ZoneMinder Forums

Hi there,
Been looking recently at Zoneminder for a CCTV system i am setting up on our farm after a few recent break-ins.

Looks exacly what we need!!!

Havn't set anything up yet or even ordered anything but i just had a few questions.

Firstly our setup is likely to be analogue cameras connected to a server that i will build. We also have cat5 cable going places so the office, house and workshop are connected with internet. I decided against IP cams becasue it would be nice to have +10FPS at some points.

In the house we can connect to the server to see whats on the cameras but we would also like a buzzer to go off in the house so we know that movement has ben detected.
Could this be achieved easilly with a serial Relay board? (bearing in mind im new to all this). X10 is an expensive option on our big site with 3 phase supply!!

Also it would be good if in the event of the alarm trigger we could just change the TV channel and have the cameras displays up on the TV. Is this achievable with out using a TV-out on a computer?

One thing that would be very useful and im not sure if its implimented
on the web view of the server, is as soon as you log-in, is to quickly see what triggered the last alarm. ie. view the video so you can assess the situation and decide what to do.

Having the alarm going off for movement would be good but would also get my Mum scared out of her mind when she was on her own, so for her to be able to quickly log on and check what caused the last alarm she can easilly see it was just a fox and not a mob of criminals.

cheers
tim

timfishy wrote: In the house we can connect to the server to see whats on the cameras but we would also like a buzzer to go off in the house so we know that movement has ben detected.
Could this be achieved easilly with a serial Relay board? (bearing in mind im new to all this). X10 is an expensive option on our big site with 3 phase supply!!

You would need to write a script to interface to the device and find one that is supported in linux but you sould be able to.

timfishy wrote: Also it would be good if in the event of the alarm trigger we could just change the TV channel and have the cameras displays up on the TV. Is this achievable with out using a TV-out on a computer?

That would not be a function of ZM. You would need to purchase a modulator and maybe a video processor and loop the cameras through that.

timfishy wrote: One thing that would be very useful and im not sure if its implimented
on the web view of the server, is as soon as you log-in, is to quickly see what triggered the last alarm. ie. view the video so you can assess the situation and decide what to do.

This is already possible.

Regards,
Corey

ive found a board that cannects via rs232 (serial) on the pc and is controlled via AT commands so shouldnt be too hard to sort out.


Another thing that i am not sure about after talking over the plans with my father, is lighting.

We have been looking at some cameras with sony CCD's that have two infrared illuminators either side. When it gets dark the cameras automattically swtich to black and white and turn on the IR lamps.
The thing is.... we also have big 500W security lamps all over the farm that switch on when they see people etc. Do you think these will blind our cameras and stop them from getting good footage?

The problem we have with the people stealing from us is that they are not afraid of confrontation and we need to avoid them from coming on site. Once they are on site its too late to go out to "have a word" with them.

For example the other night at only 8pm in the evening, my father came in from some late night paperwork for a cup of tea. They reversed into the yard, cut the padlock off of a trailer, hitched it up and drove off with their lights off.

The CCTV on the main gates will put them off but we stil need our security lights. (Oh yeah, and the bulb had blown in the lamp in the yard).

Ok so i have rambled, but basically i am saying....

We need to keep our security lights but does anybody have any experiance with them interfering with the cameras?

Tim

timfishy wrote: Also it would be good if in the event of the alarm trigger we could just change the TV channel and have the cameras displays up on the TV. Is this achievable with out using a TV-out on a computer?

You can do it as Cordel said - modulator for one camera. For more quad and a modulator.
If you want more cameras at time I prefer using some viewer on zm server and putting the Xwindow screen on TVOUT. You can try my viewer in user contributions forum, or james's viewer. My viewer(xlib_shm, xlib_raw) has many bugs, and is not finished yet.

you will struggle to get a modulated signal to auto switch on your tv, you will need something that will emit a coded ir signal to match your tv channel when an alarm occurs, i think i could write something to do this in windows but you would need a commercial ir emitter, I once saw an item that basically sent a record signal via ir to make the vcr record but it was a while ago and i cant remeber where.

You could connect a switched raw video sig to the scart socket on your tv and if you removed and restored the connection it would auto switch but you would need to get composite to you tv.

You will need some means of 'splitting' the screen if you want multiple cams on at the same time. My ultimate aim is to get the tvout of a radeon 7000 working this way via the linux viewer but dont hold your breath. Any 'quad' splitter or seq will do this job for you just fine.
Another way would be to use modulators and have 1 per cam on different channels, but be careful to ensure your modulators arnt close to tv freq, or you will lose tv signals. Plus each modulator wired in series with your aerial will affect the quality of the output you might need an amp or a mast head amp to be sure.