T541R/5442 For Front Door Camera. Overkill?

Looksee

Looksee

Getting comfortable
Aug 20, 2025
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Planet Earth, Milky Way Galaxy
I have had this idea in my mind for a while now. The doorbell threads have recently reappeared which has made me think of asking for opinions. I don't want a doorbell. I just want to know if someone is at my door and who they are with an identifiable image/capture.

I'm sure I could get away with a lesser camera. Is the T541R light and image quality overkill for this purpose? Maybe I should consider a lesser camera. Maybe Reolink?

J/K with the last sentence.;)
 
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There is no such thing as overkill when it comes to cams. I have six cams covering my front door. See the views below:

Screenshot 2020-10-29 132025.JPG


See the below thread about having multiple cams for a given area.

samplenhold

Thread 'Why I Like Redundant Views/Multiple Cam Views'

A lot of newbies ask for help with their camera setups and most think that they can get by with a single cam to cover quite a bit of area. While that is possible if all you are interested in is a wide-angle overview, it usually will not give you a great chance of getting a face shot good enough for police to act upon. There are numerous threads here where people have an incident but their cams did not capture good enough footage to give to the police to get an arrest. They then ask what they should have done to get a better shot. Usually the answer is more cams, closer FOV, and more light...
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Thanks, guys! I'm sticking with the 541R plan.

Oh, and yes, I have multiple cameras for coverage of areas. This 541R is for the close-up beauty-shot.
 
Looksee said:
I have had this idea in my mind for a while now. The doorbell threads have recently reappeared which has made me think of asking for opinions. I don't want a doorbell. I just want to know if someone is at my door and who they are with an identifiable image/capture.

I'm sure I could get away with a lesser camera. Is the T541R light and image quality overkill for this purpose? Maybe I should consider a lesser camera. Maybe Reolink?

J/K with the last sentence.;)
Click to expand...
In hindsight, I would rather have that camera at the door than the Amcrest 1179ew 5Mp on a 1.2/7" sensor. But yes, they are not cheap.
 
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Here is what I did to make my dumb doorbell smart, and send me images from the T54IR above my doorbell.

Ri22o

Post in thread 'I decided to ditch Ring and made my dumb doorbell smart with Hubitat and Blue Iris'

I kept getting "ghost" alerts with no one in the capture. Apparently the girl across the street is too short to be in frame when ringing the doorbell...

I've decided to try rotating the camera to corridor mode, but I can't get it to update in Blue Iris. It looks fine in the GUI. I had no issues with my front sidewalk camera, but this one won't adjust the sizing. Did I forget a step I did with the other, or what do I need to do to get it to display correctly?

1772987972816.png
 
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I despise doorbell cameras. They look trashy and are all awful cameras paired with completely useless intercoms. That’s all.

I have a 5442 by my door. It’s a crappy full color one but it’s automated to turn on the light when it sees someone half way up the sidewalk and at 13ms shutter and 55% gain I get decent stills.
 
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5442 full color with LEDs?
 
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bigredfish said:
I recall these... was a good little camera, but I'm not aware of one that could activate the lights via IVS?

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I activate via homeassistant Dahua integration and frigate. Or specifically my own fork of rroller/Dahua integration. There is a small delay but it’s fast enough to catch people and add deference after sunset. Not sure what the IVS capabilities are, never used them, but it does run 4MP, 1080P and D1 all at high bitrates at the same time just fine so I’ll probably run it until it dies. It’s better than a doorbell.

For talk, I have an N45EYNZ overlooking the street (and with much better lighting being in front of the dark patio). I just have my app tylerransdell/onedoor configured to call the dome while I’m actually looking at the front door. App uses Dahua private protocol back channel so it talks decent. Not nearly as good as a real intercom, but good enough where I decided not to cut a hole in my bricks to flush mount the Ix-SS-2Gang.
 
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bigredfish said:
I recall these... was a good little camera, but I'm not aware of one that could activate the lights via IVS?

Click to expand...
Yes, it's a very nice one. It's pure LED, light can't be triggered Last batch and going totally none because of the chips supply crisis.

empiretech01.com

EmpireTech IPC-T549M-ALED-S3 1/1.8" CMOS 4MP Full-color Fixed-focal Wa

4MP 1/1.8" CMOS Built-in warm light, the max. illumination distance is 30 m Deep learning algorithm Supports max. 512 G Micro SD card Built-in Mic IP67 protection Smart Motion Detection 3.0
empiretech01.com empiretech01.com
 
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bigredfish said:
I used to have one at my front door at our previous house. Was very pleased with it.

I used the 3.6mm model..out to 15ft in a doorway it was excellent if you can live with the light always on.

trying to find a night shot....


View attachment 249553
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The Doordash drivers in Florida look much prettier than what I see around my neck of the woods!
 
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She was my favorite

I used to order like a coke, wait an hour and order a medium fries, ....

Mrs Bigredfish finally caught on and that ended that :lmao: :rofl:
 
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bigredfish said:
She was my favorite

I used to order like a coke, wait an hour and order a medium fries, ....

Mrs Bigredfish finally caught on and that ended that :lmao: :rofl:
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I understand she was your favorite, but no need to made this video an hour long and force me to watch it over and over again.
 
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