topic Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression in Arlo Pro 4

Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Thu, 17 Mar 2022 14:59:45 GMT

I have three Arlo Pro 4 cameras. I have noticed that still images captured from the camera are very poor in quality. The issue is too heavy compression of the captured shots, the details are blurred. The image is clear and much sharper if I review and zoom the image live in the video settings view for instance.

I understand the compression of video, but what’s the point with still shots as these don’t require that much bandwith etc.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

DaOtherOne — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 17:40:37 GMT

I agree that it makes no sense to compress images to the point they are useless for identifying security breach details. This should be a simple fix for the Arlo developers. Please fix this.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 19:58:06 GMT

Yes, this should be very easy to fix for better quality and user experience. I just don’t get why the image quality is messed like this in the product where such feature should be one of the top priorities.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

ShayneS — Mon, 21 Mar 2022 20:19:19 GMT

If possible can you provide a screenshot of the snapshot image?

Thanks

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 14:48:16 GMT

Please compare the pictures in the following replies (I can attach only one per reply)

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 14:56:22 GMT

Image 1 captured in the video edit settings (and zooming the screen). This is better quality and has more details and sharpness.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 14:57:50 GMT

This version is zoomed from the captured still shot. The image is heavily compressed.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 14:59:55 GMT

Another example (from the video settings, better one)

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 15:00:51 GMT

And the poor quality stillshot zoomed

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

DaOtherOne — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 15:15:41 GMT

A 1920x1080 JPG without any compression is about 6,144 KB in size. This Arlo image is 1920x1072, 96 dpi, 24 bit depth and is 128KB. 128KB is a 98 percent compression of a the maximum file size of 6,144 KB.

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

StephenB — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 15:36:38 GMT

I agree your images are overly compressed - personally I'd like to see 2K snapshots from the Pro3/Pro4 at a higher quality level. As I've said before, I'd also like to have an option to trade off retention for quality in the motion video recordings. I'd happily reduce retention to 15 days for double the bitrate (or down to 7 for 4x the bitrate).

But I don't think that uncompressed 1080p is the correct benchmark here. A typical good quality outdoor 1080p scene is between 500 KB and 600 KB (depending on the amount of detail in the scene).

Re: Poor image quality due to heavy compression

mrockas — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 16:29:53 GMT

I totally agree with you. There are options to optimize the level of quality and compression to balance bandwith and storage. The camera performs much better than the shots and videos are currently stored in the cloud.