Thinkware Internal IR Camera

TJVideo

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Dash Cam
Thinkware F800 Pro, Vantrue N2 Pro, T-Eye ADR-3000,168CarDVR
I apologise in advance if there is a thread on the Thinkware Internal IR Camera. I am not able to find one at this time, but please point me in the direction of any other threads on this subject if they do exist.

Due to a recent incident involving my car being damaged, I am seriously considering purchasing one or two internal IR cameras. I know one will fit my Thinkware F800 Pro, but I need the rear window dash cam attached too.

My first question is, would I be able to connect the IR camera's to any 12v dvr system available on the market today? I do realise that I would need to find a system that would pick up vibration in some way and work on a time or voltage basis so that the battery doesn't go flat. (Alternatively, I could find another power supply.)

I really need to think this through. I have seen a few helpful threads here about where to place dash cams etc. I have also noted that there is an alternative 4 channel camera made by another company that has recently been released, but the camera's are designed to fit to the outside of the vehicle, which to me is a bit pointless for a smaller vehicle, unless you are with the vehicle 24 hours a day. (The cameras can be easily damaged)

I suppose I could connect the Thinkware IR camera to my F800 Pro at night to record in complete darkness. I am not sure how well it would work to record around the outside of the car. For example, placing the cameras on either the side windows or in the centre of the vehicle, on the ceiling, facing outwards. All of these ideas I need to test.

My second question is: Has anyone tried to use the Thinkware IR camera to record through the window of a car, filming around the car instead of inside of the car at night? If so, please could you share your ideas and views on this.

Thank you.

Tony.
 
There isn't an IR Camera for the F800 Pro and they have no plans to release one. We had a bit of a play as someone wanted to use one as a internal camera and we got good results as it's very good in low light anyway but it needs a little light. We put my little Smart in our spare storage area covered the windows a bit with bags and then turned off the lights and it worked well.

I doubt you could connect any camera to a dash cam, i think it would have to be the correct one (definitely with Thinkware that's for sure) Also an IR camera doesn't usually see through glass as the IR reflects off of it and 'whites' out the picture. It's not a very easy request what you are trying to do without spending serious money or spending hours in fitting!
 

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There isn't an IR Camera for the F800 Pro and they have no plans to release one. We had a bit of a play as someone wanted to use one as a internal camera and we got good results as it's very good in low light anyway but it needs a little light. We put my little Smart in our spare storage area covered the windows a bit with bags and then turned off the lights and it worked well.

I doubt you could connect any camera to a dash cam, i think it would have to be the correct one (definitely with Thinkware that's for sure) Also an IR camera doesn't usually see through glass as the IR reflects off of it and 'whites' out the picture. It's not a very easy request what you are trying to do without spending serious money or spending hours in fitting!

Hi,

Thank you for confirming that the IR camera is not compatible with the F800 Pro. This has just saved me some money. I didn't realise that the F800 Pro was not compatible with the IR camera so thank you for this valuable information. :)

The photos show the car windows being covered, but I can't see any footage from the camera.

I do have a few options. I did buy a very cheap camera, that is no longer available, that uses Starlight Night-Vision Technology. It gives stunning night-time footage in pretty much complete darkness but the camera itself is not made to very high standards like the Thinkware camera's are. I don't know how they get such clarity because there are no IR's showing on the camera. Viewing through glass is not an issue at all with that camera. I also have a local company who install 4 channel taxi camera's, but again, as far as I can tell, they are not as advanced as the Thinkware F800 Pro.

As most crime is carried out at night time, it would make sense for someone to develop a camera that can actually film people damaging the car at night, especially from the side. A fisheye effect has been used in the past and has worked quite well to get a wider angle. Most dash cams concentrate on the driving aspect, meaning forward and rear views only. Mind you, with this being said, if a car was stationery, how would an accident from the side of the car be caught on camera if the camera's are front and rear facing only.

I do understand that this all costs big money to produce, and I also appreciate that a lot of work and time goes into producing the product. If there is at least one company who develops such a thing to protect someone's car, fleet of cars, or pride and joy at night then I am assuming that there would be a market for it? As an example, speaking to the police today about the incident that happened to my car from the side of the vehicle, although local people can identify the person, the Police did suggest that they need clearer footage and that if dash cam companies provided clearer night vision camera's then they would be able to convict many more people. Had I been using the other camera then a conviction could possibly have been made.
 
