July 2011 - Integrated CCTV

IntegratedCCTV – Tell us what you think!

Seems like our BlogAdmin has been provoking some stimulating feedback recently on Twitter!

Well, he’s gone off on his jolly’s for a couple of weeks, leaving the helm with us instead!

We here at IntegratedCCTV simply want to use this Blog as a sounding board for our OPINIONS regarding the state and position of our industry – sure, as has been levelled at us, we are UK based, we may not be the most advanced country in the World for adopting the latest and greatest technology, but this does not mean we do not have an opinion to offer.

Every country region has its own level of expertise and product take up – this happens in any industry with any technology.

We, as UK residents, have been accused of lagging behind in IP take-up – this is not without foundation and probably quite true. I wouldn’t say that its not without trying, but when a professional installation industry is hell bent on sticking to copper, then IP is always going to be the domain of the IT industry to move into the Security industry for the technology to gain traction.

Whilst talking about ‘lagging’ behind, we should really exploit our considerably better nationwide ADSL/Cable infrastructure to improve our IP CCTV market – countries like the US are actually lagging behind us with slower and more expensive internet connections, yet their IP take-up is higher than ours.

Perhaps countries like the US are simply able to adopt what’s new and interesting better than we can? Maybe we in the UK hang on until something has been tried, tested and actually reliable?

And, on the subject of feedback, it would appear that we are also criticised about our presentation and grammar here on IntegratedCCTV. For my part, I cannot see the relevance or importance of this within an informal blog – the purpose being to lay down our thoughts and yes, our musings. Whilst some may think we are some form of ‘authoritative voice’ we are not, we are merely looking to impart thought and word. Unlike many, we do not charge for the information we like to bring and long may that continue.

So, whilst we appreciate criticism, it should be constructive and polite – you know the saying, if you can do better………..

Paxton access control managing director to leave

Paxton the access control specialist have just released the following statement

Drew Hoggatt, our Managing Director, is leaving the company on 29^th July to pursue his own interests and develop his company EcoMicro Ltd. We part very amicably with agreements to promote each other’s interest without competing.

We have been preparing this transition for 12 months and I am happy to announce that Adam Stroud and Paul Rawlinson are taking over from Drew as Joint Managing Directors. They will each be responsible for specific areas of the company: nearly all of which they have been in charge of for some time now.

It’s an exciting time for Paxton. We are on the verge of some significant product announcements and we are seeing substantial sales growth in the UK and overseas. We aim to continue our philosophy of providing industry leading products and customer support. As always, we will be looking for ways to improve further on what we do.

more news to follow on this .

CCTV facial recognition and access control using the WJ-NV200

Here is a thought . Could the next generation of access control be completely free of any kind of intervention from the subject being granted access through the door. Consider this, we will take a couple of Panasonic products from the iPro range and integrate these together in order that we may open doors. Using the Panasonic WV-SF346 vandal resistant dome camera and the WJ-NV200 NVR, the technology now exists to allow us to integrate doors into camera systems.

By using the facial recognition features with the WJ-NV200 we can open doors as a subject approaches. As long as his face is a match and he has access rights granted. So what type of advantages does this integrated access control system offer to the end user. No more expensive cards or tag systems. Video evidence of the time and date the subject passes through the door and simplicity with no expensive biometric readers or card readers. The route of facial recognition to open doors brings a high tec cost effective access control solution that many end users may buy into into. Just a thought!!!

HDCCTV is the future ..but why?

Yes….. well the big idea is that HDCCTV solutions will transform the CCTV industry. Where IP has failed, HDCCTV will succeed. The reason is simple. IP is the domain of the IT world. HD CCTV is the domain of the security world and that’s because its simple. More than that its a massive improvement on what we have had to endure with analogue CCTV over the last 30 years. The dream of CCTV and why it evolved in the first place was to read number plates, to see faces and identify criminals. The effect was supposed to deter crime. With HDCCTV this is now actually possible but with HDCCTV we still protect existing investment in the coax infrastructure. Relatively cheap but ultimately effective……….that’s why it will succeed……..

HD SDI CCTV

HD SDI CCTV is a new technology that will enable the CCTV industry to bring HD quality images to the masses. Unlike IP CCTV the existing coax infrastructure can be used , no new cabling is required to upgrade from analogue to HD. The industry is buzzing with this news. We have many thousands of miles of coaxial cable that is currently out there and it is only now that by using HD SDI CCTV we can use this coax to bring high quality HD images into the world of CCTV without huge costs involved to upgrade to IP.

So whats out there and who are the main players? Well HD CCTV Solutions and Everfocus both have offerings in the form of HD SDI DVR’s. HD SDI cameras were being proudly displayed at IFSEC this year on quite a few stands. Opinion is still split as to what HD SDI DVR will prove to be the best solution to sell here in the UK . Will it be better to sell a hybrid DVR that is able to record both HD SDI cameras and their analogue counterparts ? This would mean customers could do a partial upgrade rather than change their whole system to HD . The option to target areas for HD is appealing to many. This said full HDCCTV upgrades will not be out the question and there will be demand for an HD SDI DVR that is able to perform, record and produce clear crisp images that has been sought by CCTV installers and their customers for many years.

HDCCTV alliance

So what are the benefits of HD SDI CCTV over HD cameras run on IP networks? Well it really is the simplicity of the installation that makes it a winner . No need to re-train engineers and no need to run new cables, just plug and play. HDCCTV has long been the holy grail within the CCTV industry and it seemed that we had it with megapixel IP cameras albeit expensive and difficult to deploy. Now however, CCTV sales personnel will be falling over themselves to get this new technology in front of customers . Having seen the HD SDI CCTV in action I can vouch for the fact that it will sell its self during the dem part of the sale. Price is still important though and its not as cheap as we would like to to be as yet. Also we warn against using HDCCTV cameras outside at night .The CMOS version of the HD SDI camera is almost 3 times as cheap as it CCD equivalent , but you get what you pay for, so if you need quality night time views pay more for the CCD version, its worth it.

As for functionality HD SDI CCTV is very flexible. It can still be connected to remotely and will do anything a standard analogue DVR will do. However We now have a zoom facility that can give us more detail post event. Double the detail in fact. So where faces before were blurred with analogue now we have a chance to see who really did break into the yard or premises. This is the clincher because it was the biggest weakness with analogue CCTV and one that effectively renders the hundreds of thousands of analogue CCTV systems already out there , useless.

So HD SDI CCTV is about to come of age and there are many hundreds of thousands of customers out there who are ready to take up this technology sooner rather than later .