march 2016 Issue 374
PP 100001158
Eye in the Sky
l Quorum Installs Mobotix at Transit l Council CCTV Systems: A Snapshot l The Lens Maketh the Camera: Fujinon 15-50 l CoastalCOMS Eyes James Cook University
l Back to the Future: BGWT’s Rob Meachem l Automation: Coming, ready, or not? l Monitoring: Threats and Opportunities l Review: AXIS P3225-LV Camera Review
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editorial s ec u ri ty e l e ct ro n i c s & netwo r ks ma r c h 20 16 issue 374
game of thrones
By John Adams
In the electronic security industry, the current activity seems reflective of high levels of confidence in underlying business fundamentals at board level. HERE have been so many acquisitions and mergers in the electronic security market over the past 12 months it’s enough to make your head spin. Honeywell has bought Xtralis, is looking to divest its Building Controls business and has talked merger with UTC. Ingram Micro is being bought by HNA, Apollo has bought ADT, Johnson Controls and Tyco are merging, FLIR has acquired DVTEL and Canon has acquired Axis and Milestone. What do these acquisitions mean for installers, integrators and end users? Do changes of ownership undermine the nature of an organisation, disrupt its lines of product development? And what is the motivation for the current flood of M&A activity? An increase in the number of mergers and acquisitions suggests different things about the electronic security market. For a start, mergers and acquisitions are fundamentally different in nature, with an acquisition being the 100 per cent takeover of one entity by another, while mergers involve 2 organisations combining to form a new organisation. The driving forces of mergers and acquisitions vary – in some cases they represent a fast way for organisations to gain market share and increase revenue.
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They might also be a way to access markets vital to maintaining growth which an organisation under its current ownership can never access. Additionally, M&A can be a way for an organisation to buy expertise, as well as R&D and product manufacturing chains. Other drivers include low cost credit, the desire to liberate the value held in a business by its owners or board of directors and a desire to increase profit margin by more efficient management, the latter of which can be a rough ride for staff. Alternatively, these huge deals can be the opus of a CEO or board of directors - successful acquisitions or mergers worth billions of dollars can represent the pinnacle of corporate achievement. Only rarely are M&As about the survival of a business at the cost of losing its identity. The impact of such machinations on the fundamentals of a business is hard to predict. Hostile acquisitions are more often than not, destructive of value – that’s why most modern acquisitions tend to emphasise the identity and stability of the existing business, its products and services, its staff and their relationship with their customer base. The decision to retain the identity of a business isn’t always consistent. If the purchaser has a strong business and the acquisition fits into that structure relatively seamlessly, the change of identity may be rapid. In any case, acquisitions that are disruptive can lead to the long term decline of a high quality business and while this might sometimes be deliberate, with businesses stripped of value by corporate raiders and allowed to expire, it’s not a common model in the security industry.
Instead, our mergers and acquisitions are about the expansion of market share, the acquisition of adjacent expertise, the purchase of high quality product lines and reputation, and guaranteeing of future revenue streams. In the electronic security industry, the current activity seems reflective of high levels of confidence in underlying business fundamentals at board level. Seen in this light, the flurry of M&A should be seen in most cases as reflecting positively on the future of the electronic security business, which is continuing to grow at healthy rates globally. Not only do purchases suggest there’s value in the security market, they suggest that despite high levels of global indebtedness, electronic security businesses retain significant reserves of cash. From the point of view of installers and end users, the M&A activity in electronic security has been fundamentally positive, with changes of ownership having minimal impact on business models or channels to market. Probably the key thing from the point of view of installers and end users, is that product development is not disrupted through changes of direction or loss of key staff members. Judging by the high levels of product development taking place across the industry, such fears seem unjustified. As 2016 rolls out there’s every chance we’ll see further M&A activity but while each these corporate deals should be considered on a case-by-case basis, for the most part the signs for customer value look positive. n
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26 and a Milestone VMS to allow James Cook University in Queensland a powerful and flexible remote surveillance solution to monitor wildlife in the canopy of the Daintree Rainforest.
mar 16 18: Mobotix in Transit Integrator Quorum Security Systems has installed a Mobotix CCTV solution, integrated with access control, at the Transit Systems’ bus depot in Sydney. 26: Council CCTV Systems One of the fastest growing CCTV user groups in Australia is local councils. Research conducted by the Australian Institute of Criminology gives a snapshot of market penetration, an idea of system size and topology, as well as a sense of the usage and value of these public surveillance solutions to police investigations. 30: The Lens Maketh the Camera Want to convert a low cost 1080p network camera into a pixel monster with the optical power and image quality to scare off the best integrated camera systems on the planet? All you need is a thoughtful angle of view and 130 bucks. 36: Eye in the Sky CoastalCOMS has installed Sony CCTV cameras
40: Back to the Future BGWT’s Rob Meachem is one of electronic security distribution’s most experienced leaders. Now tasked with taking BGW Technologies to next level, he discusses the company and the opportunities and challenges facing the distribution market. 44: Coming, ready, or not? We hear a lot of talk about home automation these days but it’s not easy getting a sense of how much home automation is being used and what the overall penetration automation has into the Australian market. 52: AXIS P3225-LV Camera Review AXIS P3225-LV is a 60ips 1080p fixed dome camera with a 1/2.8-inch sensor, a 3–10.5mm f1.4 varifocal lens with remote zoom and focus, Zipstream for bandwidth and storage reduction, 25m OptimisedIR range, IP52-rating for dripping water and dust resistance, and IK08-rating for impact-resistance. 60: Australian Catholic University Chooses CAMS Every educational facility is a serious security challenge and Australian Catholic University is no exception to that rule. The ACU has a sprawling
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campus spread across the bustle of North Sydney’s CBD but the responsibilities of its National Security Centre extend further afield than that. 62: Panasonic Fires A Bullet
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MARCH 2016 ISSUE 374
l Quorum Installs Mobotix at Transit l Back to the Future: BGWT’s Rob Meachem l Council CCTV Systems: A Snapshot l Automation: Coming, ready, or not? l The Lens Maketh the Camera: Fujinon 15-50 l Monitoring: Threats and Opportunities l CoastalCOMS Eyes James Cook University l Review: AXIS P3225-LV Camera Review
Publisher Bridge Publishing Aust. Pty Ltd ABN 11 083 704 858 PO Box 237 Darlinghurst NSW 1300 tel 61 2 9280 4425 fax 61 2 9280 4428 email info@bridge publishing.com.au
10 news Latest business, product and technical news from Australia and around the world. 44: monitoring ALARM monitoring’s future looks both threatening and full of opportunity – new technology offers plenty if the right business models can be found but there’s a chance the shift to networked security and automation solutions could impact on the underlying nature of alarm monitoring and the alarm monitoring industry. 68: editor’s choice What’s new from our manufacturers. 72: helpdesk Our team of electronic security experts answers your tough technical questions.
Editor John Adams Advertising Manager Monique Keatinge Customer Service Annette Mathews tel 61 2 9280 4425 annette@bridge publishing.com.au Design Tania Simanowsky e: taniasdesign@ optusnet.com.au Subscriptions 11 issues per annum One year (11 issues)
Australia 12 months $A104.50 (incl GST) 24 months $A188.00 (incl GST) Overseas 12 months $A155.00 (incl GST) 24 months $A270.00 (incl GST) WEBSITE www.securityelectronics andnetworks.com No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form in whole or part without prior written permission of Bridge Publishing.
news in brief
SecTech: See it in Your City! p.12 Honeywell Buying Xtralis For $US480 Million p.14 Hikvision 2015 Earnings Grow 47 Per Cent p.16 SCSI Secures City of Stonnington p.16
c o mpi l e d by j o h n a d a ms
m a r ch 2 0 1 6
Bosch Product Training Available through ASG Integracom.
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AFTER announcing their partnership late last year, Bosch Security Systems and ASG Integracom say their first security product training courses are now available for enrolment. Focusing on the much-demanded Solution 2000/3000 and Solution 6000 alarm panels, ASG Integracom has commenced delivery of these 2 courses in NSW, VIC, QLD & WA at their specialty training facilities. The Solution
2000/3000 course runs for a half day at $A150 and the Solution 6000 course is a full day at $250. “Installers of Bosch alarm products will benefit from having these specifically designed training courses available regularly and locally, and delivered by a professional industry training organization,” says Bosch’s product manager - Intrusion & Access, James Layton. “ASG Integracom is a nationally accredited
training provider to the telecommunications and electronic security industry (RTO 20749) and works closely with ASIAL.” Courses based on the Bosch Security Video product offering are in development now and will be coming soon. For more information on courses, training dates and locations, or to register online, visit the ASG Integracom website at www. asgintegracom.com.au or call 1300 139 865.
Maroondah City Council Expanding Public Safety CCTV Solution n MAROONDAH City Council has gone to tender for the expansion of an existing CCTV public safety solution installed around the booming centre of Ringwood in Melbourne. In the initial installation, a Federal Government grant of $A200,000 facilitated the design and installation of CCTV cameras and supporting equipment in Ringwood. The expansion of the safety system by Maroondah Council builds on existing camera infrastructure located at the Ringwood bus interchange and the Ringwood Metopolitan
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Activity Centre, which is designed to monitor and facilitate response to issues of safety with a live feed to Ringwood Police Station. According to Maroondah Council, CCTV in the Ringwood Metopolitan Activity Centre: “Enhances actual and perceived public safety; provides a direct feed to Ringwood Police Station to support active policing; provides recorded footage to assist evidence collection and prosecution; reduces anti-social behaviour and crime, particularly in crime hot spots; and adds value to initiatives conducted
by Council, Victoria Police, State Government and other stakeholders.” The tender closes on March 21, 2016.
The expansion of the safety system by Maroondah Council builds on existing camera infrastructure located at the Ringwood bus interchange and the Ringwood Metopolitan Activity Centre...
Shepparton City Council Seeks Maintenance of Safe City Solution n GREATER Shepparton City Council has taken to tender ongoing maintenance of its Safer City Camera Network (CCTV) System. The Safer City Camera Network was installed in 2014 and comprises 19 closed cameras in the Shepparton central business district. Images captured by the system are recorded and stored for 31 days. The maintenance contract includes re-instatement of lapsed software maintenance agreements; ongoing maintenance software; maintenance agreements for term of contract (12 months); maintainance of all necessary system design, programming (videotext, point descriptors, display maps, alarm message text) and engineering. The contract also covers ongoing system maintenance and reporting to specification; provision of ongoing responsive service to specifications; provision of annual on-site system training to specifications, plus specific training on a case-by-case basis and
any other works required by the specifications to complete the system to an acceptable functional and industry standard. This contract is offered for an initial 12-month period and following a successful 12 months, GSCC will review with the surveillance system contractor the option for an ongoing contract on a yearly basis with an option for up to 4 individual years. The Safer City Camera Network is a partnership project between Victoria Police and the Greater Shepparton City Council. The network was part-funded by the Department of Justice’s Public Safety Infrastructure Fund, the Attorney Generals Department’s Safer Suburbs Program Taxi Security Scheme and the Greater Shepparton City Council. Objectives of the GSCC Safer City Camera network include improving perceptions of safety within the network area and late night venues, reduction
Adam Tran
of anti-social behaviour and property damage within the Maude Street Mall, Maude Street Bus Interchange and late night venues within the network area, to encourage increased community confidence
Hills and Genetec Tee Off ANZ Summit n GENETEC and Hills launched the inaugural Genetec ANZ Summit at Mercure Kooindah Waters on the Central Coast, Tuesday. The event included keynote addresses from Genetec’s Andrew Elvish, vice president of marketing & product management, and Jennifer Elliott, director of channel management, who outlined Genetec’s solutions and opportunities. There were
also presentations from Hills’ sponsorship partners, including Ruckus, Juniper, Pelco, Axis, Assa Abloy, and Vivotek. At the Tuesday evening gala dinner there were awards, including Top Performers, which went to Telstra SNP, Siemens and Integrators Australia. Rising Stars awards went to Fortis Security, ACG Fire and Security and Constant Security.
Ingram Micro to Be Acquired by China’s HNA Group for $US6B in Cash
“The Genetec summit was highly successful and provided a good opportunity to network and collaborate with Genetec’s technology partners and Genetec’s Andrew Elvish gave a presentation that was certainly a main highlight,” said Logan Power of integrator, Fortis Security. “The technology insights and user case studies behind each new product or
and enjoyment of public spaces and retail areas and to support local police to detect and respond effectively to incidents, antisocial behaviour or escalation of identified incidents. The contract closes on March 23, 2016
feature Andrew was able to demonstrate were very good. Hills distribution of all of the leading vendors at the event showed the strength of the Hills portfolio, which will enable Hills to provide to their customers, integrated turnkey solutions based around the Genetec platform.” Hills’ head of product practise Daniel Lee said the company was delighted to collaborate with Genetec on its inaugural ANZ Summit. “We’d like to thank our customers who attended; we hope you found it valuable and informative,” Lee said. “At Hills, our vendor ecosystem is vital to the value we bring to our customers and we’d also like to thank our ecosystem sponsorship partners; Ruckus, Juniper, Pelco, Axis, Assa Abloy, and Vivotek.”
INGRAM Micro Inc. and Tianjin Tianhai Investment Company, Ltd have announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which Tianjin Tianhai will acquire Ingram Micro for $38.90 per share in an all-cash transaction with an equity value of approximately $US6.0 billion. Ingram Micro will become a part of HNA Group, a Hainanbased Fortune Global 500 enterprise group and a leader in aviation, tourism and logistics and the largest stockholder of Tianjin Tianhai. “Ingram Micro has clearly established itself as a leading distributor and global provider of IT products and services,” said Adam Tan, vice chairman and CEO of HNA Group. “The company has a proven and talented team and we believe Ingram Micro is unrivalled in its ability to offer industryleading, differentiated and easy-to-manage solutions to vendor and customer partners worldwide.” Meanwhile, Alain Monié, Ingram Micro CEO said the agreement to join HNA Group delivers near-term and compelling cash value to stockholders and is expected to provide exciting new opportunities for vendors, customers and associates. “Innovation, new services introduction, brand management and ensuring the stability and continuity of the businesses joining their enterprise are fundamental to HNA Group’s overall strategy,” Monié said.