Though I haven't had the chance to implement and experiment with it, I think an IR cam in the car would work OK with an IR illumination source outside the car. If someone knows for sure I hope they will share that :D My illuminator is a cheap LED job made for IP cams, about $5, so even if it were vandalized I'd still have vids of them beginning to do that as they would not be able to see it functioning and would not know there was a camera going ;)

If there's any light at all, some of the cams using the Sony Exmor sensor might be enough for your needs. The 2 I have are at least good enough to cause a conformation of the ID of a known suspect up close and maybe better- but they still need some light to do that, just not a lot :cool:

Phil
 
Hmm.

I need an IR cam for inside of my cabin at night too. I was watching YouTube and the upcoming F100 looks interesting.
f100-ir.png


Code:
https://youtu.be/mb30FteugHc?t=602

f100-2017.png


Not sure why the F800 Pro doesn't offer the Rear IR camera and the protective casing since it's the top of the line version.
 
It did surprise me too why the F800 Pro doesn't offer the Rear IR camera since it's the top of the line version, but the F800 does.

I will keep looking around for ideas. I have suggested creating a camera just for night vision to be used on it's own, or as a dual system, to a friend who is into electronics etc, based on a discontinued camera that performs extremely well in complete darkness. It is early days and it will probably take quite a while to develop.
 
It did surprise me too why the F800 Pro doesn't offer the Rear IR camera since it's the top of the line version, but the F800 does.

I will keep looking around for ideas. I have suggested creating a camera just for night vision to be used on it's own, or as a dual system, to a friend who is into electronics etc, based on a discontinued camera that performs extremely well in complete darkness. It is early days and it will probably take quite a while to develop.

I failed my Signals and Systems class and dropped out of Engineering school back in the day but after reading this forum, it makes me want to go back and even do a senior project on making a dashcam =_=.

I guess the F800 Pro's rear camera is pretty decent without the IR features. Here's a video of what it looks like inside my car in almost pitch black (some lighting very high up on the building roof 20 feet away or from a Light Poll somewhere... I think).
http://vietpho.net/f800pro/in-cabin-rear/rear-cam-night-time.MP4

Speaking of Light Polls, I uploaded another front + rear RAW footage of a night (morning but looks dark) time parking lot. The camera is super clear. If you look closely at my rear camera it even caught the license plate of that red truck on the right through my 35% window tint.
http://vietpho.net/f800pro/night-parking-lightpolls/


But I think once the F100 comes I will have a better 4 channel option.
 
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That's a pretty good angle. I have my rear view camera facing out of the back window, luckily. That's how I caught the idiot who damaged the car. The police however would rather have the camera on the roof or in the doors I think so that every detail can be caught on camera. I did see a good idea about placing small cameras in the wing mirrors.

A lesson learnt from my experience this week, where I live anyway, is that dash cams are useless unless the image is crystal clear and the camera catches every detail of the crime committed.

This means that any criminal damage that is not seen by the camera can't be used as strong evidence in court, even if it is obvious that it was done by someone by the sound of the damage being caused and the person walking away from the car.

That's life I guess.
 
It did surprise me too why the F800 Pro doesn't offer the Rear IR camera since it's the top of the line version, but the F800 does.

F800 doesn't have an IR option yet either
 
It is surprising that the IR camera that Thinkware already have is not compatible as it looks like a good camera.
 
It is a good camera but due to the different hardware inside the F800 range won't recognise it and the front cam will constantly reboot.
 
WOW! I just found this.
F100 IR looks very good. I normally look for an internal camera that can show the driver and passenger windows too, but the quality of this footage for the F100 IR looks very clear.
 
I found another cam that has 1080p ir but the image is not as bright. The angle is slightly wider though.

I do have one concern about the cable length between the two F100 camera's. As I already have the F800 Pro, my idea was to place the front camera of the F100 in the rear of the car, facing the front, to film inside the car from the rear window and the IR camera on the windscreen, facing into the car so it can film everyone inside the car at night. I am guessing that the Thinkware camera with the IR package will only have a limited length of wire between the two camera's.

An ideal set up would be to have two camera's filming down the sides of the car with a good night quality image.
 
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I spend a lot of money to upgrade my dash cam to f800 pro and now don't have the ir camera for my taxi, this is my last thinkware dash cam for sure.
 
