So I've been lurking on this site for the last week or so, reading through all of the important newbie threads, like:
The Importance of Focal Length over MP in camera selection
i-want-2-8mm-cameras-everywhere-to-see-everything-this-is-why-you-need-specific-fovs-with-purposeful-focal-lengths.70053/
The Typical picture of a Perp on Nextdoor-type Apps with Consumer Grade Cameras like Ring, Nest, Arlo, Canary, Wyze, etc.
I'm totally across the whole appropriate sensor-size to MP ratios now, which makes sense (having played around with DSLRs and needing to understand focal length, sensor side, available light, shutter speed, etc). For the last year or so, I've had Frigate and Home Assistant connected to a couple of Reolink E1 Pros and Eufycam 2c's - I realise these aren't serious cameras and are pretty useless for real surveillence monitoring, but because I live in a rental in Australia, I'm not able to hardwire anything in the 2-storey townhouse that I live in, so I originally fell for all the slick marketing of Anker/Eufy, then got the Reolinks when I wanted to play around with RTSP.
I'm about to step into the world of getting my first "proper" cam, which I'm going to try and run an external ethernet cable and power over PoE, but am trying to work out what would be the best first step. I'm looking at placing it on the 2nd floor, attached to the railing (since I can't drill holes), and pointing at the front door, which is 8m away from the mounting location. This distance seems like I don't need a crazy long focal length to get decent Identify at night, and I want to get this first cam to start to play around with vari-focals, but I'm tossing up between:
The Importance of Focal Length over MP in camera selection
i-want-2-8mm-cameras-everywhere-to-see-everything-this-is-why-you-need-specific-fovs-with-purposeful-focal-lengths.70053/
The Typical picture of a Perp on Nextdoor-type Apps with Consumer Grade Cameras like Ring, Nest, Arlo, Canary, Wyze, etc.
I'm totally across the whole appropriate sensor-size to MP ratios now, which makes sense (having played around with DSLRs and needing to understand focal length, sensor side, available light, shutter speed, etc). For the last year or so, I've had Frigate and Home Assistant connected to a couple of Reolink E1 Pros and Eufycam 2c's - I realise these aren't serious cameras and are pretty useless for real surveillence monitoring, but because I live in a rental in Australia, I'm not able to hardwire anything in the 2-storey townhouse that I live in, so I originally fell for all the slick marketing of Anker/Eufy, then got the Reolinks when I wanted to play around with RTSP.
I'm about to step into the world of getting my first "proper" cam, which I'm going to try and run an external ethernet cable and power over PoE, but am trying to work out what would be the best first step. I'm looking at placing it on the 2nd floor, attached to the railing (since I can't drill holes), and pointing at the front door, which is 8m away from the mounting location. This distance seems like I don't need a crazy long focal length to get decent Identify at night, and I want to get this first cam to start to play around with vari-focals, but I'm tossing up between:
- 52IR Z12E - because the 5-64mm focal length would let me play around with things like LPR (which sounds like a real rabbit-hole, and potentially a gateway drug
- 22IR ZAS-S3 - because realistically, the max 13mm focal length of this might be all I need, and it's half the price