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news
Alarm.com 2015 Revenue Climbs 26 per cent
march 2016
SecTech: See it in Your City!
n SECTECH Roadshow gets into gear early May and gives end users and installers in Australia’s state capitals a chance to get their mitts on all the latest electronic security solutions. You won’t go wading through hundreds of stands and thousands of products at SecTech – instead we’re trucking 20 of the industry’s leading manufacturers and ou’ve seen distributors, and all their ff, it’s also latest electronic security chance for products to your home y people to th friends town. valuable SecTech Roadshow has with other no airs and no graces – nstallers, it’s about new electronic and end security products and solutions, what they offer and how they work - period. And after you’ve seen the new stuff, it’s also the perfect chance for security people to catch up with friends and do some valuable networking with other suppliers, installers, integrators, consultants and end users. Last year, SecTech’s free happy hour continued for hours – even when our roadies were helping exhibitors pull their stands down no one wanted to leave. It’ll be more of the same this time around. SecTech’s camera shootout will be another big highlight and this year’s going to be a little different. We’re going to take a look at 3 groups of cameras, including compact domes, bullet cameras and last but not least, a group of 4K UHD photon buckets.
after you’ve seen the new stuff, it’s also the perfect chance for you security people to catch up with friends and do some valuable networking with other suppliers, installers, integrators, consultants and end users.
Steve Trundel
There’s even talk of throwing in a comparison of thermal cameras… We’ll be testing each camera group for colour rendition, sharpness, contrast, WDR performance, low light performance and motion blur, and this year we’re going to cap bitrates to make your assessment of what’s best much easier. There’s no Security in Government Expo this year, so manufacturers and exhibitors looking to retain momentum should seriously consider keeping their relationships trucking with SecTech Roadshow in
2016 - you’ll cover 5 cities in 12 days. SecTech Roadshow is short, sharp and perfectly focused. If you have new product to show, or there’s new product you need to see, be there. Dates are: • Perth 4th May 2016, • Adelaide 9th May 2016, • Melbourne 11 May 2016, • Sydney 16th May 2016, • Brisbane 18th May 2016. The exhibition is open from 12 midday until 6pm, with Happy Hour from 4.30pm. The HD Camera Demos run at 2pm and 3pm - registration opened March 1 2016.
ALARM.com, which develops software solutions for monitoring security and automation systems, has reported financial results for Q4 2015, as well as for the 2015 financial year, with both results indicating a revenue spike around 25 per cent. For Q4 2015, SaaS and license revenue increased 25 per cent to $US38.7 million, while SaaS and license revenue increased 26 per cent to $140.9 million for the full year 2015 compared to $111.5 million for the full year 2014. Total revenue increased 25 per cent to $208.9 million for the full year 2015 compared to $167.3 million for the full year 2014. Net income was $11.8 million for the full year 2015 compared to $13.5 million for the full year 2014. “Our 2015 fourth quarter and full year results demonstrated nice momentum which positions us well for 2016,” said Steve Trundle, president and CEO of Alarm.com. “We led with innovation, and our service provider partners continued to see strong demand for the interactive services we enable in North America and increasingly abroad.” Alarm.com’s services are available locally in partnership with Hills and QSS.
Canning Vale College Seeking IP Video Solution n WESTERN Australia Government has gone to tender for the supply and installation of a new IP-based CCTV solution for the 1100-place Canning Vale College. Canning Vale College was built in 2004 at a cost of A$15m for a business centre, 2 level middle school buildings, an arts centre and a library. At the end of 2005, work commenced on the second stage of building at a cost
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of an estimated $20m. This stage included a 2 level senior school building, gymnasium, materials technology centre and hard courts. Along with its buildings and facilities, the school includes 5 hectares (12 acres) of wetland and bush, and as part of their studies the students work with environmental organisations to maintain, monitor and enhance this area.
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news march 2016
Sydney Trains Awards $A70 Million 11,400-Camera CCTV Contract to Spanish multinational, Indra
n SYDNEY Trains has awarded its $A70 million 11,300-camera, 5-year CCTV upgrade contract to Spanish multinational, Indra. The unified video management solution will be Genetec’s Security Center, supplied by Hills. More than 30 companies bid for the contract, which is thought to be Australia’s largest integrated surveillance solution. Geographically, this rail system is vast and has components on the Far North Coast, the Mid North Coast, New England, the Central Coast, the Hunter Valley, Cumberland/ Prospect, Nepean, Northern Sydney, the Inner West, South East Sydney, South West Sydney, the Central West, Orana/Far West, the Riverina/Murray, Illawarra, and the Southern Highlands. The video management
system handling the entire system will be Genetec’s unified platform, Genetec Security Center, which will integrate analytics, cameras, help points and more. To handle particular operational complexities, Indra will also implement its intelligent video technology in 2 control centres from which the entire video surveillance system, comprising 11,400 CCTV cameras, will be managed. Indra will replace all existing analogue cameras with IP cameras, which will connect to the existing network of trunk communications through a new network to be deployed across the rail network’s 150 stations, as well as on buses, light rail, and ferries. It will also provide servers and storage equipment on which the images are recorded.
Genetec Security Center incorporates all the advantages of IP technology - for instance, when connecting a camera directly to the computer networks of Sydney Trains, any user station may be used as a control console, from which display images of any camera in real time and retrieve the recorded video. Authorised mobile devices connected to the network may also access the video via Security Center. This means that any authorised tablet or mobile phone becomes a mobile console from which security teams can view images, increasing operational effectiveness. IVA software that Indra will implement throughout the project incorporates algorithms to continually analyze image streams from the stations to
Seadan Strengthens Queensland Branch n SEADAN Security and Electronics has expanded its Queensland team with 2 new appoints in the Brisbane office. Casey Jobben joins Seadan as business
development manager intercom division. Jobben previously worked in the gas and oil industry. Meanwhile, Nick Rickett joins Seadan in the role of technical support. Casey Jobben (l) and Nick Rickett
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automatically detect situations which pose a potential risk, such as a passenger falling onto tracks, or the entry of unauthorized personnel into tunnels. The system also generates alarms automatically in such situations, allowing operators and patrols to take immediate action, reducing response times. Because Genetec Security Center is an IP-based video platform which incorporates new and enhanced functionality, the solution implemented by Indra can be readily expanded, something currently impossible due to constraints inherent in analogue CCTV technology. At the same time, use of megapixel cameras will significantly improve the quality of video streams. A decision on which IP cameras will be implemented is expected shortly and it’s understood a related security patrol tender for the entire Sydney Trains network closed last month, with an announcement on this significant manpower contract expected within 4 weeks.
IVA software that Indra will implement throughout the project incorporates algorithms to continually analyze image streams from the stations to automatically detect situations which pose a potential risk...
Honeywell Buying Xtralis For $US480 Million
David Paja
ACQUISITIONS in the electronic security and fire sector keep rolling through – now Honeywell is to buy aspirating smoke detection and perimeter detection manufacturer Xtralis for $US480 million. “This acquisition fits perfectly with Honeywell’s technology innovation and leadership,” said Alex Ismail, president and CEO of Honeywell Automation and Control Solutions. “Xtralis’ early smoke detection and advanced security technologies and video analytics software complement our growing Security and Fire business, and show our commitment to making the world safer and more secure.” “Xtralis is a fantastic addition to the Honeywell portfolio that strengthens our offering for critical infrastructure and highvalue assets,” said David Paja, president, Honeywell Security and Fire. “Eliminating downtime for an IT data center is mission critical considering that the average revenue loss due to a fire or smoke is more than $5 million a week [Source: Aberdeen Group, “Datacenter Downtime: How Much Does It Really Cost?” March 2012]. The addition of Xtralis to our portfolio enhances our ability to meet the needs of our customers for early and reliable smoke detection.”
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Book into a Bosch Security Training login user: Katarina.bailey@au.bosch.com, password: %dot#au72j) Course delivered by ASG Integracom
A training partnership. Bosch Security Systems has partnered with ASG Integracom, one of the largest private training providers in telecommunications, MATV and electronic security, to provide comprehensive security product training to those who install and commission Bosch systems. With national dedicated training facilities, industry-based trainers and a close working relationship with Bosch and ASIAL, ASG Integracom can provide the knowledge and guidance your team requires to minimise your installation and service times when using Bosch products. Enrol now for Solution 2000/3000 and Solution 6000 training courses. Bosch Video Systems courses coming soon. Course details, costs, dates and locations are available on the ASG Integracom website: www.asgintegracom.com.au. Register online or call ASG Integracom on Ph: 1300 139 865.
Bosch Security Systems | Ph: 1 3000 BOSCH (26724) | www.boschsecurity.com.au
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news
Hikvision 2015 Earnings Grow 47 Per Cent
march 2016
UL 1023 Opens Door For Pro Grade Z-Wave Alarm Sensors n UL has approved the latest Z-Wave protocol for UL 1023 compliance, a move that will see Z-Wave become the wireless comms of choice for old and new manufacturers of security panels and security sensors. It’s a move that could over time undermine the entire nature of controller-based security solutions. Currently, sensors and panels conform to UL compliance for wireless comms – in Australia most wireless sensors are 433MHz, with a smaller number of 866Mhz devices. While these sensors are low cost to manufacture and easy on battery life, bandwidth is low and the networks on which they reside don’t support the tidal wave of Z-Wave devices flooding the market. Last year, Z-Wave comms owner and developer,
Sigma Designs kicked off its Z-Wave Security 2 framework for Z-Wave devices, which is being developed with the support of UL specifically to give manufacturers of Z-Wave devices a 1023-compliant platform for the development of security sensors. Last month, Sigma announced Z-Wave transceivers ZM5101, ZM5202, and ZM5304, which feature protocol SDK version 6.60, have been evaluated to UL’s standards for home security. The products feature anti-jamming and AES 128-bit encryption provisions. The development means that every device in a Z-Wave system from sensors to locks will reside in a secure ecosystem. “Now you can standardize on one radio for both security and convenience,”
says Avi Rosenthal, VP of security and control for Nortek Security & Control, developer of 2Gig alarm systems. “There has never been an end-to-end encrypted protocol for life-safety,” Rosenthal says. “Every device from a door/window sensor to a sophisticated door lock will be part of the secure environment. The
consumer doesn’t have to worry about any of it. It is a single, compatible standard for convenience and security.” According to the Z-Wave Alliance, Z-Wave is included in more than 90 per cent of professionally installed security systems. UL 1023 compliant Z-Wave security solutions will hit the market in Q4.
IP Address SIM service that allows remote access and monitoring of CCTV, access control, medical and IP based platforms. SCSI retrofitted DirectConnect to a recently commissioned NUUO CCTV system supplied and installed by Q
Security Systems and ADT. In the past, staff would drive to each location and check each system was running correctly and fault free. This would typically take 4-5 hours and involved driving to each facility in Council
HIKVISION’S preliminary earnings results for the full-year 2015, with revenues of US$3.88 billion, amounting to a 46.97% growth rate year on year. Cynthia He, vice president at Hikvision, says there were a number of significant factors behind the company’s sustained growth. “The security industry is continually developing and Hikvision is at the forefront of that development,” she says. “Our ongoing investment into research and development is a crucial component of our growth. Each year Hikvision invests 7 per cent to 8 per cent of our sales revenue into R&D, focusing on product innovation and our comprehensive and industry-leading product development system. “We have an ever-expanding network of domestic and international business contacts, which allow us to keep in touch with the market and make decisions based on the practical requirements of customers worldwide. And our range of total solutions for vertical industries means we can cater to a huge variety of specialist applications.
SCSI Secures City of Stonnington n SCSI’s new DirectConnect Fixed-IP SIM service has recently been deployed across the City of Stonington’s Council facilities and now offers direct access to its CCTV systems. City of Stonington’s iconic
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buildings including the Prahran and Malvern Town Halls, Prahran Aquatic Centre, Harold Holt Swim Centre, Stonnington’s Animal Pound and a number of other key locations. DirectConnect is a 4G fixed-
vehicles. This obviously resulted in not only the cost of Council vehicles and fuel, but also had a major impact on carbon emissions, congestion and the environment in general. David Taylor, risk management coordinator for Council, can now log on to all sites via iPhone or PC and remotely connect to each site and carry out system checks, stream live or playback video, and monitor the status of Council’s systems. “Partnering with SCSI has not only allowed us to achieve operational efficiencies within the City, it has also improved Community Safety which is paramount to our local and visiting residents,” said Warren Roberts, City Of Stonnington’s CEO. “We are always striving to lead through innovation and the results we have seen only strengthen our commitment to our residents, our community and our environment.”
â—? Case study
Mobotix
Mobotix in Transit Integrator Quorum Security Systems has installed a Mobotix CCTV solution, integrated with access control at the Transit Systems’ bus depot in Sydney.
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ROM humble beginnings providing bus services along the New South Wales and Queensland coasts in Australia, Transit Systems has not only gone on to become one of Australia’s biggest public transport providers, but has also made significant inroads overseas, having purchased several bus routes from the First Group London, United Kingdom, in 2013. Now employing more than 2500 staff Australiawide, Transit Systems operates from 26 depots and terminals, with a fleet of 500 buses and 40 ferries. When Quorum Security Systems was approached by the company to install an access control and surveillance system at its newest Sydney depot, the team was able to develop a multi-faceted solution
F
BY J O H N A D A M S
providing far more than just security. Quorum, named MOBOTIX dealer of the year in 2014 and 2015, is a strong proponent of a consultancy-based approach to design. “After a series of meetings and site visits, we created an extensive business case with the client, along with detailed ROIs. This was then developed into a totally bespoke system, which went far beyond security,” explains Chris Pearson, managing director at Quorum Security Systems. “Surveillance is fast leaving behind its traditional role of securing premises against unlawful entry,” he adds. “It’s moving increasingly into the spheres of risk mitigation, compliance monitoring and process management.” Working to identify the core needs of Transit Systems, it became clear that an integrated approach using IP surveillance cameras, along with access control and fleet tracking technology, would best serve to improve services and cut costs, while offering a clear audit trail along the way.
