Re: Video cameras

[Nigel Orr <nigel.orr@xxxxxxx>]

At 09:49 15/03/99 GMT, you wrote:
>Actually it's pretty good during daylight (as one would expect) but
in=20
>total darkness mine might be suffering from a problem of "too
much"=20
>light?? - the camera has a circle of IR LED's around the lens to
provide=20
>illumination for the camera in darkness,

I bought one of the Henry's ones last week (to have a look inside a chimney
(don't ask!)), which is also a bit over-illuminated at close range...

You could always cover some or all the LEDs... I would say disconnect one
or two, but as they usually have a 12V supply, I suspect they connect them
all in series...

> but it's also positioned=20
>immediately below my PIR activated porch light, and I think the CCD=20
>might not like that level of illumination too much??

If it's below the light, there shouldn't be a problem- and I hope you
weren't implying that the PIR was producing any illumination ;-)

Daylight is _alot_ brighter than any light you will have around the house!
However, the little cameras claim to have auto-iris (probably just some AGC
of the video luminance), and this may not take account of a small bright
area (illuminated person standing at the door) against a dark background
(the path etc).  I noticed that candles cause bad flare on my camera.

>If you wait until Homebase has one of their occasional 10% of
everything=20
>days (as I did) then you can pick this up for about =A342 (ish - I
think I=
=20
>paid about that for mine...) at which price, it really is pretty
good=20
>value.

You should also have a look at CPC- they are currently selling little
monochrome cameras with IR illumination and microphone for =A329.  They are
even in a nice little box, rather than a bare board.  We have a couple here
(they're in the catalogue for about =A3100, but this is a special offer),
an=
d
they seem quite good.

Nigel

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