modulator.

Bill
My Plugin: My People

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