Required 30 min or 1 hour mp4 files, 24+ hours capacity

Sooo glad I found this discussion. I'm in the same situation as I too use cameras for traffic counting. We have a camera system we pieced together over the years and its a huge, heavy and cumbersome PTZ camera running off of two 12v sealed batteries. Our goal is the same trying to record the files into 1 hr intervals for axle classification purposes. Reading what you have discovered sounds really hopeful.

If you don't mind could you share results of your system and how it turned out for you? I'm a newby when it comes to camera specs but pretty good with building the mounting hardware. We are in serious need of upgrading our system as the cameras are having constant firmware issues and loosing video segments within recorded files.
 
I'd be glad to help, if we're not direct competitors. What agency or company are with and where?

Sent from my SM-G935P using Tapatalk
 
I'm with a (edited) Transportation agency
 
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I just whipped up a little video about how to use "RV" to make a lot of small files into one big ass one.

Do not fear the little files, they are your minions to do with as you please, and with the right tool it is as easy as it get. :)

If you hit pause at 0:39 you will see 2 larger driving sessions at the top of the list, made up of 20 and 47 files.
There might as well only have been 1 driving session detected by "RV" if i had been on a really long drive where the camera/car was not stopped, then RV would only have found that 1 session on the SD card, and all i would have to do is right click on it and select save entire group, and it will then be output to 1 long file made up of however many 3 minute files a 64 Gb card can hold with this bitrate the camera use.

So if i was you guys i would use a low bitrate ( around 10 mbit ) that give more room on the memory card, but should still be good enough footage for you guys to determine what you need visually from the footage.
There is a bitrate calculator on the site which let you ballpark how much footage you can host at a given size memory - card.

And do note the yellow warnings ( corrupted files ), for some reason my Mobius 2 do that now so something i will have to look into right now.
Lucky thing is "RV" can fix those broken files too, at least most times it can
 
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Traffic-jam, sure. I'll get the information together for you - hopefully in the next couple of days. I'm with Fagan Consulting. We used to use DVRs, zoom cameras, and lead-acid batteries (or waterproof AC connectors). We have now used the dash-cam type setups on several AVD/AVC/LPIC audits. They are less expensive, run longer, are incredibly easy to set up, and the video is better and such easier to prepare for review. It's nothing but wins. Oh, and it's easy to swap lenses if needed.
 
Traffic-Jam, I just sent you a PM (forum conversation).

Regards,
Andrew (Drew) Lindsay
 
Traffic-Jam, please check out my PM and drop me an email.
Regards,
Andrew
 
I got the M2 running in my living room window aimed at the street below, stuffed in a 128 Gb memory card, set it to 1080/30 and lowest bitrate, H.264.

When that fill up i will see what sort of hours i can get using same settings but H.265 that the little mobius 2 also support.

Off course not much traffic on the street below, and it do get a little dark at night with just 1 street light every 50 Meters.
Still you should be able to see what kind of stuff go past down there.

Results in in 23 Hours.
 
kamkar1, be aware that the file sizes will vary quite a bit depending on the amount of activity being recorded. I've found that for very active roads that it will produce 15 minute files just shy of 1.5 gb at low data rate, 30 fps, 720p.
 
I just took a look at the camera, and i damn near fell off my computer chair :eek:

The camera have recorded for 24 hours strait and that dident even fill half of the 128Gb memory card ( the mobius 2 have the option to use VBR or CBR )

So every 3 minute file i have recorded is between 91 and 96 MB in size with a staggering low bitrate of only 4 mbit, and while the M2 is not optimized yet in firmwares the low bitrate is just killing low light performance.
Okay i just have a single street light in front of my apartment block, and i am told everything is bigger in the US, so maybe you have more light at least on intersections.

Anyway ATM my computer is processing the 482 files into one large one just to see how fast it can do that, and i have a daylight and low light examples set aside for you to see.

I would be tempted to put the full 24 hour file on youtube, just to see if it would take it :p but it is a 42 Gb upload after all.
 
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Okay the results are in.

It took my computer ( first generation intel core I7 3 GHZ ) 50 minutes compiling all the 3 minute files into one 24:03 hour file using registrator viewer.
Thats including "RV" loading and auto detecting the files on the SD card and bundling them up into one large file ready for export.
24HRV.jpg


And here is the 2 demo videos put on youtube, one daytime and one night time.


That daytime should work fine i think.

Its a whole other question with the night time footage of the M2, and this is made worse by the low bitrate used too.
I will make a test tonight with a slightly higher bitrate to see what that give of a result.


I should also say my windows have not been cleaned on the outside in over 2 years, cant afford a cleaner for 2 floor windows as it take more than a ladder like on 1 floor.
And to be honest personally i dont really care.
 
In my case, we've ended up just using the 15 minute files. A 30 minute or 60 minute file would be handy, but the time it takes to go through and merge every two or four files into one just isn't worth it. It takes less time overall to load and view two or four smaller files than it does to merge the smaller files and then view them.

The Mobius does require a higher bit rate if we need low light performance.
 
I am testing right now with a higher bitrate and B&W footage to see how it look when it get dark in a few hours.

I was thinking would video lapse be a option, time lapse video with a pic taken every second, i would assume things dont move that fast over thate that they get in and out of frame in under a second.

This should make footage take up less space, and should make it faster to manually go over it as every second of video you look at is actually 30 seconds wirth of pictures.
 
I have this IP camera core that also have onbord SD card, but unfortunatly i can not get that SD card slot to work, at least not recording anything my computer can play back.
But it is damn small and it have the Sony IMX 185 sensor that almost turn night into day.

This is unaided ( ir light ) footage from a IMX 185 camera on a dark roof in China, work well just with the light of the moon.

 
There is also the warrior G1S to consider it pack the IMX291 that also do well in low light.

 
For my project, we are committed to the Mobius and have already purchased seven along with accessories. Using time lapse is a great idea, but not an option for my use. The cameras are sometimes set close to the lanes and at highway speeds 1 second can allow a vehicle (&/or needed detail) to be missed. Still, the information you're providing my be very helpful to others. A 0.25 second time lapse might work, but would require significant modification to our viewing tool that syncs the video with with other data.
 
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Yeah if you are up close then things will get in and out of frame in no time.

Okay dident know you had other data sources too, that off course complicate things.

Anyway i an just throwing things out there, then people can take what they want. :)
 
You bet. All good ideas. They will help someone.

Yeah, in our case it's not just simple video viewing. If it were then RV would be a great tool.
 
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