Wireless surveillance cameras - use, laws and ethics. | Where to Place a Wireless Surveillance Camera – Let the Light Guide You

Regardless the model wireless surveillance camera you own or the use you intend, there are variables which can render even the best equipment next to useless. A few frustrating attempts after setting up your camera may find you back at the store attempting to return it as defective when, in fact, the hardware was actually perfectly fine. Quite often, simply placing the camera in the appropriate location may be all it takes to render usable images. Let’s review some do’s and don’t’s.

One common lament is that images appear washed out or too dark. While even modestly priced wireless surveillance cameras automatically adjust for various lighting conditions, there are limits to what they can accomplish and scene complexity (think various lighting conditions, not clutter) can be a real headache.

If you are attempting to capture interior images such as with a nanny cam or a pet cam, avoid placing the camera so that it points directly at a window. In this image, the camera is pointed directly at a window and, during the day, is adjusting for the prevalent lighting in its view. The result is that the exterior view through the window is appropriately lit, but the interior is completely dark. You can make out the silhouette of a lamp, but little else. It’s not unlike wearing sunglasses.

When you’re outside, sunglasses help moderate the light your eyes receive. Walk into the interior of a building after being outside on a bright day while still wearing those sunglasses and you’re practically blind. Until your eyes adjust to the new lighting conditions, you’ll be lucky to see anything without taking those sunglasses off. Had you not yet gone out into that bright light and put on your sunglasses, the interior of the building would still be darkened by your stylish shades but not as dramatically as had you just walked in from the bright outdoors.

By angling the camera away from the bright window, the sensor adjusts for the new lighting conditions and the scene becomes properly lit. But even in this picture there’s a flaw that can be anything from a mild to moderate nuisance and that’s the glare from the window bleeding into the image. Even a sliver of light from the window is enough to cause this problem. Again, if possible, this can be avoided by eliminating the window entirely from view. Another option is to ensure that the unlit elements of the room such as the walls and furniture make up the majority of the scene. You’ll have to experiment, but this approach can “trick” your camera into adjusting its sensitivity for the predominant light level (the dim room) rather than for the small section of view that includes the window.

Not surprisingly, the reverse of this scenario can also cause problems. Let’s say you have an interior surveillance camera that happens to also capture what’s going on just outside your window to where your car is parked. The room gets plenty light and the camera works fine during the day, capturing both interior and exterior activity. One night, vandals damage your car. Justice will be served, you think, and review the camera footage. What you wind up with is a nice bright view of the interior of your home and a pitch black window with no view of what happened outside to your car.

Again, your eye is a near perfect analog here. If you have a dark section outside your home (an unlit back yard, for example) wait until night falls, ensure all the lights are on in your room and then take a look out the window. How much can you really see? Most likely, you can only see a reflection of the room you’re standing in. Even with that complex computer inside your skull compensating for what you now know is going on, you will still find it impossible to see more than a few feet beyond your window to the darkened yard beyond. There are two remedies for this. 1) Equalize the interior and exterior lighting conditions by either brightening the back yard or dimming the lights in the room. 2) Move your face right up to the window and shade your eyes from the light behind you. The exact same solutions would apply to your camera.

Regardless its ability to adjust to varying light conditions, there are limits to any camera. A day-light camera aimed directly at the sun outside your window will provide a completely washed-out image (if it isn’t destroyed entirely). Though rated to work in daylight, it can only take so much. A night-vision camera is even more sensitive to light. While it may do fine monitoring the exterior of a home, the bright wash of car headlights or a street lamp in its view may render it useless.

If you’ve bought a nanny cam in the hopes of keeping your babysitter honest, your focus will probably be on discreetly placing it where she won’t see it. Don’t let simple things such as a window ruin your whole effort. Avoid placing the camera opposite (and facing) windows where daylight or even light from cars at night can ruin your objective. Your best placement will be a discreet location facing into the room in the same (or nearly same) direction as the greatest source of light (be that sunlight through a window or a bright lamp in the room). Point your wireless surveillance camera directly at any light source and you’ll likely have nothing but audio for your money.

Obviously none of these issues are of concern with fake security cameras. Even should you opt for a mimic camera of some kind, ensure you do everything in your power to complete the illusion or it will be just as useless as a light-burnt legitimate camera.