New Activity Zone feature

[RegularJoe]

After moving a camera to a different location, I went to change the the activity zone parameters. I was pleasantly surprised to see that we are able to make the zone size exactly fit the space to be covered and not be forced to be  satisfied with only rectangular zones.
  I guess that this change was instituted on their end, I don't suppose that this was some update on our cameras... I haven't updated anything?
  Doing it on my phone, see the pic on the left? It's a little strange trying to get the different points to move in the direction I want them to go. 
  On the desktop, it doesn't work this way... you only get to choose square or rectangle.... If you set it to some rhombus shape on your phone, when you look at the zones on the web, they still show up in that configuration.. but as soon as I attempted to redo them on the web... they instantly went back to rectangular.... kind of odd.

[DannyBearAgain]

Can you confirm that the zones are actually working as intended?

Using the original arlo app does not allow the feature, still same old rectangles.

[RegularJoe]

Well, no, I can't "prove" that the odd angles actually make any difference... the zones don't really work that precisely, do they?  I haven't manually updated any firmware, nor have I been alerted that it needed done. Looking at the firmware version... 1.090.30.4-42-

   If movement occurs outside of a "zone", does the system ignore movement and not send a notification?
  I guess what I'm asking is "if you don't create a zone for a camera in the first place....doesn't it see and notify you of movement anyway?"

  Experiment time: I deleted a zone on my front porch. Walked out on the porch.... movement detected... short time later.... video showed up in feed... but no sound to alert me.
  Came back in, enabled a zone... walked back out on porch...movement detected... vid shows up in feed... but still no sound alert? I didn't try walking in front of the camera in an area that wasn't covered by the active zone, though.
  But, just now... 4 minutes after my first test walk... get notification sound on phone for that first test walk...and only one? Maybe only got one because test walk was conducted 2 minutes apart... and system figures "they don't need alerted for each one"?
  Who knows... seems like sometimes I'll be out walking around in the alley... 4 cameras... and I won't notice an alert for each one every time. Some times it will alert for each one.. sometimes not. A crap shoot, I guess.

[DannyBearAgain]

I generally find the activity zones do work and are reasonably accurate using the rectangular box method.

push notifications are almost instant for me at least within a few seconds.

 If you’re using smart activity zones, could be the reason for the delay I guess. Do you have a subscription plan on the cameras?

The reason for the original enquiry was to determine if the zone multi point area settings  are real and not a bug in the app.

[RegularJoe]

I just have Arlo Secure. I don't know about it being a bug. 

  I'm just curious as to whether a zone actually makes a difference or not.

I'd guess that theoretically, if movement is detected outside of a zone, it would be ignored. Realistically, though, my little test there showed that zone or not, if it moves in the viewing range of the camera, it gets recorded. The test wasn't structured very well though, I admit.

[StephenB]

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@RegularJoe wrote:

I'd guess that theoretically, if movement is detected outside of a zone, it would be ignored. Realistically, though, my little test there showed that zone or not, if it moves in the viewing range of the camera, it gets recorded. 

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What is supposed to happen:

When motion is detected, the video is streamed to the Arlo Cloud for analysis.  If the motion is outside the zone, the recording and the notification are both supressed.  Otherwise, the notification is made and the video is stored.

If you have local storage also: the recording is always stored locally, even if the motion is outside the zone.

[AH619]

(Same Camera) I have a similar issue, I could customize the shape of my zones on my phone, took the camera down to recharge then reinstalled the camera, as the Camera isn't 100% exactly where it was before my zones does not match up, I went to edit it on my mobile app but now it ONLY allows rectangle shapes and I cannot customize the shape of it eg. create a curve (as shown on original post photos).  WHY has this feature changed and when I tried to fix it on the computer I have the same issue.  Can the feature of customizing the shape be fixed as rectangles does not work for my situation! (Photos for reference below)

It worked perfectly as the camera would record only people who are against the fence now it records every passing car because the corner just touches the edge of the road!

[RegularJoe]

I can't see your photos.... just a pair of triangular icons.

[AH619]

Here are the photo's again, if you cannot see them I cannot explain why, I've used the insert photo function and made sure they are JPEG format.

Just another thing Arlo can't get right let alone the multiple issues with the app and support they offer!

[StephenB]

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@RegularJoe wrote:

I can't see your photos.... just a pair of triangular icons.

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All embedded photos need to be manually reviewed/approved before they are shown - which can take a while.

[kazmatty]

Hi, my alro spotlight 2030 had this rhombus feature after firmware update, recently the camera went offline on its own, I could not get it to reconnect, so I had to do a reset, after reinstalling it, the rhombus feature has disappeared, I can only get rectangular which is really annoying. My other cameras have the new feature, so on checking both firmwares for comparison, they are both the same, but one has the new feature, the other doesn't. Any ideas how I can get the new features back onto said camera? The rectangular feature is very outdated and annoying. Thanks Matt.

[Mike1T]

I've experienced same.  Exped zone adjustment to also motion which ai expected but it did not.  I think it should.

[kazmatty]

Hi, after speaking to the Arlo team, that rhombus has been removed, so it's back to the basic rectangular method, I did say its very annoying, but personally I don't think they care. Thanks Matt.