Features & Technology

Viewing Angles - Varifocal Lenses

You can change the viewing angle of a camera to make distant objects appear closer, to zoom in.

Using the image below, left, see that little black car in the top left corner, whats the registration number? The number plate is too small to read even when zoomed in.

A varifocal lens lets you set the camera viewing angle from wide (92 degrees) to a narrow view (23 degrees) and anywhere in between.

Doing this brings distant objects closer and therefore makes them clearer.

In the image on the right the little black car is shown with the camera lens zoomed in. You can now read the number plate, but at the cost of the wide angle view.

This is why a varifocal lens is best so you can set the best viewing angle for each location, not too wide and not too narrow.

View cameras on your TV or Computer monitor

There are several ways to get the recorder and cameras showing onto your television screens or a spare computer monitor. If the recorder is located close to the TV you can use a standard HDMI cable or a VGA computer cable to connect TV/monitor to the recorder If the recorder is not located close to the TV you could use extra long cables and a remote mouse for recorder control. Alternatively, if you have a Smart TV that uses the Android operating system you can download the app to the TV, or use a cheap Android box with the app.

Can I remotely access the cameras with my smartphone?

Yes, all of our cctv systems allow remote access, simply connect the recorder to your broadband internet, or use a 3G dongle if there is no internet at the location.You can then access the cameras live, and playback recordings using a smartphone or tablet device. Android and IOS devices are supported. Also you can use a Windows or Apple Mac computer to access the cameras using the software XIQ CMS, playback recordings and have full remote control of the recorder. Many customers install the recorder in the attic and remotely access it using their devices in the house and their phone when they are away from home Here is a link to the mobile ANDROID APP. Here is a link to the mobile IOS APP . This video shows the mobile app XIQ Mobile CMS.

This video shows the computer software XIQ CMS

Email Notifications

Our CCTV recorders will send out email notifications to let you know of motion activity being detected with a snapshot of the camera that detected the motion. The mobile app XIQ Mobile CMS can also give you push notifications to the home screen of your smartphone or tablet that takes you direct to the system when opened.

Cloud Storage

Our CCTV Systems can send snapshot still images to a Dropbox account, these images can be sent whenever motion is detected, or you can set it up to send an image at a timed interval. At present sending high definition video images of 25 frames per second from multiple HD cameras to a remote network server is not viable for 99% of UK customers, there simply is not the network bandwidth available to most people.

Night vision

All our cameras have on-board IR LEDs which enable them to provide clear black and white images when it goes dark. Our cameras have between up to 180 metres Night vision range - we think that's pretty impressive. Have a look at a few night snapshots below taken using our cameras:

Starlight

Starlight technology is the gold standard in low light video performance. It provides clear and relevant images regardless of lighting conditions, time-of-day or object movement. Our cameras that feature Starlight technology can deliver detailed monochrome images where other cameras show no image at all, substantially improving levels of security.

Facial Recognition

Both HD 1080P and 5 Megapixel Systems are clear enough for facial recognition - View the video below for actual 4MP footage from our cameras.

NPR - Number Plate Recognition

During the daytime it is not a major problem to read number plates, all you need to do is set up a camera to capture the plate, make the number plate as large as possible on screen and it will capture it, if the camera viewing angle is too wide the number plate will be too small and will not be readable.

Night time number plates is a different story… what happens is the Infra Red light that the camera gives out bounces back off the plastic plate and shows on screen as a white glowing rectangle. This is why on motorways where there are cameras there are lights.

There are specialised number plate cameras available but these are costly and more importantly they are only useful for capturing number plates, they achieve the number plate capture by dimming down the whole picture by closing the iris so much that the plate becomes readable, but this darkened picture makes them useless as a general purpose security camera.

The best solution for capturing number plates at night is a three point method… light it up, slow it down and zoom it in. Light up the car with a security light, this switches the camera to daytime mode, slow the car down with traffic calming methods to reduce image blur as much as possible and zoom it in, make sure the number plate fills a significant portion of the overall screen, doing all three of these will capture number plates, doing any less than the three things will reduce the chances of capturing a plate 100% of the time.