An integrated system MOBOTIX IP cameras were integrated with a sophisticated access control system incorporated with long-range RFID readers with prox-boosters to allow dual custody-tagging of either buses and drivers, or buses and routes. Armed with a wealth of fully traceable real-time information, Transit Systems is now able to streamline and enhance its business and operational processes, saving both time and money. Surveillance monitoring is ensuring that buses are refuelled before leaving the depot and that any vehicle damage is always
reported, a comprehensive record of driver and vehicle movements is used for dispatching and scheduling purposes, and OH&S compliance is enforced, with the footage also serving as proof that due diligence has been carried out. In addition, payroll time and attendance has also been automated. The installation also doubles up as a PA system, which is essential for mustering on a dangerous goods site and also extremely useful communicating with staff over such a large area. Easy to install and configure, with low power and network bandwidth consumption, the MOBOTIX cameras offered the flexibility, functionality, and high
You’re talking about 2-foot thick concrete slabs in the bus bays throughout the whole depot which meant that cabling through the concrete was unfeasible from a financial and time point of view.
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● Case study
Mobotix
Surveillance is fast leaving behind its traditional role of securing premises against unlawful entry. It is moving increasingly into the spheres of risk mitigation, compliance monitoring and process management.
image quality required to achieve effective coverage throughout the depot. The versatile mounting of the S15 camera, with its dual lenses, each connected to a cable of up to 2 metres, means vehicles sitting in the fuelling bays or repair docks can be monitored from all sides. An M15 camera with a long-pass filter and ANPR (Automatic Number Plate Recognition) technology, records the number plate of every vehicle that leaves and enters the depot, and hands-free entry and exit increases site security, safety of drivers and reduces manpower requirements. Furthermore, the cameras provide a foolproof real-time backup of all movements recorded by the access control system for auditing and compliance purposes. Of course, retro-fitting such a large installation into the purpose-built depot was not without its challenges. “You’re talking about 2-foot thick concrete slabs in the bus bays throughout the whole depot, which meant that cabling through the concrete was unfeasible from a financial and time point of view,” Pearson explains. “Instead, the MOBOTIX cameras were powered from existing poles inside the depot and we used Ubiquiti Wi-Fi to transmit video streams back to the NAS.” The MOBOTIX decentralised concept makes this easy because the recordings are compressed and stored on the SD card inside the camera, so the bandwidth required to transfer the images to
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the NAS is very low. All other things being equal, MOBOTIX says its systems can support up to 10 times more cameras per server compared with a centralised VMS-based recording system, thus requiring no additional computers. This new surveillance and access control system has enabled Transit Systems to monitor the behaviour of vehicles and people throughout the depot, bringing an increase in effectiveness, efficiency and safety. With Government-funded bus routes incurring penalties for failing to meet ontime targets by at least 9 per cent, this achievement promises further financial savings. And because the video surveillance system footage provides protection against negligence claims by proving due diligence, expensive litigation proceedings can be avoided. The role of security is evolving and this example shows one of the many diverse ways in which security can be applied to modern business practices to make operations more efficient and economical. n
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● Special report
WA
WA CCTV Strategy
Western Australia has released its State CCTV Strategy, setting out a vision for the shared use of integrated and compliant CCTV resources to enhance public safety and security in crime hotspots. The Strategy provides a framework for how this process will be achieved and in the future, face recognition and video analytics may be incorporated.
HARING CCTV image streams is not without precedent but the State Government of Western Australia is taking this to another level, after unveiling plans for the integration of public and private CCTV resources in the interests of public safety and security by the end of 2017. It’s a bold vision that may well become a template, not just for other Australian states but for governments globally. Importantly, this strategy has evolved over a decade or more. WA’s Blue Iris State Register for CCTV Owners in 2009, the creation of CCTV guidelines in 2011 and a code of practice in 2012, the integration of multiple systems and the establishment of a control room in Mayfield to handle CHOGM in 2011, the commitment to integrated CCTV solutions in the 2013 state elections – all these have been signposts on the journey. There was further support along the way in the findings of a report published by the WA Auditor General in 2011, which concluded that “there is potential to realise greater benefits through better sharing and more strategic use of CCTV information by the WA Police and local governments”. At the heart of the strategy is WA’s State CCTV Strategy Secretariat, to be part of WA Police, which will be responsible for executing the Strategy’s initiatives and will report to the Minister of Police. A CCTV Advisory Panel, comprising a chair from WA Police with membership expected to be comprised of representatives from government, peak bodies and industry, will also be established. It will be responsible for providing independent advice to the Minister on CCTV-related matters.
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Implementation of the State CCTV Strategy To ensure that delivery and risk is managed in an achievable way for the community, business and
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C o m p i l e d by S E N s ta f f
Connecting the State’s CCTV systems will be challenging, due to the diversity of system types, age and access restrictions. government, the strategic initiatives of the strategy will be implemented over 3 temporal horizons. Horizon 1 will run to the 2016/17 financial year with a focus on establishing the Strategy’s key foundations with feasibility studies conducted to explore the required technology solutions and updates made to legislation, policies and criteria to support the Strategy’s implementation. Any required technology solutions will be built in Horizon 2, commencing in the 2015/16 financial year and running until the 2016/17 financial year. Once built, the technology solutions will then be scaled to suit ongoing operations. A review of this State CCTV Strategy will be conducted at the end of Horizon 2 when the required activities for Horizon 3 will be determined. It is also expected that Horizon 3 will pursue new opportunities identified following the implementation of Horizon 1 and Horizon 2, and may involve deepening technological capabilities through tools such as facial recognition and analytics to improve community safety and security outcomes. Connecting the State’s CCTV systems will be challenging, due to the diversity of system types, age and access restrictions. To circumvent this, the Strategy will prioritise registered CCTV system donors to identify those of the highest value for public safety. The Strategy also takes into account the fact that rapid development of CCTV technology may outpace the relevance and suitability of the documentation supporting the Strategy. The Taskforce will be responsible for reviewing and
● Special report
WA
keeping documentation up to date. At all times, the Strategy’s progress and outcomes will be measured on behalf of the community and government to track that the aspiration of the State CCTV Strategy is achieved.
Mobile footage from the general public is included in the Strategy, which recognises that everyone with a smart phone or tablet now possesses a CCTV camera.
Operational fundamentals Same as the rest of the world, leveraging the data gathered by CCTV cameras is hampered by technical challenges. There’s a multitude of proprietary systems and management solutions, a lack of technological expertise to operate discrete systems to retrieve footage, as well as a lack of consistency in how CCTV owners are approached to provide footage for investigative purposes. By facilitating better information sharing between donors and clients, the Strategy aims to accelerate investigation outcomes while reducing the impact of CCTV footage retrieval on daily operations. WA’s State CCTV Strategy is to provide a mechanism by which CCTV owners can volunteer the data from any public facing camera that they manage to one or more agreed clients – typically law enforcement agencies like WA Police. When a CCTV system owner shares its data through the State CCTV Strategy, it is considered a donor. Any organisation that receives data from a donor through the State CCTV Strategy is known as a client. Everyone in WA has the opportunity to become a CCTV donor should they choose. Donors may be grouped into 3 broad categories, with each category being afforded a different way to participate. Government agencies will participate, business may choose to become registered, while members of the community may choose to become mobile-enabled via smart devices incorporating video cameras. The State CCTV Strategy will facilitate data sharing in the following ways: On request data sharing for those donors recorded in the State Register, effective data sharing for donors who adopt the published leading practice criteria, guidelines or policies, real time and recorded data sharing for high value donors who become connected, or for mobileenabled donors. The State CCTV Register, which is currently called Blue Iris, will be refreshed to provide better functionality and operability for those CCTV owners who wish to voluntarily provide information about CCTV cameras that face public areas. The State CCTV Register will form a comprehensive database containing information on the State’s CCTV infrastructure and, in the event of an incident, WA Police and emergency services will be able to respond more effectively by obtaining CCTV system locations. All client access to CCTV footage must be donorapproved. If connected, a legal agreement will be used by donors to formalise the terms of the donorclient relationship. The WA Police will always be the primary client, however, there is potential for
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other bodies (i.e. Local Government Authorities) to become a client if agreed by the CCTV owner and if they meet certain eligibility criteria. Of the CCTV owners who register their infrastructure, it is expected that a small subset will have a large number of cameras covering public spaces. These owners will be encouraged on a caseby-case basis to become connected, so that WA Police can directly access their live, and potentially recorded, CCTV footage for safety and security purposes. A technology solution will be trialled and developed as part of the Strategy to connect these identified ‘high value’ CCTV owners. This connection will serve to minimise disruption to donor operations and increase police responsiveness to critical incidents. Mobile footage from the general public is included in the Strategy, which recognises that everyone with a smart phone or tablet now possesses a CCTV camera. As part of the Strategy, a Mobile Video Sharing solution will be tested to unlock this potentially rich source of data, providing a new way for citizens to contribute to WA’s safety and security. When footage of interest is identified, dissemination of the data is often obstructed when it is in a proprietary format. The Strategy will provide the community with guidance to ensure unifying technical formats that are simple and usable to facilitate data sharing. Meanwhile, clear guidelines for voluntary participation in the Strategy will be developed to emphasise that data sharing will only be allowed for supporting community safety and security initiatives and that commercial use of the data will not be allowed. The most relevant privacy laws relating to the State CCTV Strategy include the Surveillance Devices Act (1998) WA, the Security and Related Activities (Control) Act (1996) WA and the Freedom of Information Act (1992) WA. Where appropriate, the criteria, policies and guidelines will also reflect how the existing legislation affects donor and client roles, rights and responsibilities. The goals of the Strategy are clear. By coordinating the State’s CCTV assets, the Strategy will improve the ability of WA Police and other agencies to gather intelligence and respond to emergency situations in a more efficient and effective manner. Having access to a greater number of CCTV resources is expected to enhance the situational awareness of these agencies, improve their ability to allocate resources across multiple incidents, monitor crime hotspots and gather evidence for legal purposes. n
● Special report
Council CCTV
Council CCTV Systems One of the fastest growing CCTV user groups in Australia is local councils. Research conducted by the Australian Institute of Criminology gives a snapshot of market penetration, an idea of system size and topology, as well as a sense of the usage and value of these public surveillance solutions to police investigations.
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ESEARCH conducted by the Australian Institute of Criminology into public surveillance systems installed by councils around Australia is highly instructive given the fact it’s hard to get a sense of the number of systems, how they are used and whether or not they provide value. The AIC’s research on the subject was published last year and while there’s been continual growth in the market since, the findings remain valuable for industry and end users. For a start, 561 councils around Australia were invited to participate and 221 completed the survey, a response rate of 39 per cent. Of the responders, 57 per cent reported they had a CCTV system, 12 per cent did not have one but planned to install one and 37 per cent had no CCTV system and no plans to install one. The figures showed huge growth in the market over a 10-year period, with earlier research showing only 9 per cent of councils used CCTV in 2005. In addition, only 2 per cent of councils intended to install it in 2005. What this means is that the proportion of councils with CCTV systems or a plan to install CCTV systems has increased from 11 per cent to 69 per cent in 10 years.
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Of the 30 per cent of responding councils which had no CCTV and did not plan to install it, reasons included a perception CCTV is not required as crime is low (65 per cent), that CCTV was not a strategic priority (65 per cent), lack of funding (51 per cent), lack of community support (25 per cent), lack of expertise in council (13 per cent), and the perception CCTV does not reduce crime (5 per cent). While a large number of councils without CCTV cite funding as an issue, there is a considerable amount of funding on tap. There’s the National Community Crime Prevention Programme (NCCPP), Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) funding program, Safer Suburbs, Secure Schools and, most recently, Safer Streets. A number of state and territory crime prevention agencies have also established CCTV funding streams within their grants programs, such as the Public Safety Infrastructure Fund in Victoria and the Community Crime Prevention Fund in WA. Other government agencies also offer funding for CCTV without the explicit goal of preventing and detecting crime, while a number of private corporations have also provided funding for local government CCTV. The research showed 58 per cent of councils had received funding for CCTV over a 5-year period, with an average $A198,214 received by each council. Most of this funding was provided for capital infrastructure and installation costs, rather than for the ongoing maintenance of CCTV systems.
Characteristics of CCTV systems Overall, the mean number of open street CCTV systems reported by councils was 5.0, while the mean number of cameras operated by local councils was 43.2. Around 53 per cent of all councils reported operating 20 cameras or fewer, while 27 per cent had 10 cameras or fewer. Only 12 per cent of councils reported having more than 100 CCTV cameras in operation at the time of the survey. These numbers suggest that a small number of councils account for a significant proportion of all cameras currently being operated by local government. The survey results also showed that cameras have been installed by local councils in a range of different locations. Among those councils that had CCTV in operation at the time of completing the survey, 56 per cent had cameras installed on local council-owned property (libraries, cultural centres, waste transfer stations, swimming pools), 48 per cent had cameras in recreational areas, 28 per cent had cameras in outdoor shopping malls and 27 percent had cameras installed in car parks. Around 18 per cent reported having cameras installed in an entertainment precinct. The most common location for the main CCTV system (the system with the largest number of cameras) was council-owned property (25 per cent of councils with CCTV), this was followed by recreational areas (21 per cent).