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I spend a lot of money to upgrade my dash cam to f800 pro and now don't have the ir camera for my taxi, this is my last thinkware dash cam fo sure.
I ended up getting the Vantrue N2 Pro Dual Dash Cam for the interior. You need to fiddle around with the positioning of it though to find the best place to put it without the rear view mirror getting in the way. It uses a suction cup mount which is a bit big for my car. Ideally it would be good to place it above the rear view mirror, but it's not possible. The best place I could find for it was where my Thinkware F800 Pro is, but I didn't want to mess up the setup of the Thinkware and it is the best place for the Thinkware to be too. I have settled for the centre of the passenger side of the windscreen for the Vantrue for now.
I must admit that you would think that the F800 Pro would have an additional option for IR as mentioned before. I still say that the Thinkware is one of the best cameras out there for parking mode and video quality. I have not tested the Vantrue for parking. I know I can't leave both of them on at the moment for very long before the battery runs flat so I turn the Vantrue off if I am away from the car for more than 10 minutes and let the Thinkware do it's job.

I think maybe the Thinkware F100 would be better for Taxi's? It's a lot cheaper too!
Thinkware F100

I guess it really depends on choice and if you want the rear window camera, which I must say has come in handy for me. I am surprised that a 3 way camera has not been designed yet. Front, Rear and Internal. (Maybe it has but I have not seen it)
 
I ended up getting the Vantrue N2 Pro Dual Dash Cam for the interior. [...]

I think maybe the Thinkware F100 would be better for Taxi's? It's a lot cheaper too!
Thinkware F100

What's taking @BlackboxMyCar so long to get the IR rear camera option on their website? DashCamBros have it but I rather stick to 1 website to buy all of my DashCams. I bought my F800 Pro from BlackBoxMyCar a while back.

I'm thinking about getting the Thinkware F100 + Rear Infrared + the Thinkware hardwire kit.

How are you liking the Vantrue N2 Pro ? Do you have any videos? The suction mount style dashcams look a bit bulky.
 
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What's taking BlackBoxMyCar so long to get the IR rear camera option on their website? DashCamBros have it but I rather stick to 1 website to buy all of my DashCams. I bought my F800 Pro from BlackBoxMyCar a while back.

I'm thinking about getting the Thinkware F100 + Rear Infrared + the Thinkware hardwire kit.

best to tag them if you want to find out, @BlackboxMyCar I'm sure they'll let you know
 
What's taking @BlackboxMyCar so long to get the IR rear camera option on their website? DashCamBros have it but I rather stick to 1 website to buy all of my DashCams. I bought my F800 Pro from BlackBoxMyCar a while back.

I'm thinking about getting the Thinkware F100 + Rear Infrared + the Thinkware hardwire kit.

How are you liking the Vantrue N2 Pro ? Do you have any videos? The suction mount style dashcams look a bit bulky.

Were you referring to the F800 IR camera? I don't believe that is available yet. As for the F100 I'll take a look into that for you.

Jimmy @ BlackboxMyCar
 
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How are you liking the Vantrue N2 Pro ? Do you have any videos? The suction mount style dashcams look a bit bulky.

It's a nice camera, but the suction mount is too bulky and the colours aren't perfect. It gives a slight blue tint with the front camera. I would recommend it though. The night time recording is very good. I was going to do a review on it when I got time, but I noticed that everything I was going to say about it has already been said by others apart from the double clicking the record button to record video footage manually. I will post it in a Vantrue N2 Pro forum when I get enough video footage. There are some really good videos on YouTube. The internal IR on the Vantrue N2 Pro is very good. From the footage that I have seen, it looks like the Thinkware F100 IR is good too. I opted for the Vantrue because I didn't want loads of camera's on my windscreen as I already have the Thinkware F800 Pro. If Thinkware did a standalone internal camera or a compact dual camera then I would of probably purchased from Thinkware because the F800 Pro is an amazing camera. Mind you, with the bulkiness of the N2 Pro suction mount and awkward positioning, I might of been better off with the F100. I guess it depends on your car and what you like.

I hope this helps a bit.

Tony.
 
F100 IR looks very good

For sure that's how a cabin camera should be, it do however look like it is B&W all the time, not that it matter to me personally but it would have been nice if it was color in the daytime.
But that's not a deal breaker for me.

OT: and i like the level of spagetti in thet car :giggle: no doubt its a dashcam test vehicle.
 
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