SmartTiles: Video Camera Compatibility

Wiki Projects & Stories
, , , ,
263

Burn time! Burn! :fire:

264

give me sec… it’s not liking the new url.

265

Do you have the stream set up for public view? I think that is required.

266

I have taken a different route to implementing cameras on the SmartTiles dashboard.

I am running a Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials box, and I have installed Netcam Studio on it. I have added four FOSCAM C1 cameras to Netcam Studio, and configured the router to allow external access to the cameras only via the NCS application. I have created a guide on how I configured Netcam Studio on the Netcam Studio community site.

The C1s, like many of the FOSCAM HD cameras, support the snapPicture2 method. This is in the format:

http://{url}:{port}/cgi-bin/CGIProxy.fcgi?usr={username}&pwd={password}&cmd=snapPicture2

Whilst this is useful, and works perfectly well with SmartTiles, I didn’t want to have to poke a hole in my port forwarding rules for every single camera. Instead, I was able to use a feature built in to Netcam Studio to create a set of URLs that contain an authentication token.

  1. Remote Desktop into Server as an Administrator
  2. Open Netcam Studio Client and connect
  3. Select Settings, Generate HTML
  4. Select the “View only” user
  5. Select a sample source, such as 0
  6. From the displayed source code, copy down:
  • URL
  • Source
  • Token

This provides the following URL formats:

Static JPEG

http://{url}:{port}/jpeg/{source}?authToken={token}

Refreshed MJPEG

http://{url}:{port}/Mjpeg/{source}?authToken={token}

Live HTML5

http://{url}:{port}/Live/{source}?authToken={token}

Now, I only need to port forward 8100 to my server, and I can access these views from outside my network. In SmartTiles, under Video Streams, I add the mjpeg URLs. If that doesn’t work for some browsers, I add the jpeg URLs to the refreshing streams.

Netcam Studio is my NVR. It managed the cameras on a schedule, records things as needed, and even copied motion detection files to my Dropbox and Google Drive. It has a URL that enables me to view live, and manage recordings.

SmartTiles provides an instant snapshot of what is happening on the cameras at any given moment.

267

This is awesome, thanks for the write up. I’m using this perfectly to connect my DLink DCS-2330L to Smart Tiles using MJPEG

268

I was apparently naive thinking that ANY foscam camera would work for what we’re doing.

I have a C1 that requires a plugin. I see references to using VLC to turn this cam’s output into a Smarttiles compatible stream, but even reading http://www.engadget.com/2005/11/29/how-to-stream-almost-anything-using-vlc/ does not give me enough info to make it work.
I tried
http://192.168.0.33:88/index.htm/videostream.cgi?&user=UNAME&pwd=PWD
but that doesn’t work. I get a 404.

Is there a guide out there that tells me how to do this? In particular, I need the format of the URL for the C1 Cam.

I’m pretty unhappy with the C1. Bought it directly from Foscam & don’t think I have the box any more, but if I did I would return it. Bad documentation full of terrible English, my SD Card spontaneously is no longer recognized, and my included rolling day of cloud recording requires Flash.

269

Try the following:

http://{url}:{port}/cgi-bin/CGIProxy.fcgi?usr={username}&pwd={password}&cmd=snapPicture2

It works a treat in the “Refresh after x seconds” mode in SmartTiles. I have 4 C1’s.

270

Thanks for this. I had found something similar in another thread, and now have my C1 showing in SmartTiles locally.

My opinion of the camera is just slightly better though.

  • No direct addressing of the image/video URL except as above.
  • Terrible documentation.
  • Messages, warnings, internal camera web pages barely in english.
  • Foscam’s Dynamic DNS doesn’t seem to work, or else the docs are so bad that it’s impossible to figure out.
271

Really basic question here guys. Just got SmartTiles, and I’m trying to figure out how to get the video to show in SmartTiles. I have a DCS-5222L model camera (which is one of the compatible cameras). Not sure I see there’s a number of options, but I haven’t been able to figure out where to go. Any help would be awesome!

272

As @DeanSmith said you have to use the refresh option and not the live stream for the C1’s. Also make sure your C1’s are on the latest firmware since the older version of the firmware the “snapPicture2” function was broken.

273

Any help with the Samsung SNH-P6410BN??

I tried digging for a URL in any of the events, and can’t see anything that looks right.

274

Can Smart Tiles take links from IP Webcam running on android?

I’m thinking of using an old tablet as a center control using Smart Tiles with speech notification and as a web cam on Smart Tiles.

Thanks,

275

Do these cameras happen to work with SmartTiles?
I ordered one to play around with as an alternative the the Dropcam Pro’s I have. I’m tired of paying a monthly service for them.

276

Can someone review this and let me know if these cameras will be able to be viewed on SmartTiles?

277

They are not IP Cameras so I think they answer would be no.

278

That was my concern, but they are networked and accessible from browsers, so thats where my question stems from.

279

Yes… you are correct to believe that these quite likely might be compatible.

But SmartTiles does not provide User Support for Video; find the actual detailed specifications and user manuals (probably downloadable from Armcrest vendor) and/or call the vendor’s tech support, and find out if HTML5 non-plug-in MJPEG http video streams are provided. That’s the only type of stream that generally works fine (but not always).

Flash, ActiveX, etc., work “in the browser” but generally do not work in SmartTiles due to plug-in issues.

RTSP does not work “in the browser”, but there are transcoding services and transcoding servers you can run at home … and this type of system should have that built-in, but you have to ask the vendor directly.

I personally recommend Blue Iris Software (from Foscam?) as it supports many cameras and I believe does transcoding and can be run on a pretty cheap mini-PC. Total cost is a bit higher, but expandable and flexible (you can use many camera brands, etc.).

280

Thanks for this info. I do have a camera software but cannot recall what the name is, as I was trying to get a dome camera working (but failed).

I can do more research on these cameras, but youre probably right with regards to access via browser is probably plugin reliant.

281

I hear there are a few iOS users here.

Well, if you’re not still using those iPhone 4’s, you’ve got a use for them now: IP Cam, available in the App Store, turns your old iOS device into a bonjour-compatible, MJPG serving web cam!

I have this working in my SmartTiles setup.

282

Hi All, I’ve been searching for a couple of days and haven’t found a solution to my issue. Sorry if this was already answered and I just did not find it.

My camera is an FI9853EP. Which is working perfectly for live view in SmartTiles, however I tried to configure SmartTiles to use the stop motion rather than live view and I am unable to get a picture to show up in SmartTiles.

I am using the URL “http://myip:port/cgi-bin/CGIProxy.fcgi?cmd=snapPicture2&usr=myUser&pwd=myPass” and it works fine in a browser, but in SmartTiles the tile is simply grey.

Thanks in advance for the help.