adjusting camera view infront of garage

[Jordandawg05]

hi guys,

i moved my camera from my hidden tree in front of my garage to front facing the driveway.  

still playing around for best motion sensor.  as of alst night i was receiving several notifications for cars passing by even though the camer's is not facing my street that much maybe two feet view in the camera.  i pulled the sensitivity to 87 as i was getting alot of cars passing by.  what has been your experience with this situation? i am going to pull the camers view little down to only show the driveway and side walk but not the street. i hope this helps.  

The position in the tree was good but it was capturing the subject walking up/down my driveway sideway which was 'ok' but not best. Also if someone was coming across the opposite side of the camera andtoward the entry of the house it wasn't capturing. i had delivery yesterday and i happened to capture the scene via live feed but not captured via recording.  so i reposition my camera above my garabe with full view of my driveway to catch anyone coming to the front of house.  With the 2-3 second delay my testing resulted in capturing the subject walking to right side of the camera .  I think positioning it there helps capture any subject walking to my front door even for a 'shorter' period than the position on the tree.  

the down side is now eliminating the false alarms - i'll countinue to play with it and if its recording cars i may have to put it back up the tree.  Ideally i would want second camera in the front door and have them record if one is triggered but at this time i only one ! 

Thanks ! 

PS i am trying to upload an image of the front driveway to help visully but its not working ...

[Jordandawg05]

Ok here's a snapshot ! 

[Hula_Rock · Accepted solution]

You are going to run into "problems" due to the fact that this system does a very poor job picking up motion if a subject is walking towards the camera.  My suggestion would be to keep playing with locations until you find some where that fits your expectations (  I have yet to find the perfect location).  Minimize drilling holes to mount the cameras or else you will have a bunch of patch work to do over the weekend.   It can get frustrating, may the force be with you.....  🙂  good luck.

[Jordandawg05]

haha dont' even start with me about the holes !! one reason i was hesitant to even put it on the garage...

anyways, i had two locations on the garabe and one location by the tree leading up to my driveway..that location i think might be better to pick up motion since the subject is walking up the driveway and across the cameras field of view...the thing i didn't like is the 'view' was sideway of the subject which i guess i may have to compromise if i move it back to that location...the reason i thought to move it because i had a delivery and the mail man cross my driveway diagnoly to my driveway ...still crossing the field of view ( i think) but camera didn't pick them up...this is a first because usually people walk  up next to the camera going up my driveway but not in this instant....the only reason i know they walks diagnoly because i happened to have my phone and was in 'live ' mode ...

such a love hate relationshp with this system ! 

[Hula_Rock]

I hear you........

My wife wend off THE DEEP END after she found out how many holes I drilled on the front of our BRAND NEW HOUSE.  The problem is that Netgear had a very good Marketing team.  Arlo is advertised as "Plug and Play" , "Sitck the Camera anywhere" etc, etc, etc.  I am guilty of falliing into the marketing trap after seeing this product at the Las Vegas CES show,  I had to have it.   After using it and uncovering its flaws, I wish I would have went with a wired system from the get go....

[Hula_Rock]

As you can see, I amost have the same coverage area that you want covered, LAG IS HORRIBLE 

[Jordandawg05]

i may position it back on the tree havne't decided yet...i got a delivery today so i am gonna see how it captures them...its a double edge sword at this point, but i may buy another one...where i can position the first camera on the tree , it'll catch the side of the person coming up the driveway, then a rule to turn the second camera up the front door to start recording..but tha'tll cost 150 for another camera ...only reason i didn't want hardwired cause of the wires/isntallation costs...plus i wanted cloud solution ...

btw i am not able to see the picture/video you linked? 

[Hula_Rock]

give the picture a few it takes the some time to see it after it posts.

I have almost the same coverage area, but flipped.  Cloud storage is nice BUT the drawback is if you lose internet connection, this system is dead in the water.  I have a 1 gig dedicated pipe coming to my house simular to Google Fiber.  About a week ago there was an outage that effected my area for almost two days,  lets just say, Arlo went on vacation.  Hopefully they find a solution for that too......

[Jordandawg05]

thats so true about internet or even power outages ! 

ya we do similar set up - lag bugs me as well..2-3 second from my experience. this is why may position it back on tree..at least i'll see the subject walking up but its a side view and if they are coming down as well. 

[Jo]

Try adjusting with your pan and zoom functions instead of moving the camera, it takes some time but so worth it.  That's how I got mine to get what I wanted to see.  Keep in mind the motion "beams" are to the left and right not so much dead center so aim before and after where you want to record.  

[RobertRosal]

This may help on finding the best placement prior to drilling.  What I have found is that using duct tape works the best.  Make a large cross with the duct tape and position the mount within the center.  Now you can move it around at your hearts content without drilling any holes until you find the perfect spot for your needs.

It has worked wonderfully for me and kept drilling to a minimum.

