Best Settings for V2 for Outdoor Use? Flies and people?

[jweg]

Hi all! I just bought two Wyze V2 cameras and a Pan/Scan this week. Great products! I have these placed outside temporarily until I get the outdoor camera.

I was wondering if you could give me some tips/settings for best usage for outdoors. I am getting a lot of events recorded at night that record little bugs flying around. I have enrolled in the CMC service and Person Pilot program as well. I like being able to just have recordings of events, but would like to not have it record 50+ events a day which include cars and flies. 99 % of my event recordings are Motion, v.s People, when people are clearly in the frame. Would rather get it to notice people better.

These are the settings of my cameras:

V2 camera # 1-
-Event Recording set to ‘All Day’ (I want to keep this) and ‘Detects Motion’ set to on.
-‘Send Notifications’ set to on and ‘Person’ set to on
- Detection Zone is set to the area of interest, BUT even as I look at it now with a person there, there is no ‘Person’ notification popping up. I tend to get more ‘Motion’ event recordings. Also my sensitivity for Motion is set to 100. The camera is maybe 20-30 feet away from said person.
-Night Vision IR lights are on
V2 camera #2-
-Event Recording set to ‘All Day’ ( I want to keep this) and ‘Detects Motion’ set to on
-‘Send Notifications’ set to on and ‘Person’ set to on.
-Detection Zone is set to the area of interest. I did just receive a ‘Person’ Notification as one was in the area. This camera is much closer to the detection zone area and my Motion detection sensitivity is set to 75.
-Night Vision IR Lights are set to On.

Thanks in advance!

[Brlepage]

Welcome to the Wyze community!

@jweg

Detection Zone is set to the area of interest, BUT even as I look at it now with a person there, there is no ‘Person’ notification popping up.

Person detection is still being tested and improved so this might happen!

@jweg

Also my sensitivity for Motion is set to 100.

Try dialing it down to something between 80-50.

@jweg

I am getting a lot of events recorded at night that record little bugs flying around. I have enrolled in the CMC service and Person Pilot program as well. I like being able to just have recordings of events, but would like to not have it record 50+ events a day which include cars and flies.

This will happen because the camera is obviously outside. The bugs will trigger the pixels-based motion detection. The only way to fix this (that I can think of) would be do change the detection settings.

[jweg]

Thanks @Brlepage! So what about during the daytime? For example, right now my camera’s detection zone is not picking up the person in view and not sending my notifications (this is the camera that is about 20-30 feet away with the detection sensitivity up to 100). I’d figure dialing up the sensitivity would detect people if the camera distance is further, or does it not work that way?
And to change the detection settings for the bugs, what would you change exactly?

[isaiah58]

The person detection is a work in progress. The original AI was not kept, Wyze is working on developing their own algorithms.

I dialed the sensitivity back to about 40% to stop getting clips caused by shadows from clouds, shadows from trees, leaves fluttering, bugs, birds, etc… I also turned alerts off, I do not need an alert for every vehicle that passes by.

Even with sensitivity at 100% I rarely see the Person indicator. When a person sets off a clip, maybe 2% show the indicator. Maybe 3% at 100% sensitivity. I can’t remember the last time we generated a clip walking by. The clip generates after we move a vehicle.

[jweg]

Thanks Isaiah. So is there a correlation between how far the camera is and detection sensitivity?

[Brlepage]

What @isaiah58 said is perfect! If possible, try moving the cam closer.

[sodcam]

@jweg

And to change the detection settings for the bugs, what would you change exactly?

It’s a tough one, at least in the summer where I live. The bugs are big and love to fly so close to the cams that you’d almost have to turn motion detection completely off to miss them.

You can turn off motion alerts and leave Person alerts on, so it’s less annoying, but you still have the 5 minute cooldown between every event.

The PIR detection system on the new Wyze Outdoor cam should be better at eliminating these false positives than the pixel based detection on the V2 / Pan.

