Questions from a new owner of A119 V3

[StR]

Hi all!

I've just purchased a new A119 v3 camera, and I have a few questions:

1. During the night, all license plates on the video appear blown out (all white): they seem to be too reflective. CPR doesn't seem to have any effect on that. Is this normal or do I have a bad camera? (see the snapshot)

2. During the night time the camera constantly catches a reflection of the console display (radio etc.) in the windshield (see the snapshot). (CPR doesn't seem to have any effect) Any suggestions?

3. I see that while I was setting it up, I must have pushed some button and ended up having two photos in DCIM/Photo. How can you take a still shot? (I was not doing any time-series) I couldn't find that option in the manual.

4. Is there a way to save a frame from within the camera, without attaching the camera to a computer?

 

[LateralNW]

Welcome @StR .
1. Yes this does happen. I don’t have a solution. Reduce the exposure value.
2. Your dash cam looks like it is pointing towards the sky rather than the road. Consider pointing the Dash cam with 1/3rd for the sky.
Changing this may remove the dashboards reflections.
What kind of car is it? Interesting problem.

3. I think tapping the capture button will do this. I longer press captures the video.

4. Not that I’m aware of. I’m curious how would this be used.

Cheers.

 

[VIOFO-Support]

Hello @StR,

1. Please try to reduce the exposure value first as @LateralNW said. Please tell me what's the current firmware in your dashcam. I'll see if there is a firmware that can help improve.

2. I also agree on this with @LateralNW. Rotate the front cam's lens a bit down to ensure it record more ground.

 

[StR]

Thank you for the suggestions, @LateralNW !
Let me share some thoughts about them.

1. Reducing exposure... Unfortunately, that would reduce exposure for all time. Right now, the daytime exposure seems to be perfect.
In principle, enabling HDR could do the job (that's what HDR [high dynamic range] is for - to be able to catch the shadows and highlights at the same time. However, I am not sure how that is implemented in these cams: it may (or may not) reduce the resolution of the image by adding motion blur if it effectively takes successive images at different levels of sensitivity, combining them in one frame.
I can experiment, but I thought someone here might have done that already.

2. That has been adjusted since that screenshot (also, I cut off the bottom of the screenshot for the privacy reasons). I don't think that solves the reflection issue.
The car is Hyundai Sonata.

3. Never mind, I've found it. After your response (thank you, it was helpful!), I've found that "Menu" button in recording mode captures a photo.

4. When you are in the middle of the road and don't have a laptop with you, - it would be nice to save a frame from the already recorded video into a JPEG file, which you can then quickly load on your phone from the SD card, and zoom in to look, say at the license plate number.

I got interrupted before I could send this response, and I just noticed suggestions from @VIOFO-Support, thank you as well!
Sorry, I suspect my questions #3 and #4 were not clear enough. I hope my comments above clarify what I was looking for.

To answer your question, the firmware is just one update behind the latest version. I don't remember the number and I am away from my car at the moment; as far as I remember it was from March (or April) of 2021.

 

[Kremmen]

The only way to capture a photo from an existing video is on a PC. I do it a lot.

The night time white number plates seem to be an unfortunate side effect of newer brighter headlights. My previous car with halogen headlights in lit urban roads would often capture plates at urban speeds but newer LED headlights do tend to wash out number plates.

 

[LateralNW]

Thank you for the suggestions, @LateralNW !
Let me share some thoughts about them.

1. Reducing exposure... Unfortunately, that would reduce exposure for all time. Right now, the daytime exposure seems to be perfect.

Yeah that was in the back of my mind. If you only drive at night not such an issue

2. That has been adjusted since that screenshot (also, I cut off the bottom of the screenshot for the privacy reasons). I don't think that solves the reflection issue.
The car is Hyundai Sonata.

I had a look at this model. Some models look like the console projects to the windscreen. Do you notice this just looking through the windscreen? Try brining the dashcam forward eg further down the screen.

3. Never mind, I've found it. After your response (thank you, it was helpful!), I've found that "Menu" button in recording mode captures a photo.

They changed the firmware and the button functions.

4. When you are in the middle of the road and don't have a laptop with you, - it would be nice to save a frame from the already recorded video into a JPEG file, which you can then quickly load on your phone from the SD card, and zoom in to look, say at the license plate number.

On other models of Viofo dashcam's you can Wi-Fi the footage to your phone. A129's A139 MT1 and coming soon T130. I use an adaptor as I don't have a TF card slot on my phone.
Doesn't directly help you but others who may read this post.

 

[Kremmen]

What I like about the Viofo A119 range is that I can easily lift the unit off the mount, bring the whole thing indoors and plug it into a USB port to offload the footage. No need to fiddle about with SD cards.

 

[LateralNW]

What I like about the Viofo A119 range is that I can easily lift the unit off the mount, bring the whole thing indoors and plug it into a USB port to offload the footage. No need to fiddle about with SD cards.

Used to do that until - and if you aren't organised forget it when you next use the car! I keep a spare TF card in the console.

 

[VIOFO-Support]

We recommend you turn on the HDR and see if there is an improvement.