Using earlier data for comparison, researchers found there has been an increase in the proportion of councils with more than 15 cameras in operation between 2005 and 2014 (from 31 per cent to 43 per cent). There have also been increases in the use of digital technology (from 59 per cent to 83 per cent), use of colour imaging has gone up (from 61 per cent to 80 per cent) and the use of wireless connections has increased (from 33 per cent to 41 per cent). The size and sophistication of camera systems (or at least the main camera system) appears to have increased significantly in the past decade. The research showed that CCTV systems vary in terms of control room operations, which the report suggested are the most crucial element of a CCTV system where the aim of a scheme is to improve the response of police or private security to incidents as they occur. The monitoring of CCTV can be classified into 3 broad categories: Active monitoring, where a person sits and monitors camera footage in real time; passive monitoring, where monitors are in view and are casually monitored by staff who react when an incident is observed in progress; or no monitoring, where recording devices record images that can be viewed if a crime is reported. Responses to the survey indicate that the majority of main systems
The research showed 58 per cent of councils had received funding for CCTV over a 5-year period, with an average $A198,214 received by each council.
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● Special report
Council CCTV
operated by councils are not monitored (61 per cent), while a further 15 per cent were occasionally monitored by an operator during business hours (passive monitoring). Only 10 per cent of systems were actively monitored, either during business hours or 24 hours a day. Based on earlier data, the research shows the number of main systems actively monitored has fallen from around 25 per cent to 10 per cent over the last decade, while the proportion of main CCTV systems that are passively monitored has fallen from 22 per cent to 15 per cent. The proportion of main systems that are not monitored has doubled from 31 per cent to 61 per cent. Further, there are important differences between councils and jurisdictions in terms of the relationship between local government and police and the extent to which police are willing and able to monitor local government-operated CCTV. The actual benefit of monitoring CCTV systems will ultimately depend on its intended use. Specifically, monitoring offers the greatest benefit where it is used to support the rapid deployment of police or security personnel (or both). While this requires the resources to support monitoring activity, it also requires an effective working relationship between camera operators and local police or security providers.
Use of CCTV footage by police The AIC survey included a number of questions about the frequency with which CCTV footage was requested by police where police were not responsible for monitoring the footage themselves. This is important, given that there appears to have been a recent shift towards placing greater importance on the value of CCTV footage in criminal investigations, rather than focusing primarily on the crime prevention benefits of camera systems. Overall, 81 per cent of councils had received at least 1 request from police for camera footage from
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...many councils believe their footage makes a significant contribution in identifying and apprehending offenders. a system they owned or operated. Around 20 per cent of councils reported having received requests for footage from police approximately once a week on average, while a further 19 per cent of councils received requests on a monthly basis. Meanwhile, 15 per cent of councils had not received a request for camera footage in that financial year. Councils were also asked to indicate the extent to which police had used this footage for different purposes (to the best of their knowledge). In this case, 69 per cent of councils who had received a request for footage from police reported that it had been used to successfully identify an offender ‘sometimes’ or ‘often’, and 55 per cent of councils reported that the footage had been used to prosecute an offender ‘sometimes’ or ‘often’. CCTV footage provided by local councils was used 33 per cent of the time to seek information from the public about a crime and 16 per cent of the time in community safety messages. In short, CCTV use is growing, CCTV systems are becoming much more sophisticated thanks to IPbased technologies and wireless links, and there’s significant funding available for those councils seeking it. Research shows video images are often requested by police and many councils believe their footage makes a significant contribution in identifying and apprehending offenders. However, many councils would also like more feedback from police on the effectiveness of footage they provide. And researchers found that a consistent theme throughout the survey was the need for local government and police to work more collaboratively in designing, managing and monitoring CCTV systems. n
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Contact Hills today for a quote. Call 1800 720 000 or email customersupport@hills.com.au T RU ST E D T EC H N O LO GY
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â—? Product review
Fujinon 15-50
The Lens Maketh the Camera Want to convert a low cost 1080p network camera into a pixel monster with the optical power and image quality to scare the best integrated camera systems on the planet? All you need do is put a little thought into angle of view and spend about $A130.
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BY J O H N A D A M S
CTV lenses are so easy. Find the hyperfocal distance on the kit lens that came with your low cost HD camera, fiddle with zoom and focus, tighten the drag screws, mount the camera on a wall and hurrah! ‘Crystal clear image streams with an angle of view of 100 degrees’, right? Well – actually, that’s bollocks. Outside your scene’s centre and any deeper than about 10 metres in good light you’re going to give the customer what everyone politely calls situational awareness – soft and partially distorted images complete with CAs, that embraces everything they don’t need to see. Walls, sky, trees, fences, powerlines, ceilings, signage, floors – a waterfall of noise that combines to distract the eye and ensure snapshots of faces and license plates will never be admissible in court. But there is a way to turn your $A250 1080p camera into a raging pixel monster capable of excellent face recognition and tight situational awareness at 15 metres, and able to peer 2000 metres into scenes, giving detail and depth of field that’ll knock your client’s socks off. It’s all about lens choice and I don’t mean choosing lenses costing vast sums of money. Not much more than $A130 will change the nature of a low cost CCTV camera – performance won’t just be a little better, it’ll take the capability of your customer’s CCTV solution to a whole new level. In this review, we’re going to partner Fujinon’s 1550mm F1.5 varifocal 1/2.7-inch MP lens with an entrylevel full-body camera and see whether there’s any improvement in operational performance. When it comes to specifications, the Fujinon 15-50 is IR-corrected for low-light cameras and features DC-iris and CS-mount. This is not a large, heavy lens but packs in 3.3x telephoto and incorporates Fujinon’s Aspherical Technology - lowdispersion glass with a high-reflective index. Thanks to quality glass and good coatings on multiple elements, the Fujinon 15-50 offers sharper images with less internal reflection, better contrast and colour rendition, and overall higher optical performance. At least that’s what it says on the tin. We’re going to test the lens on a camera we’ve met before – the compact Axis M1125, which is the only camera in our stable right now with a sensor small enough to avoid vignetting with this 1/2.7-inch Fujinon lens. The M1125’s sensor is a progressive scan ½.8-inch CMOS with a maximum resolution of 1080p HD (1920 x 1080) and a frame rate of 25fps in H.264 and MJPEG. Zipstream is available in H.264 and I run with it on the highest setting the whole test, switching to low later on to check the impact on bitrate. In our earlier test the M1125 with 120dB WDR did well in strong backlight. Minimum scene illumination with this camera is claimed to be 0.25 lux in colour and 0.05 lux in monochrome but we won’t be going lower than a shade under 2-lux at the lens. The nice thing about using this camera is the fact we’ve got images from an earlier test we undertook using the kit Ricom 3-10.5mm f1.4 varifocal lens for comparison. What will our findings show? Let’s see. From a mechanical point of view, CCTV lenses like this aren’t a deep subject. Swapping out the lens takes all of
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5mm focal length
15mm focal length
License plates
And face recognition
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● Product review
Fujinon 15-50 There is a way to turn your $A250 1080p camera into a raging pixel monster capable of excellent face recognition and tight situational awareness at 15 metres, and able to peer 2000 metres into scenes, giving detail and depth of field that’ll knock your client’s socks off.
5mm at sub-2 lux at lens
15mm at 80 lux
15mm at sub-2 lux with floodlight
half a minute – I replace the lens, plug in the auto iris cable and adjust the lens for 50mm by targeting the trees down on Belmore St while running back and forth from tripod to workstation monitor. In the earlier test we ran the Ricom at 3mm to view the district and then 5mm to view the lane. In the wider angle views from the earlier test, I could see the skyline of the city but detail was smudgy and there was considerable chromatic aberration throughout the scene. Today, as soon as I place and adjust the camera’s angle of view (this takes a number of trips through the office – long focal lengths are exacting), and sit down at the monitor, I get a big surprise. The Fujinon 15-50mm lens has turned this affordable little network camera into a video surveillance weapon.
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I have extreme detail of a chimney pot and branches at 35-40 along with excellent detail of World Square at 1000m. It’s the best view of both parts of our district view I’ve ever had. This camera and lens combination also give me the best view of Sydney’s Centrepoint Tower at close to 2000m, as well as the best view of the Memocorp building, at close to 1000m. Flaring? No, Ghosting? No. Chromatic aberrations? No. Distortion? No. Even given the grey and glary afternoon, colour rendition remains high. Something I was on the lookout for with this lens was reduced depth of field at the long end and it’s true that if the lens is focused on objects close up at a focal length of 50mm, then there’s background and/or foreground blur. But when the camera is set close to infinity viewing objects 15m or more away, depth of field yawns out behind the subject forever. A focal length of 50mm is not what users think they need but don’t underestimate its power in serious applications – not just externally but internally as well. Before I change the focal length, I put Norman out the back in 75,000 lux of backlight and positioning the camera about 15m from his face, I tweak focus. The quality of face recognition at this distance is superb. It’s not for every application, given depth of field is reduced, but long focal lengths are discreet and allow perfect facial identification without the need to cable right up to an entry point. Next, I grab focus on the back fence at a focal length of 15mm, set up to view the lane and take a look at the monitor. Framed for a tight view of the 5m wide lane with a scene depth ranging from 12-20m from the lens I see extremely high levels of detail come streaming through. All the pixels in the 1920 x 1080-pixel sensor are available to give detail in the target area. The tightness of the scene evidences itself in a number of ways – not just in the sense that I’m only looking at the place people and vehicles ever move out here. Longer focal lengths make for flatter images. There’s no barrel distortion – I later confirm this by pointing the camera at a nearby block wall. No distortion means sharper images. And another important point is that I’m able to frame out irrelevant moving objects like trees and shrubs that contribute to elevated bitrates. But it’s when people and vehicles start moving around in the lane that the impact of lens choice really hits hard. Instead of getting situational awareness over a huge area that melts upon zooming digitally into my zone of operational priority, this narrow field of view is giving huge levels of detail. I have court-admissible face recognition, clear number plates and great colour
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● Product review
Fujinon 15-50
Face recognition at night is a snap. And don’t worry about bitrate – with Zipstream still set at high, it’s miniscule. rendition to boot. Each time someone walks the lane, it’s brought home yet again that high quality image streams are all about lens choice – from an operational perspective you need to think long and hard about angle of view and focal length. The image quality is so good with this camera-lens combination I only save snapshots of people walking away from the lens. The front-on views I’m snaring feel like an invasion of privacy. Something it’s also worth wondering about is how this camera system performs at night and I run the test until there’s sub-2 lux at the lens in order to check out low light performance with the F1.6 Fujinon. Once again, performance is a revelation. The 15mm focal length allows me to concentrate detail while framing out dark areas and focusing on a pool of light in the lane. Conveniently, there’s a movement sensor floodlight right above my target area, which is sort of cheating but clearly shows the benefit of exploiting movement-activated or incidental ambient lighting at key points in your scenes. Face recognition at night is a snap. And don’t worry about bitrate – with Zipstream still set at high, it’s miniscule. It’s not easy being an installer or integrator right now. End user choices are too often governed by price and it’s the rare security manager who can convince bean counters of the importance of bolting a CCTV solution’s capabilities to operational procedures. Senior managers want overall coverage of an area and often don’t worry if motion blur or a wide angle of view renders people in most parts of the scene unrecognisable. Performance! Don’t make the accountants laugh! Instead, camera choice usually comes down to the closest 3 all-rounder cameras with integrated lenses – jacks of all trades and masters of none. Once camera selection has narrowed, the screws are applied to price.
5mm focal length crop - note softness and high level of CAs at 5mm.
15mm focal length at 5m
50mm focal length at 15 metres
15-50mFujinon 15-50mm with AT
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While price can be a factor, it’s also the factor that can render a camera system useless for serious investigative work. Getting worthwhile images from a video surveillance solution is not about hanging a low cost wide angle CCTV camera on a wall - when it comes to investigating crime, performance does count. But even though pixels speak louder than words that needn’t mean installing the most expensive cameras with the highest resolutions. Affordable cameras can be empowered by quality lenses and longer focal lengths to concentrate maximum sensor resolution in a way that utterly changes overall performance parameters. n
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● Case study
CoastalCOMS
Eye in the Sky
CoastalCOMS has installed Sony CCTV cameras and a Milestone VMS to allow James Cook University in Queensland a powerful and flexible remote surveillance solution to monitor wildlife in the canopy of the Daintree Rainforest.
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LATERAL application that leverages the power and flexibility of the latest video surveillance solutions is empowering James Cook University (JCU) researchers at the JCU Daintree Rainforest Observatory. JCU’s Daintree Rainforest Observatory is one of only 5 long-term ecological monitoring sites in Australia. There are 2 laboratories onsite, one openair teaching lab and one traditional, air-conditioned laboratory equipped to support the basic needs of most rainforest research. The observatory includes JCU’s canopy crane, which allows researchers to explore the rainforest from above, where the atmosphere is different, down through its various levels and into the soils and subterranean water resources. The wide
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BY J O H N A D A M S
It’s been a big success. We have a steady stream of happy researchers using Milestone for various projects. They pick it up really quickly. monitor the ospreys’ movements and everything happening in and around the nest. They also needed flexible video data storage management and a system that was easy for researchers to download and use. To assist with the application, JCU enlisted the help of CoastalCOMS, a company specializing in cloudhosted environmental digital asset management and a long-time Milestone solutions partner. To handle the task, CoastalCOMS mounted a Sony VM632R network camera at the end of the crane boom and a robotic SNC-WR630 on the crane tower. A fibre optic cable is used to connect the cameras to a JCU server room. The camera, which operates at 1 megabit per second, sends its data for viewing and recording on Milestone XProtect Essential video management software (VMS). With a camera mounted on the crane, researchers are now able to closely monitor the birds without disturbing them. They can also isolate video segments to capture still shots of the ospreys to export and share. The easy-to-use VMS interfaces allow researchers fell with no prior VMS experience to quickly download and monitor the osprey camera output from various remote research facilities. According to Nigel Sim, application development manager for CoastalComs, a division of Coastalwatch, the ospreys have been nesting in Daintree for years,
variety of micro-climates present in the rainforest makes it possible for researchers to conduct many experiments they could not conduct elsewhere, such as exposing a small section of the rainforest to drought conditions to test the effects. One of the drivers of this application was an osprey nest on top of the canopy crane at the uppermost rainforest layer that encompasses the branches and leaves of the trees and serves as the richest habitat for plant and animal life. Monitoring the fortunes of a top predator gives researchers a bellwether for the entire Daintree ecosystem, as well as allowing them to monitor the behaviour of these beautiful birds in greater detail than they usually could. To enable JCU researchers to monitor the ospreys, JCU needed a CCTV camera that could be mounted in a delicate position and a system that could
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CoastalCOMS
It’s been a big success. We have a steady stream of happy researchers using Milestone for various projects. They pick it up really quickly. but now the Milestone solution is giving researchers the chance to observe them up close. “Researchers had no reliable way to access these birds,” Sim says. “We thought about a GoPro camera but it was way too inconvenient to have to constantly shift the camera angles and send people to collect the footage. With Milestone, we have every setting and feature we could want at our fingertips - remotely. It’s an incredibly powerful monitoring tool.” Meanwhile, Chris Lane, general manager at Coastalwatch, says that the day after the cameras were installed, the ospreys began to investigate their new neighbour and the results were stunning. “The birds were curious from the start,” Lane says. “They would fly right up to the camera and poke their heads around it. Nigel and I happened to be around the observatory one day, and one of the people monitoring the camera excitedly called us into the control room. The Milestone VMS had recorded an osprey looking right into the lens! Nigel archived a 2-minute clip of her flying up into the nest and back down, and we isolated single frames from the VMS. There’s an incredible shot of her looking out at the entire rainforest. It’s one of the best shots we’ve ever captured.” Lane says that researchers are encouraged to download Milestone Mobile on their phones and tablets and are provided with logins to view the cameras and extract imagery. “It’s been a big success,” Sim says. “We have a steady stream of happy researchers using Milestone for various projects. They pick it up really quickly.” Lane is also excited to share the osprey cam with the public in the near future. “Right now the nest is comprised of 2 ospreys bringing up their young in that nest,” Lane says. “My hope is that in 12-18 months, satellite connections will improve to the point that we can stream the camera live to the public, so they can get as excited
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as we are about it. We may even be able to show a live hatch.” Meanwhile, Sim says based on the success of what’s being called Osprey-Cam, researchers asked for 5 static Sony VM632R cameras to be installed to monitor a group of possums they thought were living in a particular location. But when the cameras went live, they saw that no possums were there after all, however, a large colony of huge tree ants had made its home there. “While it turned out to be a completely different research project, we got incredible footage of these enormous ants,” Lane says. “The ecologists were super excited to get live shots of the ant nest getting built. Without Milestone, none of this would have happened.” Lane says there are also cameras monitoring penguins in Victoria. “They’re affiliated with the penguins on Phillip Island, which is the biggest penguin colony in mainland Australia,” Lane says. “With just a camera or 2 connected to Milestone, biologists and ecologists are now able to do research that just a few years ago they were only dreaming about.” n
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The Interview
Back to the Future
BGWT’s Rob Meachem is one of electronic security distribution’s most experienced leaders. Now tasked with taking BGW Technologies to next level, he discusses the company and the opportunities and challenges facing the distribution market.
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JA: How does it feel to be back in the electronics security industry, Rob? Are you enjoying yourself? RM: It feels great but to be honest, having so many strong relationships and friendships in the industry, I hardly felt I ever left. Certainly, a lot has changed in 2 years and I’m loving being a part of helping to grow this young business. JA: Tell us about BGWT, it’s a bigger company than many people in the local security industry realise, isn’t it? RM: BGW Technologies (BGWT) is still very young in its evolution as part of the electronic security industry when
Rob Me achem with John Adams
compared to other distributors yet we’ve already established a very solid base in terms of our products, people and customers. BGWT operates as a separate division of the BGW Group of companies, which is a proudly Australian familyowned business. When it comes to our size, the locations of our branches and the depth of our capacity to serve customers and support suppliers is probably underestimated. The BGW Group of companies has more than 1000 staff and more than 100 branches across Australia and Asia, and has a history going back more than 40 years. BGW Group’s core business is based around wholesale electrical, technology and plumbing supplies to the trade. In terms of BGW Technologies, the electronic security business, we have more than 20 dedicated customer-facing staff with branches in Brisbane, Perth, Sydney, and Melbourne. JA: Tell us about BGWT’s people – who are the key members of the team? RM: The owner Brian Webb and CEO Laurie Murphy share a strong focus on people which makes up an important element of our culture. I also share this value and that of a team approach. I believe our customers want to deal with a distributor that has people able to answer questions and provide information at a very technical level. We have a great pool of these people and continue to recruit additional people that meet this need. Examples include the last 3 people to join our team - Mark Shannon, Aaron Colley and Paul Felton. All are highly regarded for their industry knowledge and deep technical ability. JA: What would you say is BGWT Australia’s greatest strength – what does BGWT bring its customers no one else can offer? RM: I reckon this is a great question for the customers to answer, but I believe one of our greatest strengths is our inherent business DNA and our ownership structure. Let me explain - at every level in our business we understand the fundamental needs and wants of our customers. From the owners, executive team, and management all the way to
We are not governed or driven by external factors like share price or a heavy-handed corporate mentality. We have structure and measures but our focus is always on customers, people and partners.
customer facing staff - we simply get it. A great majority of our people in all areas have a strong technical and trade background - for instance, I’m an electrician and security technician by trade. When your customer knows you’ve been in their shoes and shared many of their experiences (good or bad) this typically means trust and relationships become more meaningful. I still believe trust and relationships in a trade-based industry (let alone any business) is a key to building loyal repeat business. In terms of our ownership, we are a very entrepreneurial business and the team is encouraged to think this way. We are not governed or driven by external factors like share price or a heavy-handed corporate mentality. We have structure and measures but our focus is always on customers, people and partners. We are encouraged to ask this question: ‘How does this benefit the customer?’ and to be outwards focused, not internally focused. This type of positive culture is very energising. In terms of what we can bring to our customers that no one else can, I think it’s a combination of many things, whether it be great people, unique products, our down to earth approach, financial strength and our understanding of the customer. What we offer is the sum of all these things – the capabilities and characteristics that we integrate are what set us apart and what keeps customers coming back for more. JA: What are the biggest brands in the BGWT stable? What about the most successful electronic security products? Which products are going well for BGWT right now? RM: Almost every product and brand is on an upwards sales trend in our business and we feel very proud of the brands/suppliers we represent. Pelco and Panasonic would be what you call the
big brands, but our product portfolio has many other well-known and respected brands from quality security and IT manufacturers. Importantly, we not only support and promote well-known brands but we are also working hard to highlight brands and products that are establishing themselves in the local market. JA: The electronic security industry has been going IP for some time and that’s accelerating with cloud services and remote access of systems. This is not a new area for BGWT but have you noticed as a distributor that there are installers who can handle analogue and networked solutions or are there distinct layers in the installer market? RM: The improvement of the knowledge and skills around IP based products has been pretty good across the board in the industry. With more IT skilled people in the industry and the ease with which the products connect and configure, we have seen a reduction in technical support, especially with smaller systems. Large scale enterprise and complex networks (fixed and wireless) still require a good degree of support and this is why we have skilled IT professional in all our branches and in support roles. JA: Where do you think the profitable future of the industry lies? Is it partnering with installer/integrators customers, providing a technical edge? Or do you think the core fundamentals of product quality and reliability backed with strong warranty and service are unlikely to ever change? RM: From a distributor perspective, I feel the answer to your first question in relation to a profitable future is that we need to deliver all of the things you mentioned - partnering, technical support and service and we need to do it with absolute consistency. The largest, most profitable and successful business (by
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The Interview a quantum) in the electronic security distribution space in Australia was built on all those qualities you mentioned above. It was a model built on value, and a deep and wide solution that its customers wanted, demanded and were prepared to pay for. It survived and grew despite technology and channel disrupters over several decades. I take the view that strong businesses are built on understanding of customers and partners, and delivering what they want. If you fail to understand and deliver, you get the opposite result – I think this is an observation that has been repeatedly proven. JA: What are the local plans for BGWT? What new technologies and products can we expect from BGWT in the next 12 months? RM: We will continue to strengthen our security product offering in depth and breadth to provide more complete solutions to our customers. We know this is important as evidenced by hiring a head of product management and sharpening our focus on this. We will build on our technical expertise and add complimentary products and technologies that our customers are asking for. Our recent announcement of the addition of the Auriga IP based Public Address and Alert messaging system is just one example. We will also be working hard to improve the sales and profile of our current brands and products and our capability to support the customers.
I take the view that strong businesses are built on understanding of customers and partners, and delivering what they want.
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JA: Does BGWT have a plan to increase its physical footprint in the Australian market over the next 12 months? And more broadly, where do you see the company going in the next 5 years? RM: As demand grows we will absolutely grow our footprint. Geographic expansion into South Australia and ACT would be our first point of expansion when the time is right. Beyond the plans I’ve mentioned, we do intend on expanding our offer into Asia via our JV businesses. I think 5 years is a long way off, but with the entrepreneurial leadership and culture within the BGW Group we will have an eyes-wide-open approach to our future.
Rob Me achem with John Adams
JA: Looking much ahead further - 10 years - where do you think electronic security technology is going? Will the same general technological delineations and market segments be maintained or will there be significant and unusual advances and segment integrations? And in which areas? RM: Wow – 10 years - that’s a long time in this industry! I do think segments will overlap further but I also think specialization will always have its place. I think the desire to access information, use it to predict behaviour and then influence or control outcomes will be underpinned and made possible by advancements in core technologies, such as processing power, resolution and compression, in conjunction with a growing ability to analyse data in order to predict events or outcomes. Today’s technology is mostly reacting to an event or outcome. The ability to make accurate predictions will be where the game changes in security electronics. It also goes without saying that the need to be able to control/monitor home and business environments anywhere at any time at the micro level will further advance symbiotic integration. JA: What do you think are the key business challenges distributors face in the current market? Do you worry about telcos intruding into the market, DIY, grey imports, the fall of the Aussie dollar, or are you more concerned with global financial conditions? RM: I think distributors typically face the same challenges today as they did in the past. Maintaining a value proposition, changes in channel strategy, upskilling to stay ahead of new technology, new entrants, the speed of obsoletion, to name a few, are all ongoing challenges. The other things you mention have been challenges to watch for more than a decade now and while some see them as threats, others see them as opportunities. My preference is to be mindful of threats yet spend time and energy seeking out opportunities, taking some risks and having fun along the way. These are values ingrained in the BGW culture and they are the reason I joined this company. n
● Special report
Home automation
Coming, ready, or not? We hear a lot of talk about home automation these days but it’s not easy getting a sense of how much home automation is being used and what the overall penetration automation has into the Australian market.
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OME automation is the next big thing. When it comes to domestic and small commercial electronic security solutions, automation comprising management of lighting, air conditioning, the addition of video surveillance and some access control really is the next step. The trouble is, it’s a big step and a layered step and getting the balance of cost and function right is not the easiest thing to do. In fact it seems that all the necessary technologies are there but no one has quite combined them in the perfect way to blow the market onto its ear. The rewards of success are likely to be huge for the company that achieves this – creating an affordable and powerful solution that handles more than security and a few ancillary lights really is the holy grail for home automation people. Of course, saying this misses a point. There are systems and
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BY J O H N A D A M S
suppliers which have been providing capable security and home automation solutions for ages – I’m thinking about the Ness M1 and Crestron – Risco, too. But even taking this into account, in the main part of the market, automation has been relatively slow in coming and now it has come there are weaknesses – the main one being that automation without the expense of an electrician is limited to simple devices like wall lamps. Want to address your fridge or washing machine remotely? You can browse in if the unit is IP addressable but that’s not the same as global automation of all devices in the home from a single browser. Is the infrastructure there to support remote access of video and control? In the metro areas, sure. And outside, there’s usually bandwidth and uptime enough for the task. It’s now possible to handle a system with a minimum of latency, though video upload remains an issue for asynchronous links, even in the city. For handling security and electrical units like air conditioning, intercom and access control, bandwidth and network reliability is a non-issue. The fluency of addressing such systems comes down to the comms path and network structure, including reliance on remote servers to manage data storage. But while the process of getting all these technological ducks into a row is taking time, suppliers in the market report that home automation is building as a trend and installers are now asking for automation-capable security solutions. “We definitely see the entrance of automation into the security market in Australia as a process which is currently in the ‘push’ phase with installers using automation to differentiate their product offerings from competitors,” says Bosch’s James Layton. “As end users continue to become better informed, we should see the market move into a ‘pull’ phase where the end user’s expectations will set the basis of the system to be installed, and the features offered by automation will be a big part of this change.” According to Layton, selling security has traditionally been all about selling peace of mind, but recently, that hasn’t been enough. “For your system to be successful, you also need to offer comfort of life,” he says. “User experience (UX) is a huge part of product design now and it encompasses all areas of the user’s interaction with the product – UX considers both emotional and physical context of use, as well as looking to create a value not just around the time of use, but the anticipation of use, and the memory of past use. Automation features, user control, and selfverification are all examples of concepts built around the intentions of UX.” Over at Hills, Matt Bailey says installers are showing a growing appetite for automation but that there’s still work to be done at the installer level in terms of packaging automation solutions in a way
Smartphones like alarm keypads are now the user interface of choice for security and home automation.
Neil Morgan
that best appeals to their customers. “Installers are certainly asking about automation more often and those we speak with are keen to implement automation in their offerings to customers,” Bailey explains. “However, automation is a relatively new market in Australia, not in terms of being a new concept but in terms of being packaged in a way that makes it available and appealing to your average consumer. “Because automation is a wider technology-based system, not just a security product, customers are more likely to research all the options available to them and make well informed decisions,” he says. “This will mean that the end user will typically drive the demand for home automation, as opposed to being driven by the installer.” Meanwhile, Hills’ James Todd says that installers currently see automation as nice to have but not necessarily must have. “With technological improvements and some manufacturers utilising wireless automation standards, such as ZigBee and Z-Wave, we are certainly seeing a slight increase in the interest in the internet of things,” Todd explains. “At Hills, products like Reliance can already provide a level of automation via the ComNav module and the short term roadmap will see some exciting announcements.” Ness is in a quite different position to other electronic security distributors because the company chose to specialise in home automation many years ago and over time has elected to feed automation capability into its range of locally designed and built alarm panels. “From early on, even before we released the M1
John Gellel
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James Layton
Home automation
Matt Bailey (R) and Ian Law
automation panel, we understood some of our customers wanted automation,” explains Ness’ Neil Morgan. “Of course up until the M1, it had been a rather clunky approach by using systems and linking them together at a low level. The industry and market has vastly changed since then, the smartphone was released and apps are now an indispensable part of the scene. Smartphones, like alarm keypads, are now the user interface of choice for security and home automation. “The demand is sufficient that our range includes the M1 with multiple apps, the SmartLiving panel with 2 dedicated native apps, and the Ness D8x/ D16x series controllers, which also have multiple Steve Charles apps,” Morgan says. “Most panels on the market have to run 3rd party hardware to run an app and some have to go through cloud servers requiring ongoing monthly service fees. Installers coming across to the SmartLiving panel have given us plenty of good feedback regarding this one point alone. “We’ve had an excellent grounding in automation for more than a decade, and winning many CEDIA awards proves we have been listening and understanding customers and installers’ home automation requirements for a long time. In terms of growing demand in the market, the introduction of the SmartLiving panel has allowed us to open up the home automation market to more installers who didn’t want to commit to the M1 panel but wanted an expandable security panel that also had automation capabilities and interfaces.”
Installers are certainly asking about automation more often and those we speak with are keen to implement automation in their offerings to customers.
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Rob Lucas
According to QSS’ Rob Lucas, automation is making inroads, with end users wanting products that have feature-rich functionality and flexibility, along with mobile apps that make life simpler. “Installers are responding to their customers by offering these products to ensure they don’t risk losing business opportunities,” Lucas explains. “Generally speaking, people today have busier work schedules and longer working hours; the thought of being remotely connected with the home and family is important. Home Automation with video and push notifications allows parents for example to watch over their children’s safety or monitor no-go zones at home or work remotely.” When it comes to QSS’ product spread, Lucas says manufacturers are constantly responding to the growing demand for automation products and with 2GIG and Alarm.com responses to these changes can be prompt with software/firmware updates taking place on a constant basis. Other manufacturers and distributors are also pushing in this area, including CSD, which has product offerings in the automation space and Honeywell, which has been investing in this area for some years and has a significant and rapidly growing product portfolio. According to Honeywell’s John Gellel, automation is certainly being asked for not only by installers but at a number of different levels of the market. “Developers see the advantage of making properties more saleable by pre-installing automation systems, while end users also believe an automation system will add value to their home,” he explains. “Users also look forward to the convenience and control automation offers them in their everyday lives, as well as the utter coolness and fun!” n
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Monitoring
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The Future: Threats and Opportunities ALARM monitoring’s future looks both threatening and full of opportunity – new technology offers plenty if the right business models can be found but there’s a chance the shift to networked security and automation solutions could impact on the underlying nature of alarm monitoring and the alarm monitoring industry.
ROBABLY the most interesting thing to happen to the alarm industry in last year is UL’s 1023 approval of the Z-Wave wireless mesh protocol, which allows the technology to be incorporated into professional-grade UL-rated alarm sensors. Sigma Z-Wave transceiver models to which UL1023 applies include ZM5101, ZM5202, and ZM5304, and all now feature protocol SDK version 6.60 and are evaluated to UL’s standards for home security. The transceivers feature anti-jamming and AES 128-bit encryption provisions and moving forward this means every device in a Z-Wave system from sensors to locks can reside in a secure ecosystem. This ratification of Z-Wave by UL was important because the market feared – and I think these fears were at once slightly justified and yet well off the mark – that Z-Wave was hackable and that once a device had been breached it would give an attacker ready access to an entire Z-Wave security and automation mesh. The threat was revealed when U.S. Black Hats intercepted a Z-Wave transmission and impersonated a device last year but it’s my opinion that as a raw wireless technology, Z-Wave is superior to
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consumer-grade 433MHz comms found in most alarm sensors and garage remotes. Adding anti-jamming and AES encryption to Z-Wave simply takes things to an even higher level. If there’s any negative about Z-Wave in security sensors, it’s an issue of battery life and that issue is rapidly being resolved as manufacturers develop more efficient designs. What does all this mean for alarm monitoring? It means that serious security manufacturers of quality alarm sensors – Risco, Bosch, Interlogix, Ness, Honeywell and others – are going to be motivated to incorporate Z-Wave into alarm sensors for a number of reasons. The first is that many of their controllers already include Z-Wave transceivers and it makes no sense to use 2 independent wireless networks when one will do a better job for less money. Security manufacturers will also find themselves competing with manufacturers of ULendorsed Z-Wave sensors spilling over from the automation market. There are around 350 Z-Wave manufacturers globally and the chance some of them won’t take a tilt at professional grade alarm sensors is a big fat zero. From here out, things get interesting from a temporal standpoint. What will
the future look like? Proper UL security sensors running on Z-Wave don’t need to work with traditional solid state alarm panels with Z-Wave bolted on. Instead they can be deployed around any one of dozens of controllers like Samsung’s SmartThings Hub, which supports Zigbee and Wi-Fi and Z-Wave and Bluetooth and has USB ports and is addressed by a comprehensive (probably much too comprehensive) mobile app.
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If the default passwords are not changed bypassing them is relatively simple
That’s really the fulcrum of upheaval right there - home automation hubs handling proper security sensors that link via existing WiFi to existing and increasingly reliable IP networks for pro-grade monitoring and remote user managment. Smart networkable hubs which integrate with any of 1500 or more Z-Wave security and automation devices can only be seen as the alarm market disrupter of the future. Some
manufacturers are well aware of this, as their router-looking security and automation systems loudly declare. Annoyingly, it’s not as if electronic security manufacturers can’t do it better – the industry’s sensors, cameras, locks, keypads, mobile interfaces and underlying comprehension of the robust dependability required by alarm systems with a 20-year lifespan, is second to none. But our manufacturers and their networks of installers and monitoring providers are yet to come up with holistic, futureproof security and automation ecosystems fronted by competitively-priced and yet profitable business models. It’s not all scary, however. Convenience and security are not the same things. The Internet of Things is sure to be riddled with back doors in a way that makes serious security managers and cautious business and home owners shudder in their shoes. For instance, IoT search engine Shodan recently discovered a teddy bear was vulnerable to hacking and found video monitors could be accessed by unauthorised mobile phones. What’s interesting is that most backdoors to IoT devices are things like default passwords or flawed configs – those guilty of the former misstep include anyone who’s stuck with Admin 12345 or Root Pass as a user name and password for their network camera, then promptly forgotten they did so. According to Tom Lysemose Hansen, of app security firm Promon, part of the IoT vulnerability is due to the ease with which consumer goods can be cracked. “If the default passwords are not changed bypassing them is relatively simple,” explained Hansen recently. “A patch can be introduced retroactively but until then, the device could be a single entry point into an entire private network, enabling hackers to uncover sensitive data or relay false information. The model of using default passwords must be put to bed if IoT is to become an integral feature of domestic life, otherwise its associated
dangers will overwhelm any perceived benefits. “The security of the IoT hinges on the apps used to access, monitor and control the device – whether it’s a mobile app used to control a doorbell or a teddy bear. It is crucial this app is able to selfprotect, otherwise sensitive data, such as passwords, may be leaked and misused. Ideally, the device should verify that it’s being accessed from a trusted app, and this verification process should not rely on single static factors, like default passwords, but multiple factor authentication to ensure the integrity of the private network. “While the implications of a hacked banking application are widely recognised, wireless consumer goods now pose an uncertain threat,” Hansen explains. “How app developers and manufacturers handle these threats will determine the success and legality of their entry into the consumer IoT market. It’s important that these early incursions on unsafe networks are nipped in the bud with effective security measures, namely the replacement of ineffective or unavailable anti-malware software with perennial inapp security and a more individualised, user-friendly password system. “The developers of applications are all too eager to crack the simplest and least demanding way of controlling a device remotely, but – in order to maintain IoT’s pace of growth without muddying its image – adequate security must be developed in tandem.” Is it likely automation and app developers will create secure home automation solutions interfaces and networks able to seriously challenge traditional security solutions? Perhaps, and the UL listing of Z-Wave is a step in the right direction. But in the medium term it’s still the traditional solutions that offer users the pinnacle of reliability, sensor quality and battery life, network isolation, professional monitoring support and integrated comms backup. In the longer term, however, it’s a mistake to think that Z-Wave hub controllers are not going to become powerful and flexible security solutions in their own right. Exactly what that means for the electronic security market in the long term remains difficult to say. n
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Infrared
Passive aggressive Passive infrared sensors of high quality offer installers and end users excellent catch performance and reliability if thoughtfully installed.
UCCESSFUL use of passive infrared detection demands a stable IRE environment, with no heater vents, powerful flood lamps or sun-filled windows likely to generate excessive infrared energy levels. When it comes to the latter, PIRS can’t be located facing unfiltered sunlight and exposure to glass surfaces should be space divisions in office or home environments - not perimeter glass - unless a verandah keeps direct sun off. Other potential challenges with PIRs include humidity, unsuppressed electrical equipment that could cause interference (this includes things like fluorescent lights), and dirt and dust in the environment. You can effectively seal PIRs and conformal coat their boards if you’re installing them in tough environments like bathrooms, garages or covered ways. Another mistake is to install PIRs in environments in which cats, dogs, birds and flying insects are present unless the sensors have been specifically designed to resist these false alarm signals through sensitivity adjustments, microprocessor control or lens design. In the past, pet immunity meant keeping the IRE sensitivity above knee or thigh level with lens design, creating what was called a “pet alley”. This was effective up to a point, especially with small dogs, but climbing animals like cats are likely to leap onto lounge chairs or tables causing false alarms. Modern microprocessor-controlled PIRs are claimed by manufacturers to be able to recognise the waveform signal output from a pyro in the presence of IRE, making it possible to recognize a range of different animals – including dogs up to 50kg and unlikely numbers of cats. It’s true that well-designed sensors can monitor such waveforms amplitude, cycle, frequency and wavelength and compare what they detect to what has been programmed into their memory as a threshold. Before the sensor goes in, you also need to know the layout of the sensor’s zones defined by lens design. Always check the specification sheet before installation and ascertain the sensor’s strengths
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and weaknesses. A typical PIRs is designed to activate if a certain number of zones is breached in a given direction at a given speed so PIRs should be installed so they position the maximum number of zones at right angles to what is the most likely track of an intruder. Passive infrared sensors are far more sensitive to changes between live and dead zones and live and live zones, than they are to changes inside detection zones. If the PIR you’re installing has no anti-masking feature, make sure it’s positioned so an intruder will have a hard time reaching it to mask it. Most modern sensors have anti-masking but the cheaper ones will be devoid of this feature and vulnerable to masking by anything from sticky tape to spray paint. Smart sensors will alarm if they think they’re being deceived in this way. Look for creep zones, too. These lookdown zones are achieved by clever lens design and they make it much harder to approach a PIR from beneath. There are 6 primary lens patterns - and these can be applied generally to both fresnel lens types and mirror optics: l Long range, dual zone, narrow coverage lenses are used to monitor narrow corridors with crossing points to protect long rows or windows l Long range, multizone, narrow coverage lenses are designed for use with long corridors without crossings in which intruders will move towards or away from the sensor l Multizone curtain lenses are mounted on ceilings above entrance doors or in glazed areas. They’re a detection fence from floor to ceiling and any intrusion through them will generate an alarm l Broad multizone, wide angle or volumetric: These lens types are the most common found. They are more sensitive to movement across a protected space at right angles to their radial zones. They’re ideal for smaller spaces in domestic homes and small offices l Finally, ceiling mount PIRs have 2-zone, 360-degree coverage, with conical zone arrangement arrayed in 2 circumference lengths. These sensors are ideal for use in offices that have large numbers of partitions between waist and shoulder height. Multiple installations generally employ overlapping pools of detection. n
If the PIR you’re installing has no antimasking feature, make sure it’s positioned so an intruder will have a hard time reaching it to mask it.
CAMS 9 is now compatible with over 90 major IP CCTV brands.
SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT AVER AVIGILON AVTECH AXIS AZTECH BASLER BEWARD BOSCH BRICKCOM CANON CISCO COMPRO D-LINK DAHUA DERICAM DLINK DYNACOLOR EDIMAX EMINENT ENEO ETROVISION EVERFOCUS FLEXWATCH FOSCAM GEOVISION GRANDSTREAM GRANDTEC HEDEN HIKVISION HITRON HUNT INSTAR INTELLINET IPUX IQINVISION JVC LEVELONE LILIN LINKSYS LUPUS MESSOA MICROVIEW MOBOTIX NEXCOM OPTICA PANASONIC PIXORD ROBIN SAMSUNG SANYO SECUFIRST SHANY SIEMENS SMC SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT AVER AVIGILON AVTECH AXIS AZTECH BASLER BEWARD BOSCH BRICKCOM CANON CISCO COMPRO D-LINK DAHUA DERICAM DLINK DYNACOLOR EDIMAX EMINENT ENEO ETROVISION EVERFOCUS FLEXWATCH FOSCAM GEOVISION GRANDSTREAM GRANDTEC HEDEN HIKVISION HITRON HUNT INSTAR INTELLINET IPUX IQINVISION JVC LEVELONE LILIN LINKSYS LUPUS MESSOA MICROVIEW MOBOTIX NEXCOM OPTICA PANASONIC PIXORD ROBIN SAMSUNG SANYO SECUFIRST SHANY SIEMENS SMC SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT AVER AVIGILON AVTECH AXIS AZTECH BASLER BEWARD BOSCH BRICKCOM CANON CISCO COMPRO D-LINK DAHUA DERICAM DLINK DYNACOLOR EDIMAX EMINENT ENEO ETROVISION EVERFOCUS FLEXWATCH FOSCAM GEOVISION GRANDSTREAM GRANDTEC HEDEN HIKVISION HITRON HUNT INSTAR INTELLINET IPUX IQINVISION JVC LEVELONE LILIN LINKSYS LUPUS MESSOA MICROVIEW MOBOTIX NEXCOM OPTICA PANASONIC PIXORD ROBIN SAMSUNG SANYO SECUFIRST SHANY SIEMENS SMC SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT AVER AVIGILON AVTECH AXIS AZTECH BASLER BEWARD BOSCH BRICKCOM CANON CISCO COMPRO D-LINK DAHUA DERICAM DLINK DYNACOLOR EDIMAX EMINENT ENEO ETROVISION EVERFOCUS FLEXWATCH FOSCAM GEOVISION GRANDSTREAM GRANDTEC HEDEN HIKVISION HITRON HUNT INSTAR INTELLINET IPUX IQINVISION JVC LEVELONE LILIN LINKSYS LUPUS MESSOA MICROVIEW MOBOTIX NEXCOM OPTICA PANASONIC PIXORD ROBIN SAMSUNG SANYO SECUFIRST SHANY SIEMENS SMC SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT AVER AVIGILON AVTECH AXIS AZTECH BASLER BEWARD BOSCH BRICKCOM CANON CISCO COMPRO D-LINK DAHUA DERICAM DLINK DYNACOLOR EDIMAX EMINENT ENEO ETROVISION EVERFOCUS FLEXWATCH FOSCAM GEOVISION GRANDSTREAM GRANDTEC HEDEN HIKVISION HITRON HUNT INSTAR INTELLINET IPUX IQINVISION JVC LEVELONE LILIN LINKSYS LUPUS MESSOA MICROVIEW MOBOTIX NEXCOM OPTICA PANASONIC PIXORD ROBIN SAMSUNG SANYO SECUFIRST SHANY SIEMENS SMC SONY SPARKLAN STARDOT SUNELL TOSHIBA TP-LINK TRENDNET TRUEN UBIQUITI VIVOTEK WISION Y-CAM ZAVIO 3S A-MTK ABUS ACTI ACUMEN AFIDUS AIRLIVE APEXIS ARECONT
Action alarms faster and improve every facet of your monitoring station operations.
CAMS is used by more Australian monitoring centres than any other monitoring platform. Another Suretek Innovation
www.suretek.com.au/cams
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CAMS 9 is a registered trademark of Suretrak Global Pty Ltd. All other trademarks, servicemarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
â—? Product review
Axis
AXIS P3225-LV Camera AXIS P3225-LV is a 60ips 1080p fixed dome camera with a 1/2.8-inch sensor, a 3–10.5mm f1.4 varifocal lens with remote zoom and focus, Zipstream for bandwidth and storage reduction, 25m OptimisedIR range, IP52-rating for dripping water and dust resistance, and IK08-rating for impact-resistance.
52 se&n
BY J O H N A D A M S
The camera feels well-made but is not overly heavy at 580 grams and while it’s compact, this is not a tiny unit.
8m at 6mm
12m at 6mm
XIS’ P3225-LV network camera bundles all the company’s goodness into a mid-sized fixed dome. Before I start droning on about specifications I’d like to point out right at the start that making Axis cameras work across networks is absolute bliss. Connect one to your PoE switch, wait a polite length of time for things to power up, hop into network in your directory, double click the Axis camera and hooray, you’re into live view and/or setup. This camera is full day/night but it also packs 25 metre LED range thanks to 3 compact 850nm IR LEDs, giving more flexibility when it comes to challenging applications. According to Axis, the OptimizedIR, automatically adjusts to the zoom level set at installation, ensuring an evenly illuminated image. Installation aids help with setup of the adjustable IR illumination angle and intensity but I found the default settings to be adequate for my test.
A
16m at 6mm
22m at 6mm
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● Product review
Axis At mid zoom settings in full sun, this Axis dome is looking very nice indeed and at full zoom detail is superb with face recognition out past 16 metres.
8m at 5mm at 7 lux
12m
16m with 15 lux side light
In the cockpit is a progressive scan RGB CMOS 1/2.8inch sensor, the lens is an f1.4 varifocal 3–10.5 mm, with a horizontal angle of view between 92–34 degrees and a vertical angle of view 50-20 degrees. Minimum scene illumination in colour is 0.25 lux at an aperture of F1.4, and with the cut filter out of the way that goes down to 0.05 lux at F1.4 in monochrome and 0 lux with the IR activated. Shutter speeds range from a supersonic 1/142850th of a second to a creative 2 seconds – the latter of which could be useful for situational awareness of static scenes in very low light. Camera angle adjustments include a pan of 180 degrees, a tilt of -5 to +75 degrees, and a rotation of 95 degrees. The outer housing is tough cream poly and there’s an aluminium inner camera module with encapsulated electronics. The camera is IP52-rated, IK08 impactresistant and is dehumidifying with an operating range between 0-50 degrees C. Considering these specifications, this camera is designed to be installed internally, though it could handle being under a roofline if carefully installed. The camera feels well-made but is not overly heavy at 580 grams and while it’s compact, this is not a tiny unit. Height is 101mm and diameter is 149mm. Power over Ethernet is IEEE 802.3af/802.3at Type 1 Class 3, with a maximum draw of 10.2W and a typical draw of 3.9W. Port choices are simple – there’s one RJ45 10BASET/100BASE-TX PoE port for comms and the camera also supports MicroSD, microSDHC and microSDXC cards, as well as remote network area storage. Resolution is selectable between 1920 x 1080 pixels and 160 x 90 pixels and frame rate and bitrate are also controllable. Compression options include H.264 baseline, main and high profile (MPEG-4 Part 10/AVC). When it comes to compression, the biggest deal with this camera is Axis’ Zipstream technology – it really does make a difference to H.264 streams. Meanwhile, WDR – Forensic Capture increases forensic usability by highlighting details in both dark and well-lit areas. Running the show is your choice of Axis Video Hosting System (AVHS), Axis Camera Companion, Axis Camera Station and ONVIF Profile S. When it comes to analytics there’s video motion detection and active tampering alarm onboard and the camera will report events with pre-alarm and post-alarm video buffering to FTP, SFTP, HTTP, HTTPS, network share and email. Axis cameras are supported by all third party VMS solutions, as well as many DVR and NVR manufacturers.
Test driving the Axis P3225-LV 22m
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Our test bed is the usual dedicated Dell 9020 server with i7-4770 quad-core processor with 8 threads per core offering a base clock speed of 3.4GHz and 8GB of RAM.
We have an AMD Radeon R7 250 graphics card with 2GB of RAM taking care of video - this is plenty enough for what we’re doing today. We’re using a Netgear GS108P ProSafe 8-port Gigabit switch with 4-port PoE for power and comms. Other cameras on the network include Panasonic’s WV-SPV7811 4K bullet, an Axis M1125 and the 1080p Uniview Starlight, both the latter of which we’re using to test Fujinon lenses. Neither of these 3 cameras is being recorded live. The first thing I do once the camera is up on my Wiring behind camera mount
monitor is dive into Setup. Settings variously include compression, colour, brightness, sharpness, contrast, white balance, exposure control (including automatic gain control), date and time, events, recording, live view config, IVA settings, and all the network and compression settings you might need. It’s all very easy but as usual, it takes me till I’m halfway through the test before I discover how to display the time, which doesn’t automatically appear when you sync time to the workstation. I make a few setting tweaks – I go to 60 per cent for colour – Zipstream is set to low by default and I leave it there – I want the benefit but don’t want to lose too much detail – bear this low setting in mind when looking at the bitrate numbers. I’m viewing in H.264 at 25ips. I’ve tweaked the low light priority a third of the way back towards low noise from motion blur. My initial impressions with a quick movement test are that motion blur with this camera is low and I’m keen to keep noise down, too. WDR and white balance are all on auto. My low light max shutter speed is at 1/25 sec which is not ideal for freezing quick human movement but is likely to be ok for faces sauntering towards the lens. The first internal view of the camera wide open under LED lights shows me that colour rendition is strong.
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● Product review
Axis
The tree movement allows me to get a clear sense that the P3225-LV resists motion blur well at default settings in good light.
There’s a little in the way of CAs around light fittings but a good view, generally. Latency seems around 300ths of a second – maybe a little less – that’s very nice work. Barrel distortion is probably around 8-9 per cent wide open, which is about right for a 3mm focal length. Bitrate numbers in here are as low as 300kbps with an average of about 500Kbps – that’s excellent performance for a camera with this level of detail. Very impressive stuff, this Axis Zipstream. While inside I decide to quickly run my WDR test and discover that performance is very composite. First, I adjust the focal length to around 6mm. Looking down the office I can see all the way through the glass door to the fence. Peak CAs and WDR noise occur with Norman in the doorway to the kitchen and once he’s at the back door, things even out from front to rear of the scene. This camera handles 80,000+ lux extremely well, passing our WDR test with flying colours. Next, I cart camera and tripod out into the courtyard and set up. It’s bright and hot out here – and windy, too. There’s about 12-15 knots of swirling wind, which is causing the bitrate to spike as trees and bushes in the field of view flail around. Between gusts bitrate falls under 1Mbps and at other times it’s up over 3Mbps. The tree movement allows me to get a clear sense that the P3225-LV resists motion blur well at default settings in good light. Heading back inside I go full wide to view the entire district scene and this tough application manages to provoke some shimmery flare and a little diamond aperture ghost in the magnesium fluoride coated lens. Important to point out here, my setup sees the dome reversed on a tripod with the tripod ballhead tilted downwards. This is an uncommon application, though wall-mount horizontal dome installations are often seen. Next, I go back inside and wind the lens out to 6mm and swing the ballhead down so we’re viewing the lane. What are SEN’s first impressions? Solid against backlight, too easy to set up, wonderful fast zoom and focus via the camera browser, Zipstream compression really is great, even on the lowest settings – we can confirm that once again. But the big strength I see so far seems to be high contrast and natural colour rendition that offer high levels of detail at 1080p. At mid zoom settings in full sun, this Axis dome is looking very nice indeed and at full zoom detail is superb with face recognition out past 16 metres. Bricks and Bessa blocks in adjacent walls look 3 dimensional in these conditions. Something I want to talk more about is the P3225LV’s remote zoom and focus. This capability is
56 se&n
5mm at 40 lux
at 10 lux
Sub-2 lux
Night mode with IR
what are SEN’s first impressions? Solid against backlight, too easy to set up, wonderful fast zoom and focus via the camera browser... great given it means there’s no need to muck around twiddling zoom and focus lock screws before, during and after commissioning. But what’s more interesting to me is that Axis’ zoom and focus is bloody fast. With some cameras I find myself hitting autofocus and going away to make a cup of tea. There’s plenty of time for it to steep as the camera trundles its elements all the way out and all the way back in, then all the way out and all the way back in again. With this camera I can zoom into a scene and jag face recognition in about 20 seconds or so, which is great for real time monitoring. The image stream remains consistent throughout the afternoon. Levels of detail are extremely high – there’s none of the heavy shadow in corners when faced with backlight with this camera that you sometimes see. As the evening starts leaning in there are changes to the image. For one thing, depth of field opens up as ISO levels increase – I can now read the Memocorp label on a tower on Oxford St 1000m away. The longitudinal chromatic aberrations that I noticed earlier on around high contrast points and lines remain – these are evidenced through the branches of trees against the sky and in the scene overlooking the lane on the edges of buildings and sky – I can’t see them within the scene and they are not intrusive.
District at 3mm. My estimation of barrel distortion is under 5 per Zipstream is set to low. cent at this 6mm focal length, which is very good.
