ZoneMinder Forums

I am trying to configure timelapse recording from an IP camera in 1.24.1.

I have actually configured the IP cam as a modect monitor and then I have a second monitor configured for record which uses the /cgi-bin/nph-zms?mode=jpeg&monitor=1&user=xxxx&pass=xxxx URL as the remote source (I would rather load up my ZM server than the actual cheap eBay camera). The camera is working fine in modect mode.

Ultimately, I am after a 4 or 6 hour event with frames taken about every 3 - 6 minutes. I have tried to configure this a number of different ways, however I ultimately seem to get the same result. I have done the following to test the abilities.

With the monitor configured with the following:
Max FPS: 3.0
Image Buffer: 20
Warmup: 6
Pre Event: 1
Post Event: 1
Stream Replay Buffer: 100
Section Length: 7200 (2 hours)
Frame Skip: 720 (i.e. one frame every 4 minutes)

I would end up with just two frames in the events frame listing even though the event table would say there were 30 frames. These were Frame ID 1 and 30 respectively. If I looked at the stills for the event, all 30 images were shown. The stream seems to show the first and last frame, which is pointless.

I have then modified the pre and post event frames counter and this will cause more frames to be shown. I.e. ask for 10 pre and post frames and I will then be able to see frames 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 30 in the events frame list.

I have tried to configure the monitor a different way, with the FPS down at 0.1 and a Frame Skip of 0, however, this basically results in the same thing.

To test things I set the FPS to 3.0 again and Frame Skip of 0 with a pre and post frames of 10 and I ended up with frames 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 100, 200 etc up to almost 300 frames.

I know I could configure this up outside of ZM using cron, but I would like to use ZM if I could. I also realise I could do the maths and just up the pre-event frame count but if this is a bug, or if I am doing something wrong I would like to try and help get it fixed.

It seems that perhaps the 'record' mode is the cause of the problem, since my modect monitors show all the frames in an event.

Any suggestions are more than welcome.

Many thanks (for the help and a great product),
Whytey

I'll see if I can duplicate that here later in the week. That should be feasible though I don't know that anyone truly used it quiet like that before and could very well be something amiss as it's not a typical setting.

Hi cordel,

Any updates on reproducing this issue? I am currently using my work-around, but it is quite brittle. I am unable to tweak the capture as much as I would like to.

Since all of the images seem to have been captured (when I look in the filesystem) is there somewhere you can point me to start debugging the issue? It must be to do with the playback of the event or something. I can create videos of the event just fine.

Regards,
Whytey