The lens shall be adjusted to point much more downward. Please have a try on this.

 

[StR]

The night time white number plates seem to be an unfortunate side effect of newer brighter headlights. My previous car with halogen headlights in lit urban roads would often capture plates at urban speeds but newer LED headlights do tend to wash out number plates.

I have regular halogen headlights, not LED, and not even a "super-duper" version, but pretty much the basic ones.

 

[LateralNW]

I have regular halogen headlights, not LED, and not even a "super-duper" version, but pretty much the basic ones.

Jump across to this thread as it is discussing firmware that improves night number plate reading.

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/reviewing-footage-on-pc.45797/post-561041

 

[Nordi]

Hello. What cut-off voltage do you have set to HK3? At 11.8 V, I did not start the car, and at 12.2 V with medium traffic detection, the power cuts off before 24 hours. Has any of you set 12V? How is it working?

 

[LateralNW]

Hello. What cut-off voltage do you have set to HK3? At 11.8 V, I did not start the car, and at 12.2 V with medium traffic detection, the power cuts off before 24 hours. Has any of you set 12V? How is it working?

I set mine above 12V.
I need more information. Is your car using pollutant fuels or batteries.(Can't help if it is electric don't know enough about them.)
Does your engine stop start at traffic lights?
What size battery do you have.
Is it new/ish. What AH rating does it have. (Not the CCA)
How often do you use the car.
Long drives of short trips?

These questions help to work out if the dash cam should work as long as you expected ie 24hrs

Cheers

 

[Nordi]

Skoda Fabia. 1.2 gasoline. 50Ah battery. 440A. inrush current. NEW. Routes to work and return, a total of 10 km. Plus short, sporadic trips. Traffic detection parking mode. Sensitivity, medium. Parking FRONT to a busy street. When I set 12V to HK3, can I have problems with starting the car again?

 

[LateralNW]

If your battery is fully charged then I would expect you would get ~25 hours (50% of energy roughly 12.1V) use with a total drain of 1AH,
with a battery reading of 12.1V at the 25hr mark (this is the 50% point). The battery needs to be fully charge for this to work.

It also depends on the power shut off point. If set to 11.8v you may get longer use but you may also damage your battery if it is not charged enough. At 12.2 it may shut off before you get the most out of the battery.

There is some gestimets in this due to the exact battery specification. Different battery manufacturers use different ways in measuring there stats.

I didn't understand what you said here "At 11.8 V, I did not start the car"

Cheers

 

[StR]

Jump across to this thread as it is discussing firmware that improves night number plate reading.

https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/reviewing-footage-on-pc.45797/post-561041

That's an interesting, and potentially useful information!
Thanks a lot!

Skoda Fabia. 1.2 gasoline. 50Ah battery. 440A. inrush current. NEW. Routes to work and return, a total of 10 km. Plus short, sporadic trips. Traffic detection parking mode. Sensitivity, medium. Parking FRONT to a busy street. When I set 12V to HK3, can I have problems with starting the car again?

I don't know yet how much this dash cam consumes in the parking (or any other) mode.
So, let me share some more general thoughts that might be helpful to you.

With a 10km commute, you may or may not fully recharge your battery:
You have a fairly small car, with a small engine and small battery. You might be surprised (I was) how much current all the electronics, including your radio, headlights, cam, phone charger, etc. could be consuming. (And A/C takes away a lot of power as well.)
In some cases, that consumption can even exceed what the alternator in your idling car (or in slow-moving in a stop-and-go traffic) is producing [*]. (I remember CarTalk guys [cartalk.com] discussing this long time ago.)
So, you can experiment next time by turning off as many of the consuming devices as you can during your commute both ways, letting the battery to charge as much as possible, and then turning your cam on for the parking mode at home, and seeing how long it would last.


[*] I was also surprised how quickly a USB charger with 2-4 phones can drain the battery when the engine is turned off.

By the way, you might get a better response if you were to post your question in a separate thread, with its own subject.

 

[Kremmen]

Back in March 2007 my new car came with a battery that had a charge state see through window. We all know that dealers don't fully charge batteries so I kept a weekly eye on the window.

At that time my daily commute was 21 miles / 34 km each way.

It took 6 weeks before the charge window changed colour to indicate it was fully charged. In March I would have been using headlights, heater, radio and SatNav for traffic.

 

[Cirrus]

The screen of my removable center mounted satnav also appeared in the night imagery when I set the satnav screen at the optimum viewing angle. Reflections were somewhat dimmer than @StR's above example though.
I got completely rid of the satnav screen reflection by using 2560 x 1080P (21:9) instead of 2560 x 1440P.

I prefer the 2560 x 1080 aspect ratio anyway, mainly because it records less sky.

 

[JockoT]

I do not have the 2560 x 1080 opinion. Take it I need to update to the latest firmware to get that.

 

[StR]

I prefer the 2560 x 1080 aspect ratio anyway, mainly because it records less sky.

Then, you might not record a meteor expoding in the sky, should that happen, - like it was with the "Chelyabinsk meteor" in Russia in 2013: