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Green Video

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pc2k17
Hero
Hero

Arlo Pro and Pro2

Camera mounted outside

200 watt Mercury Vapor light installed on roof peak of garage

 

I discovered an issue recently where recorded video and live viewing video can be green at night (instead of the normal black and white). This issue comes up when you have snow on the ground and are using a mercury vapor light.

 

I did some testing..........

 

Green grass, no light on = night vision works fine

 

Green grass, mercury vapor light on = night vision works fine

 

Snow on the ground, no light on = night vision works fine

 

Snow on the ground, mercury vapor light on = video is green

 

Everything is fine unless you have both snow on the ground and the mercury vapor light on. It appears the light reflecting off the snow makes it bright enough so night vision doesn’t come on and then the camera seems to capture too much of the green spectrum of light in this situation.

 

Not sure if this is a hardware or firmware issue or if can even be fixed. Just posting this as an FYI.

 

Pictures.........

Green grass, mercury vapor light on

grasslight.gif

 

Snow on the ground, mercury vapor light on

snowlight.gif

2 REPLIES 2
pc2k17
Hero
Hero

The high pressure mercury vapor light I have installed is over 10 years old, and runs every night, so eventually the bulb will burn out (I think it's 50,000 hours on this one). This type bulb emits primarily in the blue green spectrum so that's probably why the Arlo camera picks up the green in certain situations.

 

Since mercury vapor lamps are becoming obsolete I may look into a HPS or a metal halide lamp. I need something VERY bright, so LED, CFL, incandesant, flourescent isn't going to cut it.

 

Is anyone using HPS or metal halide lamps outisde of their house for lighting and if so do they work well with the Arlo cameras?

pc2k17
Hero
Hero

New snow and the color was blue last night. (see pic)

 

I did some research and found out what the issue is. Many cameras have issues taking pictures or videos when mecury vapor, hps, or metal halide lights are present. (Just fyi, these are the types of bulbs that street lights in the city use. Mercury vapor is blue/green color, HPS is yellow/orange, metal halide is blue/white). It's a white-balance and tint issue with the camera. It just can't adjust the white balance and tint to accodate the light emitted from these types of bulbs when snow is reflecting that light. There are cameras that can adjust correctly for these types of lighting situations automatically, but they cost $1000+. So I guess I have to live with blue/green video until I change out the light or get different cameras.

 

snowbluelight.jpg