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Another quick post, prompted by a report I read earlier today.
Since the introduction of the h.265+ CODEC we have recommended that where it is available (on all of their recent cameras and NVRs) customers set their systems up to use it. There seems to be no downside to using it.
However, one fine point that I had not fully appreciated and shared before, but was evident from the tests in this new report - increasing frame rates (fps) has a much lesser impact upon bandwidth and storage requirements than it did for previous less efficient video surveillance CODECs.
Obvious really, when you think about it, but up until today I have typically advised customers to settle in the 6-10 fps region - this may still be adequate.
But seeing as the increased burden for higher frame rates is actually much lower than it traditionally would have been, you might want to test your h.265+ system with a higher frame rate.
The report found that increasing to around the 15fps point caused approximately a 15% increase in bandwidth and storage.
And, increasing to 25-30fps caused only a 30% increase.
Your mileage may vary, as the complexity of the scene, activity, and lighting levels all have an impact upon these figures.
However, it certainly leads me to believe that I should now be encouraging users to test/set higher fps settings when they are using the h.265+ CODEC.
Of course, there is a corresponding trade-off against your retention period e.g. how far you can look back in your recordings, or how long before the oldest recordings are overwritten (but plainly less of a trade-off than I realised).
i.e. If you increase the fps you will lose some duration of retention, but apparently a lot less than you would have done with previous CODECs.
After making changes, test your system; check your recordings; play back recordings; check footage recorded during the day AND footage recorded at night.
Before you actually need your recordings for investigating an incident, please 'Walk Test' your system - especially, check if you are capturing faces as well as you can reasonably expect within your camera views.
Keep an eye on your retention period, make sure that your system is giving you that two weeks period or whatever it is that you require for your site/application.
Since the introduction of the h.265+ CODEC we have recommended that where it is available (on all of their recent cameras and NVRs) customers set their systems up to use it. There seems to be no downside to using it.
However, one fine point that I had not fully appreciated and shared before, but was evident from the tests in this new report - increasing frame rates (fps) has a much lesser impact upon bandwidth and storage requirements than it did for previous less efficient video surveillance CODECs.
Obvious really, when you think about it, but up until today I have typically advised customers to settle in the 6-10 fps region - this may still be adequate.
But seeing as the increased burden for higher frame rates is actually much lower than it traditionally would have been, you might want to test your h.265+ system with a higher frame rate.
The report found that increasing to around the 15fps point caused approximately a 15% increase in bandwidth and storage.
And, increasing to 25-30fps caused only a 30% increase.
Your mileage may vary, as the complexity of the scene, activity, and lighting levels all have an impact upon these figures.
However, it certainly leads me to believe that I should now be encouraging users to test/set higher fps settings when they are using the h.265+ CODEC.
Of course, there is a corresponding trade-off against your retention period e.g. how far you can look back in your recordings, or how long before the oldest recordings are overwritten (but plainly less of a trade-off than I realised).
i.e. If you increase the fps you will lose some duration of retention, but apparently a lot less than you would have done with previous CODECs.
After making changes, test your system; check your recordings; play back recordings; check footage recorded during the day AND footage recorded at night.
Before you actually need your recordings for investigating an incident, please 'Walk Test' your system - especially, check if you are capturing faces as well as you can reasonably expect within your camera views.
Keep an eye on your retention period, make sure that your system is giving you that two weeks period or whatever it is that you require for your site/application.
