Panasonic BL-C1 Setup Help, Please

[countd_]

I'm trying to set up a Panasonic BL-C1 to record motion detection. So far I am having limited success. My setup uses openSUSE 11.1 and a ZoneMinder 1.24.1 rpm from one of the listed repositories.

My basic settings are as follows:

Code: Select all

host: username:password@ip_address
remote host path: /nphMotionJpeg?Resolution=320x240&Quality=Standard

So far, so good. The streaming is perfect, and the camera doesn't record anything until it does, indeed, sense some motion (usually me, waving frantically!). The problem is, once it has started recording, it never stops. The camera goes into alarm state and never leaves.

Now, I don't know whether this is a problem with zoneminder, or a problem with my setup, though I suspect it to be the latter. I've trawled through the documentation and have found very little about actually configuring my camera. For example, it says in the docs to limit the frame rate on the camera for an ip cam, yet I cannot find a way to do this on the BL-C1's config pages, nor do I know if this is necessary. I don't know whether I should be setting up the motion detection on the camera, or whether that is just for use with the camera's internal program and zma will be doing the hard work, so long as the machine is receiving the images. I would be very grateful for some pointers - I feel I am so close, but I can't get any closer!

Thanks.

[cordel]

If you want to limit the fps on an IP cam serving an mjpeg push it has to be done on the cam, otherwise if you are grabbing snapshots i can be done on ZM just to clarify. In your case the above string has the cam serve an mjpeg push.

Check your blend settings and make sure they are not to low, also make sure in your options that you don't have blending the reference image during alarm turned off.

For every alarmed frame there are statistics created if you have it enabled in debug, I think this is still on by default and you should be able to see where the image is settling out to after you have left view of the cam, You might have to rise some of your settings in the zone but I really suspect the reference image is not being updated as it should settle out regardless.

[countd_]

Cordel, thank you for taking the time to explain that to me - that made sense where trawling the net for answers had not.

BLEND_ALARMED_IMAGES is enabled - so I imagine it's not that. I will try playing around with the blend %age when I get a chance tomorrow.

In terms of methods, would you say that I would be better off with the mjpeg push, or pulling the images? Is one more reliable than the other?

Thanks again.

[cordel]

I prefer the mjpeg push from the camera my self as ZM don't have to send a request for each image, thus utilizing the network better as you don't have all those requests going out

[countd_]

Yes, the push seems to make more sense in that respect now that I think about it.

Still no closer to finding my problem. I have varied the Reference Image Blend %ge up and down (slightly, and to extremes like 1% and 40%), and toggled the BLEND_ALARMED_IMAGES variable to no avail. In fact, I think anything in the global options may be discounted as I have a usb webcam that is working perfectly.

The frames grid doesn't appear to help much - the score for the extra frames all sit at 50 for at least 15 minutes - perhaps there is some sort of timer that I need to adjust?

Thanks for any assistance!

[countd_]

Most odd. I deleted my usb camera which was running in tandem with the IP cam, and the IP cam started behaving. Not sure why this happened, as the cameras weren't linked and besides, the usb camera should not have been (and wasn't) picking up any movement in any event. Anyway, problem solved for me. Thanks for the assistance