Total cctv novice help needed with my HiLook system please

[badayuni92]

I am a total novice to the cctv world and following a series of break ins on my street I have had to have cctv installed.

I have had 4 x hilook ipc-t259h cameras installed with a hilook 4k, 4 channel nvr

I am desperately in need of some help with the general settings. I sort of understand the basic settings but I have some questions and would be grateful for any assistance.

1. The camera and nvr can use h265+ encoding. Is it okay to do so? Is there any reported issues when compressing the data this much?

2. To get the best balance of picture and to minimise blur is a shutter speed of 1/25 suitable or is this to slow? Should I change this to 1/50? 2 cameras face my front door overlooking a busy street. I want to clearly be able to see anyone that approaches my door.

3. I am running the cameras at their native res of 5mp but it only records at 15fps and the footage doesn't appear to be that smooth. Would you recommend reducing the resolution to 4mp so I can run the cameras at 20fps. Are there any other settings I can change whilst running 15fps to make the video smoother

4. If using h265 what should the max bitrate be set to please?

5. I have set wdr at 15 and this seems to get the best quality but appears to distort colours any ideas why?

6. Are there any general settings you can recommend for me to get the best picture quality? Including for contrast, smoothness. To capture the best picture at video and at night.

Thanks so much for your help

 

[Kyle]

Hi @badayuni92

1. The camera and nvr can use h265+ encoding. Is it okay to do so? Is there any reported issues when compressing the data this much?

It's generally OK, but we have seen issues with the video on Hikvision cameras in complex scenes when using H.265+ and many choose to stick with H.265. Also, if your HiLook models are the same as the other Hikvision cameras, then you will not be able to use some of the smart events with H.265+.

2. To get the best balance of picture and to minimise blur is a shutter speed of 1/25 suitable or is this to slow? Should I change this to 1/50? 2 cameras face my front door overlooking a busy street. I want to clearly be able to see anyone that approaches my door.

1/25 should be OK. As they're ColorVu cameras and rely on the light available in the scene, you could try 1/12 which is the default exposure time and will give you a brighter/more colourful image generally. However, you will likely see alot of motion blur with it set this slow (and maybe even at 1/25), in which case try 1/50 or higher - check your footage back in the playback menu and the motion blur should become obvious on anybody in the scene.

3. I am running the cameras at their native res of 5mp but it only records at 15fps and the footage doesn't appear to be that smooth. Would you recommend reducing the resolution to 4mp so I can run the cameras at 20fps. Are there any other settings I can change whilst running 15fps to make the video smoother

Upping the frame rate as you say is the key setting for getting a smoother video. H.265 encoding could also help here. The IP ColorVU turret cameras are all 4MP and still popular, so you may find this resolution is fine.

4. If using h265 what should the max bitrate be set to please?

H.265 (and H.265+):
5MP (15fps) - 2304
4MP (20fps) - 3072

5. I have set wdr at 15 and this seems to get the best quality but appears to distort colours any ideas why?

Sorry - I'm not familiar with the HiLook range so am not too sure. I've looked at the datasheets for your cameras and NVR, and the cameras do not look to have 'true WDR' like the more expensive models, so my guess is that the distorion is a result of them using digital WDR.
True WDR is when the camera captures the an image in multiple different exposures, and combines them to capture both the bright and darker areas in better detail. Digital WDR means that only one exposure is used, and that the darker parts of the image are brightened by software.

6. Are there any general settings you can recommend for me to get the best picture quality? Including for contrast, smoothness. To capture the best picture at video and at night.

It's really a process of trial and error until you find the best performance in your particular scene. However, this thread has lots of helpful suggestions in it for these settings on ColorVu cameras:

HikVision ColorVu DS-2CD2347G1-LU - What's your favorite Image settings?

Hi Guys, I just registered to say Thank You! I was able to resolve several questions I had about the DS-2CD2347G1-LU ColorVu camera and this forum was the only one that was really helpful to me. As I'm getting used to the camera, I would love to hear from you about your favorite Image...

www.use-ip.co.uk

Hope that helps a bit