There is also a Wishlist item where you can vote to fix the “fast moving and irrelevant objects” issue here:

Ignore Motion Detection for events under X seconds

I have this feature on my Dlink cameras, and its very helpful at night, when bugs / rain / snow fly past the view outdoors. Its a simple check box that notes that it wont send alerts for detection lasting less than 1s. figured it would be pretty simple to implement and would save us outward looking users lots of non-events.

[isaiah58]

From what I have read, the V2 is designed for indoor use so is not really set up to detect people 30 feet away. I think 20 feet is pushing it.

If you have enough light outside, turn off the IR. I am in a condo so shoot thru a window. I have to keep the IR off, otherwise it reflects off the window. By turning it off, it keeps your V2 cam less visible to people anyways. I think this also eliminates some of the bugs being either attracted or being detected.

I keep a 32gb card in the V2. I just use the App for the live feed, or to go back and review things and edit out a block of video if needed. The 12 second clips are OK. Most of what I check on is related to noise outside.

The higher the sensitivity, the more things you will pick up, not the less. In theory, you could piggy back a V2 next to or near a WOC. Use the WOC around the clock, use the V2 for 24 hour footage. That’s under $100 for both units fully set up, less if the V2 can be in doors. Not a bad combination seeing the WOC apparently has the better detection capability.

I think, eventually, we will be able to configure some interesting triggers. Like if a WOC detects movement, trigger a light to come on, trigger a V2 somewhere else to do something.

[Customer]

@jweg

I have enrolled in the CMC service and Person Pilot program as well.

Did no one point out that these two services are still incompatible?

[Brlepage]

Completely forgot! Thanks @Customer!

[Brlepage]

@isaiah58

I think, eventually, we will be able to configure some interesting triggers. Like if a WOC detects movement, trigger a light to come on, trigger a V2 somewhere else to do something.

A way to do this currently would be to place a PIR motion sensor closer to the area you want to capture and then set the camera to record when that detects motion.

[jweg]

Thanks! I guess due to the fact that my cameras are 20-30 ft away from people, turning off motion alerts won’t help if person isn’t being recognized anyway. It seems to be recording more motion alerts when people are there, but yeah it’s getting the bugs and some shadow changes too…

[jweg]

What is incompatible between the two?

[Brlepage]

You can’t use person detection and CMC at the same time.
I know this is kind of a letdown but Wyze is working on it!

[jweg]

Prison detection? Hahaha. That would be an interesting feature!
So I have micro SD cards in each camera and enrolled in the CMC trial…
Should I not proceed with CMC after the trial is over? Will that produce more accurate person detection results?

[Brlepage]

@jweg

Prison detection? Hahaha.

Good catch🙂 I’ll fix that now!

@jweg

Should I not proceed with CMC after the trial is over? Will that produce more accurate person detection results?

Person detection doesn’t work with CMC so you’ll have better results with using a SD card. I use a SD card and I don’t get a lot of false notifications and/or recordings.

[jweg]

Ok cool. So I’ll just wait till the CMC trial ends and then test it out. Thanks!

[isaiah58]

With the PIR, I believe you are talking about the Wyze motion sensor, there is no way to set a detection zone or sensitivity. I’d be getting triggers for everything in the world going on.

Most of what we are discussing is hypothetical anyways. I look forward to testing things out.

[Customer]

Well sure there is. Unlike with camera based detection you can angle the PIR to steer its detection zone / sensitivity in an area (without regard to image capture).

Edit: left out the most obvious part; the sensor doesn’t have to be anywhere near the camera, in any plane. Also, fixed the damned autocorrect of “its”.

[sodcam]

@isaiah58

With the PIR, I believe you are talking about the Wyze motion sensor, there is no way to set a detection zone or sensitivity.

In addition to the aiming that @Customer mentioned, people far more clever than I have come up with ways alter the sensitivity with a translucent mask made from a milk jug and to set the detection zone with a toilet paper tube

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