[Jordandawg05]

Thanks Robert for the advise ! i had already drilled two sets of holes sincei moved them twice and repatched...sigh little too late with the advise but maybe for next time !

well at my current position, i had a UPS delivery today..guess what, the camera didn't even pick them up going up my driveway and into my front door...i would have expected something !!! it did record them pulling close to my driveway but not the actual delivery...never the less, after work today i grabbed the camera and placed it back on the tree and did some testing to my satisfaction again...i determined for now, that position is best for my situation as the subjects will be walking across the cameras view which is best for motion detection.  i did test walking up and down and crossing diagnoly on my drivway and the camera tripped...so i think i am covered there i would say 90% unless they kinda sneak by the garage door...

As sum mentioned, i will probably get a second camera for front door and put a rule so if one of them detects motion the second starts recording...but for now, the tree it is as it fits the best motion detection and view from what i see. 

this camera you def have to play around to get best p otition and motion...

[KenGirloy]

I wonder, because I also want to put a camera about 10 feet above the driveway in the center of our garage to watch our driveway to know when someone drives in or walks into the driveway. I know the motion detection is best from side to side, and this would be wanting to detect motion when someone is walking straight to the camera. Has anyone tried to rotate the camera 90 degrees and tilt it down? It will obviously show a 90 degree rotated view, but when rotated it should better detect motion when someone is moving from the front of the driveway near the sidewalk, to where the driveways ends at the garage, because that motion would be from side to side if the camera was rotated 90 degrees and tilted down a little so it can view the whole driveway.

Has anyone tried that?

-Ken

[jguerdat]

Good idea!  Sounds like you're the first. A bit of a pain to watch sideways but a downloaded video can be rotated via software.

[TomMac]

Another user a while back had rotated his camera 90d just to cover a narrow walk way between buildings...he stated , for him it worked well.

[KenGirloy]

I assume the camera was above reaching hight so he tilted it down a little, but did he say it improved the motion detecting when people walked straight into the camera?

Thanks.

[RobertRosal]

---

TomMac wrote:

Another user a while back had rotated his camera 90d just to cover a narrow walk way between buildings...he stated , for him it worked well.

---

Wnile I agree with Tom, the best scenario is still an additional camera to trigger the front door (direct facing of camera), or until they have a separate sensor to allow us to trigger the cameras.  

Proof is in the pudding!

Trigger by driveway.

https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/40B6EC00CCC7EA14

Front door captures what you want!

https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/A6031511604F1956

And another shot of son where with Arlo being unreliable to capture, Trigger driveway barely catches him.  Son walks much faster than his mom, like UPS, or Fedex guy.

https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/C0FCDD1A2E169593

But due to driveway camera trigger, I got him captured!

\\https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/D3D24F9D37FD63F4

[TomMac]

Agree 100% with RobertR....  and he has the perfect set up for this type of use  ( great vids btw ! )

I run mutli cams too for front and back views and it does worked fairly well again after rebuilding the 'nested' modes.

I really was just commenting on the fact it had been done and worked for the prev user.... his case was a very narrow walkway without much room for a second.

Put a wish in way back.......Still waiting for wireless PIRs without cameras... they would be smaller so batteries would last, not really need much data stream, and easier to place due to size.

[RobertRosal]

Thanks Tom, though it took some time to find the best placement for the cameras, the overall result was exactly what I was after.

[Jordandawg05]

lots of activity on my thread heheh.

good set up robert.  i bought another camera for my birthday back in November and placed it on my front door.  so due to the subjects walking towards my original driveway camera i re-positioned it back to the tree where the subjects walking to my house would cross the camera's point of view.  its worked well and its little hidden so people don't even realize thier being taped.  i actually posted several of my videos on our community next door page due to suspecious activities and had several comments about quality videos and placement.  

the front door camera has worked well too, i originally had a rule to turn it on when my driveway camera turns on but found it consumes more time as the subject is walking up the driveway, maybe 10 extra seconds.  I also tested the motion detection with the front door solo and it had captured motion pretty good so i stopped using the trigger by the front camera to concerve battery.  

front driveway

https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/D85FBB61DF6FB16E

front door

https://arlo.netgear.com/hmsweb/users/library/share/link/968FC0957A0D7CF0

[RobertRosal]

The views look great and very good capture of someone coming towards the door.  I think you have a great placement there.

[KenGirloy]

I agree, the triggered cameras work. But did anyone try to rotate the camera 90 degrees and tilt it down a little to see whether it got better motion detecting, compared to whens it was in the normal position? I get the previous user rotated it because it was looking at a narrow walkway, but did he said he got better motion detecting when rotated? Thanks.

[Hula_Rock]

........  Still don't like that you have to use a camera to trigger another camera.  The Trigger camera could be used to cover another Broader zone and should not be a wasted asset.......Your video's do look good though....

[RobertRosal]

I totally agree, a wasted asset.  That's why I have been watching the up and coming competition. 🙂  

As it doesn't make sense when you can purchase a good ZWave motion sensor for 30 - 60 dollars and have it trigger the cameras.

And thanks for the compliment Hula.