topic Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone in Arlo Essential Wire-Free Cameras

Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

USER1D — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 12:47:49 GMT

I have setup activity zones and purposely excluded the area with a flag that constantly waves, but it still picks it up every time a wind blows and it kills my battery within a few days. Is there a way to put the area around the flag into some kind of ignore zone?

Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

StephenB — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 18:14:14 GMT

@USER1D wrote:
I have setup activity zones and purposely excluded the area with a flag that constantly waves,

Activity zones can exclude notifications and recordings. But they cannot improve battery life.

The zones are processed in the cloud, so the camera streams whenever it detects motion. Then the cloud decides whether to supress the recording/notification or not. So the camera power use is the same with zones as it is without.

You could try aiming the camera downwards until the flag is out of the field of view.

Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

USER1D — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 18:45:48 GMT

Thanks for the reply!
I do understand how the process works, but I was under the impression that if the activity zones are setup, it will only monitor the area highlighted by them and anything happening outside of the zones will be ignored and will not trigger any recordings/alerts, but that's not the case, so I fail to see their purpose.
Also, unfortunately, I can't move the camera lower. 😞

Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

StephenB — Wed, 03 Aug 2022 19:10:14 GMT

@USER1D wrote:

I do understand how the process works, but I was under the impression that if the activity zones are setup, it will only monitor the area highlighted by them and anything happening outside of the zones will be ignored and will not trigger any recordings/alerts, but that's not the case, so I fail to see their purpose.

When working properly, motion outside the zones won't result in notifications or recordings. But the zones never improve battery life (as you seemed to be expecting in your earlier posts).

So even if you were able to get the zones to function as you like, you'd still have the same battery drain issue.

@USER1D wrote:

Also, unfortunately, I can't move the camera lower. 😞

Have you tried taking down the flag as a test? There are other possibilities (wind, thermals) that could also account for the detection. I'm not saying that it's not the flag, just suggesting a definitive test to confirm. Note even slight motion outside the zone will result in a notification.

Also, I am wondering if the waving flag is creating shadows on the ground that are outside the zone.

Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

Dannybear — Thu, 04 Aug 2022 01:24:45 GMT

To better manage the battery drain issue you could externally power the camera.

I wonder if you can get away with making a mask to cover the camera motion sensor to eliminate the unwanted area.

Re: Camera picks up motion not in the activity zone

StephenB — Thu, 04 Aug 2022 11:11:09 GMT

@Dannybear wrote:
To better manage the battery drain issue you could externally power the camera.

Yes, that could help - as could the solar panel.

@Dannybear wrote:
I wonder if you can get away with making a mask to cover the camera motion sensor to eliminate the unwanted area.

I don't think that is possible. The sensor has a lens, but it isn't capturing anything like an image. It'd be an interesting experiment, but I don't know how you would identify what part of the lens is gathering IR from the flag. And since the sensor is looking for changes, hiding some of the IR might actually result in more triggering.