Recommendations for webcams?

[Kurt Veltman]

My daughter is on a sleep apnea monitor, and I would like to monitor what she does while she sleeps. I have been told that some webcams might have time-lapse software that comes with them. Anyone have suggestions on what are good webcams for a reasonable price, or what one to stay away from?

[Steven Wilson]

CCTV is what I do for a living. Your not realy looking for "time lapse". Thats when a frame is saved at a specific time interval. You would be better served with a DVR set up to record on activity, or better yet if the monitor has an alarm output. DVR's can be had for cheep on the web especialy since you don't need alot of memory(150g will record for about a week with one camera) Everfocus and Speco are my favorites to work with- DedicatedMicros, Honeywell, Pelco if you want high end. Nuvico are making some real nice cameras for the money right now. If you go this way and need help setting it up I would be glad to help.
Steven

[Kurt Veltman]

Steven, thanks for the input. Money is a BIG issue right now, so if I can just buy a webcam and use my laptop to record onto, I think that would be the cheapest way for me to go. As for the time-lapse thing, I don't need to record every second, but want to get an overview of what is going on, so I don't have 10 hrs of video to wade through to see whats happening. What are the price ranges of the cameras you mentioned?

[Jim McConkey]

Don't forget that most webcams require light to see by, and your daughter will probably prefer sleeping in the dark! Find an inexpensive infrared (IR) webcam. The image sensors used in webcams are thankfully about as sensitive in the IR range as they are to visible light. Just Google "IR Webcam" and you will find several (Airlink and others) as low as $15. You are generally not stuck with the factory software. There are 3rd party softwares, like the freeware YAWCAM (Yet Another WebCAM software), that have a lot of features like motion detection and time lapse captures. The motion detection trigger might be what you need to keep you from having to watch hours of sleeping to find where she jerks as she coughs or gasps.

[Kurt Veltman]

Thanks for the tips Jim. I found one software that looked like it might work, but it seemed like they wanted to be connected to me/my computer when I used the software, and I don't need to give anyone that kind of access to my world.

[Steven Wilson]

You definetly would want an IR camera. An other option would be a camera with a built in dvr. They record to removable cards so you can get the memory size you need. They are normaly covert and used as "nanny cams".

[Jim McConkey]

Stephen, you probably are used to dealing with higher level equipment. but do you know of any inexpensive 4+ channel wireless camera systems that will operate well over a 300-400' range, preferably weatherproof? IR lighting would be nice, but I can always add that. We have a pie in the sky project to put pony cams in our barns and run-ins so we can remotely check on our horses' sleep apnea. <g>

[Steven Wilson]

Jim
We haven't had much luck with inexpensive wireless cameras. We replaced alot of systems customers have installed them selves. I've seen some that claim 800' but the problem is thats "line-of-sight", the camera has to see the reciever with no obstuctions. Even trying to tranmit through a window will reduce that range. You can expect to $4000 for decent equipment that would work for your application. Look for someting in the 5.8GHz range.
A better solution for you might be to run a piece of cat 5 down to your barn. You can transmit video 2000' passively over a twisted pair. Cat 5 has 4 pairs.
Steven

[Jim McConkey]

Thanks, Steven! CAT-5 cable would be a very easy and simple solution, but the way the barn is wired as a subcircuit off the house, adding any other wired connection (video, phone, etc.) that would create a potential ground loop would be a code violation. I would have to rewire the barns with completely separate service, and that would just be prohibitively expensive. This is only an experiment anyway. We'll try some cheap, wireless cams and see how they work.