The image sensor IR led flash DOES work, I watched it flash, but it’s too dark. The quality of the captured image is sub par.
In am sitting right in front of the camera, and you can barely see me and I look like a ghost.
I guess there is nothing that can be done. You would think a $100 sensor designed to capture ir night vision images would be able to.
I’ll double check with Alarm.com and let you know but here is my current understanding of it.
The image sensor is designed for alarm verification, not to be a general purpose camera. It’s designed to show you there is a body in the picture, not to be a detailed picture to identify to person with. Comparing the image sensor to the Alarm.com HD video cameras, which are general purpose security cameras, isn’t a fair comparison.
The image sensor is only 320x240 pixels vs the HD Alarm.com cameras which are 1280x720 pixels. The small image size keeps cost down, conserves energy and enables the picture to be uploaded through the cell connection without taking too long in an alarm situation. The HD cameras upload their images via broadband.
The image sensor is battery powered so the IR lights don’t flash as bright the IR lights on an AC wall powered camera, to conserve battery life. The IR flash is the most energy consuming thing that the image sensors does.
Attached are a couple sample pics I took which are better but they’re at a shorter distance. Also keep in mind that in an alarm situation you’ll get 3 images so even though it’s kind of hard to see your body in the pic you took, it’s easy to see that a body has moved over several pictures.
I’ll let you know what ADC says about the problem though. They might have some inside knowledge I’m not aware of.
Unless your covering an entryway/bedroom sized room, night IR capture is for the most part, utterly useless on these Image Sensors.
I doubt I will be recommending/or purchasing anymore of these. Any user interested in image sensors would be better off going with pir1 and ADCV520IR rather than wasting money on the ADC IS.
A PIR1 and a ADCV520IR is definitely going to give a much better picture than an image sensor. The image sensor costs a lot less and continues to work even when your broadband Internet connection is down for example if the intruder cuts it before they break in.
Here are a couple daytime shots to compare. The image quality isn’t great even in the day time. The ADCV520IR is (1280720)/(320240) = 12 times better resolution than the image sensor!
Alarm.com confirmed that the reason the IR flash isn’t as bright as you might expect from a general purpose camera is to conserve battery life. The design goal was to average 1 year for battery replacement. If they increased the power of the IR flash it could mean changing batteries a lot more often.
Just to follow up on this… Using a $34 lowes (iris) zwave light to suppliment the ir flash overcomes the issue (Rule to turn on light during alarm event).
All Images at distance of approx 15’-20’
Image sensor daytime (peakin):
Image sensor infared peakin:
Image sensor infared peakin (with zwave light automation on):
