Options
Using a dashcam to identify yobs.
Dunnroamin
Posts: 2,437 Forum Member
✭✭✭
My wife and I are being targeted by a few teenagers, who hammer on the glass of our front door at night so forcefully that there is a danger the glass will break. In an attempt to identify them I bought a wireless IR camera from Maplin's that sends its images to a receiver using an SD card. The receiver is in another room and plugged into our TV, so we can view the images. In daylight, they are watchable, although not great, but after dark, when the camera relies on infrared, the IR beams from the group of IR lenses surrounding the taking lens cannot penetrate the double glazing, instead the beams are reflected back into the camera as visible light, blinding it, so nothing can be seen. I have looked on the web at some dashboard cameras with night vision, and, as they have to "see" through a car's windscreen, I'm hoping they will work through our double glazing. Unfortunately they nearly all seem to be sourced from America, so if I buy one and it doesn't work to expectations, a lot of time will be wasted. Has anyone used a covert, recordable CCTV camera with night vision and been satisfied with the performance.
0
Comments
Cardboard Cutout.
Not that much easier than cutting some card out. :rolleyes:
And it means you can take it off and put it back on with ease.
I tried that with black sticky tape, it didn't work, I used two layers of tape which would be quite opaque to ordinary visible light, but the image on the TV via the camera's receiver was of three bright spots of white light, but no images. I can only assume that the infra red beams (both transmitted and reflected) were unaffected by the tape. Maybe I need to try a metal mask.
That's why I use cardboard. :rolleyes:
I tried taping and covering with felt tip but they were too opaque and let the light through.
As I said before, I've had the same problem and solved it with cardboard cut as in the pictures so that the lens is not covered but the LEDs are.
P.s. If you don't have enough light with the LEDs on the camera covered, you can by a separate IR emitter that you can set up to shine on the area which the camera should pick up.
Probably best to get one with clear LEDs rather than the ones that glow red so they are not spotted.
And when walking them and people say "nice dogs, do they bite " reply YES !
I stand very much corrected by you and the previous poster; I assumed the tape would work just as well with IR LEDs as with visible-light LEDs. Perhaps multiple layers of tape would help (I used two with a Belkin router with an annoying flashing blue light to confirm it was online) to prevent it distracting me when it was on the side of my desk, and sticky tape is easier to keep in place than a makeshift cover (which probably needs some sticky tape anyway).
A seperate IR LED emitter mounted well away from where the undesirables would be the best bet, assuming you have access to higher in the building.
My thanks to you and all who offered helpful suggestions. I am now looking into an alternative to what I have at the moment, and that is a dashboard camera that records a "rolling" sequence of recordings on an SD card. Depending on the model, I think they range from about ten minutes of recording, before they start over again, to as much as half an hour, and being dashboard cameras that film through a car's windscreen, there should not be a problem with seeing through my windows. I have, of course to be careful to choose one that has "night vision". They seem to be mainly of Chinese manufacture but, unfortunately, in rather short supply in this country, so I might have to buy from America, a camera made in China because my own country doesn't make them or import them (at least, not in quantities large enough to give adequate choice).
Word very often gets back to the culprits via the parents kids and they then lie low.
This worked for me.