While I’m looking at the camera someone runs up the lane showing there’s almost no motion blur in this light, I later see there’s a little more blur with cars but overall the Axis P3225-LV shrugs off motion blur very competently – that’s a lovely characteristic for a camera to have. During the afternoon, people meet in the lane, giving me a chance to assess face recognition performance. Having remote zoom and focus is great in this respect. If an operator notices an event, in they zoom. As the scene starts to darken, low light performance through that smoked dome is of particular interest to me. At around 745pm noise starts to become obvious in this scene – as does digital noise smoothing. The image starts to swim a little as light at the lens dips under 10 LEDs and light sensor
se&n 57
● Product review
Axis
Office at 3mm
Norman 6m from lens
Norman 3m from lens
lux. Situational awareness remains reasonable but the camera is working for it. There’s also some flare from the lens or the dome bubble, as well as the occurrence of a ghost in the foreground of the scene. In neither case do these impinge on the image and they’d be much less likely to appear were the dome installed facing downwards as it typically would be. At 8.03pm light at the lens is down to 1 EV – the image remains in colour – there’s flaring around the streetlights in the lane in a diamond aperture shape and some veiling flare in the image but bitrate is only 1.15Mbps at this low Zipstream setting, which is excellent. I notice I can still read the green neon MEMOCORP on the building up the hill and see a star in the sky. There’s still situational awareness in this scene. Not face recognition but there
58 se&n
would be no problem at all seeing the context of an incident in the lane, following the action and identifying build, hair colour and clothing colour. This is good performance from a dome camera wearing sunglasses. From about 815pm onwards, there’s less than 2 lux at the lens and the camera stays in colour – I’m going to have to force it into night mode if we are to see IR performance. Once I do this, I find night mode IR performance is pretty good – it’s definitely up around 20m and is quite strong closer to the lens. IR definitely fills in the gaps you can get in areas of shadow when a camera stays in night mode. Outside of the meat of the IR spread, the camera is still picking up situational awareness in part thanks to a fairly standard 1/25 sec default shutter speed for low light – you can go lower than this but it’s not advisable if your scene has movement in it. Moving into the office still in night mode I turn off all my screens but the workstation monitor that’s tilted away from Norman. The IR performance is strong in this 12m target area, and gives surprisingly high levels of contrast out to about 7 metres – you get easy face recognition – though at the back of the room Norman’s plastic coated face is lost to flare. Next, I head out the front. The performance of the camera externally at 7 lux under low pressure sodium is generally strong. There’s some noise in this scene and there’s a little motion blur in darker areas but generally, both these properties are well controlled, considering the nature of the camera – that smoked dome must be adding several stops of aperture – even 1 extra stop is loads at 7 lux – that’s a 50 per cent reduction in light reaching the sensor. Moving Norman to 12m, then 16m, then 22m, I’m not sure where I lose court admissible face recognition – it’s definitely still there are 12m and again at 16m and very close at 22m, it’s certainly possible to recognise/ confirm a known person at 22m. From the C-line down there’s good contrast and colour rendition is still quite strong at 22m. When I about-face Norman and turn the camera down the hill, depth of field is unusually good. Resistance to motion blur at night in this application is very good - I jag images of identifiable cars whizzing down Foveaux St with an ease I’m often not able to with other cameras. You’d have to assume elevated shutter speed is the key here and Axis has done its homework when it comes to balancing conflicting qualities. This camera view also highlights the useful depth of field and the high levels of situational awareness. The following morning, I head out front to check the performance in bright street conditions. Here, the camera shows its all-round capabilities, doing well with backlight and having no trouble with flare, despite facing direct sunlight. Colour rendition is good, performance in and out of deep shadow is strong, too. Face recognition is excellent at 8m – the entire target is well rendered - and you really don’t come to the edge of face recognition until 16m – both the 12m and 16m scenes put Norman’s face into shade and that makes a difference. The target shows contrast from the B-line down at 16m and the C-line at 22m, with good license plate recognition at 16m and the ability to roll in one click of the mouse wheel at
22m and make out a license plate. Looking down the street 80 metres to Foveaux St, resistance to motion blur during the day remains excellent. I see very few signs of chromatic aberration out here and distortion levels at 6mm are so low as to be undiscernible to my eye. When it comes to pedestrian traffic, skin tones are very true and the low motion blur makes face recognition extremely easy. There’s no sign of smearing or blocking – I have the shutter speed set to auto and the camera is handling light and dark very well – perhaps shutter speed is at 125th or 150th of a second in this light. Bitrate is low for a street scene – it’s around 2Mbps looking down the hill, though it got higher looking through wind-blown branches back the other way.
5m at 7 lux at face
Conclusion The AXIS P3225-LV is a fine mid-size dome camera for internal and covered external applications. It offers situational awareness to 80m in daylight and at night in around 7 lux, it pushes out past 40m. In patchy light in the back lane with sub-2 lux a the camera, It gives situational awareness up to 40m and at ranges up to 25m its integrated IR LEDs allow it to handle no light at all. In terms of performance, this camera handles backlight extremely well and its resistance to motion blur is noteworthy and valuable to any serious security application. No account of the P3225-LV would be complete without recognition of Axis Zipstream compression. I keep Zipstream at its lowest setting throughout this entire test, see no impact on image quality and note considerable improvements in bitrate over other H.264 streams. Zipstream is particularly good with static scenes, or scenes incorporating small amounts of movement and while our chosen settings average around 1Mbps in this test, you can get bitrate down under 100Kbps using the high setting. n
5m at 45,000 lux-plus
Features of the AXIS P3225-LV include:
Norman at 12m, IR on
l
1080p resolution at 60ips
l
Remote zoom and focus
l
WDR -Forensic Capture
l
OptimizedIR illumination
l
Axis’ Zipstream technology
l
MicroSD, microSDHC, microSDXC.
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● Case study
ACU
Australian Catholic University
Chooses CAMS Every educational facility is a serious security challenge and Australian Catholic University is no exception to that rule. The ACU has a sprawling campus spread across the bustle of North Sydney’s CBD but the responsibilities of its National Security Centre extend further afield than that.
60 se&n
USTRALIAN Catholic University is an iconic institution, incorporating multiple campuses Australia-wide. More than 10,000 students, teachers and visitors attend these campuses each day. Situated at the heart of the North Sydney Campus, which includes multiple buildings that span 4 inner-city blocks, sits ACU’s National Security Centre (NSC) and its security team. Members of the team really do have their work cut out for them, monitoring the safety and security of onsite personnel across all campuses 24 hours a day, 7 day a week. The ACU NSC was originally established to monitor the numerous CCTV systems installed across its multiple campuses, but now operates as an in-house alarm monitoring centre for all campus security and CCTV systems. To enable monitoring of their alarms in-house,
A
ACU has been making huge leaps when it comes to investing in the latest technology and the ability to monitor our own assets has proven to be a major success story. the ACU required software that could integrate its current systems and enable them to run an effective security operation. So began ACU’s search for a total business solution that could not only meet its needs for monitoring CCTV footage on an already established system, but integrate alarm monitoring as well. The team’s research led to CAMS - an operations solution with the ability to combine live video and alarm monitoring, streamlining every facet of ACU’s monitoring centre operation, with minimal disruption to its existing systems and processes. Currently the new system is working well, and meeting all the ACU’s needs. Powered by SQL, the CAMS system is completely scalable, giving the NSC the ability to monitor anywhere from 1 to 1 million assets. “ACU has been making huge leaps when it comes to investing in the latest technology and the ability to monitor our own assets has proven to be a major success story,” said Bob Pagett, manager - security and compliance, ACU. With numerous operators at the NSC having no prior training on the CAMS monitoring centre software, the migration to the CAMS system was extremely successful. After just one training session, the operators found the software extremely easy to use and navigate. “The installation process has been easy and painfree and we found the Suretek team headed by Mark Hatton wonderful to deal with,” Pagett says. “We would most definitely recommend CAMS to other users.” According to Mark Hatton, Suretek’s BDM, the entire process has been surprisingly easy. “After installing servers, receivers and CAMS 9, we cut-over to live monitoring traffic in a single afternoon and basically didn’t receive a call for several days,” he says. “This is atypical for a new install, especially since the security team at ACU had very little experience with CAMS. We’ve had the odd call since, but very little contact otherwise, and they are very happy with the outcome.” Looking to the future, Pagett says ACU NSC wants to collaborate with Suretek to integrate Avigilon CCTV, to enable CCTV coverage from the nearest camera upon alarm activation. This is well within the capabilities of CAMS, according to Hatton. “When it comes to integration, CAMS is unparalleled, operating like a community project, with shared ideas and supported products being added all the time,” he explains. “The use of industry-
leading, object-orienting programming techniques enables new formats, receivers and functionality to be easily added with minimal disruption, benefiting all CAMS users with contemporary versions.” According to Hatton, the university is just one of thousands of customers protected by CAMS. “Currently CAMS is in use in more than 60 per cent of the central monitoring stations Australia-wide,” he says. n
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● Product review
Panasonic
Panasonic Fires A Bullet Panasonic’s smoking WV-SPV781L 4K fixed bullet camera offers 4K (3840 x 2160 pixels) at up to 30ips and 4000 x 3000 pixels at 15ips. A rugged and powerful performer, the WV-SPV781L is ideal for serious applications where operators need to dig deep into scenes for extra detail.
HIS WV-SPV781L Day/Night bullet camera from Panasonic features a new progressive scan 1/1.7inch MOS image sensor offering 4K resolution at 30ips and a varifocal f1.6 lens with a 4.2mm-25.2mm range. Panasonic’s WV-SPV781L comes fully loaded with 30 metre IR, Rainwash coating, IP66, NEMA 4X and IK10 ratings, 6x optical and 1x, 2x and 4x digital zoom, Smart Depth of Field, 3D Digital Noise Reduction and plenty more. It’s a solution designed not only to survive in challenging environments but to thrive in them. Not surprisingly, the WV-SPV781L has an epic feature set. The new 3-drive lens system offers an angle of view that 101-degrees at the wide end and 18-degrees at the tele. This ONVIF compliant camera offers multiple H.264 high profile streams, as well as JPEG streams for real time monitoring and recording. There are clever features like Smart Depth of Field, which optimises DoF, probably by adjusting aperture in the presence of available light, to ensure near and far objects are in focus. There’s also auto back focus, VIQS, which allows you to set up to 8 areas in a scene that will retain high image quality. You can also set up to 4 image capture areas in a scene. High Light Compensation reduces strong light sources such as vehicle headlights to prevent camera being blinded, while Super Chroma Compensation gives better colour reproduction in low light. Low light performance is quoted as going down to 0.3 lux in colour and 0.04 lux in black and white – both at F1.6. These are typically realistic Panasonic figures that press against don’t defy the laws of physics. The camera also has a Smart IR LED array allowing monochrome performance in 0 lux. IR is adjusted to suit the scene to reduce flare from faces. There’s VMD (video motion detection) with 4 programmable detection areas, 15-step sensitivity level and 10-step detection size, along with a privacy zone that can mask up to 8 private areas.
T
As soon as I set up out the back I can see immediately that this camera is a weapon in good light over short and long distances.
62 se&n
BY J O H N A D A M S
Alarm sources include a 3-terminal input, and VMD and Panasonic alarm commands can trigger actions such as SDXC/SDHC/SD memory recording, FTP image transfer, E-mail notification, indication on browser, alarm terminal output, and Panasonic alarm protocol output. The SDXC/SDHC/SD Memory card slot allows manual recording (H.264/JPEG), alarm recording (H.264 / JPEG) and backup upon network failure (H.264 / JPEG). Realize long-term recording and auto backup function. There’s also full duplex bi-directional audio that allows interactive communication between camera site and monitoring site and fog compensation function. The camera body is diecast aluminium with resin lens surrounds, top panel and sunshade. Dimensions
8m at 6mm
12m at 6mm
16m at 6mm
22m at 6x optical zoom
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● Product review
Panasonic Looking up towards Centrepoint Tower and the World Square at distance of 1000m and close to 2000m, the Panasonic shows its optical class.
8m at 6mm in 7 lux
are 131mm wide, 130mm high and 380 mm long, and weight is 2.6kg. Protecting the lens is a clear poly resin cover with Rainwash coating. The flying leads emerging from the rear of the mounting place include 3 external I/Os, monitor output, microphone input and audio output. Unit PoE draw is around 13W, while temperature range is between -45 and 50C, and ambient humidity tolerances are 10-90 per cent. The selection of image setup parameters and recording options is too profound to explain here and is best viewed as a table, in any case. Needless to say, you can maximise the full resolution of this 4K camera on local networks or quality internet connections, or you can optimise your streams for less accommodating infrastructure while recording locally at full frame rate and full resolution.
Driving the camera
12m
16m
22m
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As soon as I set up out the back I can see immediately that this camera is a weapon in good light over short and long distances. It’s unsurpassed in our district test – with adequate light it’s just a blinder. Looking up towards Centrepoint Tower and the World Square at distance of 1000m and close to 2000m, the Panasonic shows its optical class. It shows the same levels of excellence using optical zoom and to a lesser extent, digital zoom during the day in our lane test. Something I notice right away is the cavernous depth of field. I get high levels of detail at full tele from 10m all the way to 1500m and probably beyond, if my field of view was deeper. This camera has a 12.4MP sensor and when you start hauling the elements in and out it feels just like you’re driving a crop sensor DSLR – how many mouse wheel clicks can I wind into this scene before pixellation creeps in? Is it 4, 5, 6, or maybe 7? This sort of detail is at a whole other level compared to a typical 1080p camera, which will start to go to pieces after 1 or 2 clicks of the mouse wheel. The levels of detail are outstanding. Lens quality is high. Anyone who’s owned a Panasonic camera knows its engineers do good work and this lens doesn’t break the mould. Sharpness is excellent. There are no chromatic aberrations at all and while there’s barrel distortion at the wide end, it starts to disappear from around 1x optical zoom. I don’t see any sign of pin cushion distortion at the long end either, and there are plenty of brick walls around me to check this on. High levels of lens sharpness and colour rendition make for excellent acuity. Comparatively, this seems a low contrast lens but I may be reading too much into the hardware. I have the camera settings at default with WDR on and am finding colour saturation to be very natural. At the widest setting, faced with over 80,000 lux at the lens, and the sun right above the camera sunshade, there’s no veiling flare, though I do see a group of polygon
aperture ghosting flares, with a larger circular faint ghost in the bottom of the frame. This is a tough scene, however, and I’ve propped the camera pointing upwards, which is not standard practice. After this image, I lower the camera and swing it towards the lane, putting the sun at a 90-degree angle and bringing the integrated sunshade more completely into play. I get the feeling early on that our application of lane, street and district, while excellent for 1080p cameras, is less suitable for the long reach of this beast, which would be perfectly at home in large applications like ports, transport hubs, sporting venues and public spaces. Unsurprisingly, driving the zoom through the setup functions of the camera browser is also not as intuitive in real time as it would be if I were sitting at a capable VMS platform but it’s perfectly functional. Same as every 4K camera, digital zoom within 4K images is great with the WV-SPV781L but it can’t compare to optical zoom, which is what really gives this camera its power. Zoom and focus are relatively quick with this camera – it’s not a PTZ by any means, but thanks to that optical zoom you can delve deeply into scenes to take a closer look at an incident, or reach in to snaffle face recognition or a license plate before rolling back to a wider viewing angle. Using digital zoom on top of electronic zoom is useful, too. It gives you that extra bit of reach with only a small loss of sharpness. Something I notice immediately is that there’s around one second of latency in my setup with this camera – it’s nothing to do with shutter speed – I get snaps with excellent clarity and motion blur is very low. This is a quality I keep checking wherever I move the camera and eventually I pull the 3 other cameras off the subnet to see if that’s having an impact but no. We have a 20/20 synchronous link at SEN but there’s some network delay taking place as a result of driving the camera through the browser. While 4K cameras offer excellent resolution, it’s low light where they can battle so as afternoon draws in I start paying closer attention to the monitor. Overall, performance varies as light levels fall depending on where I locate the camera. In the darker lane it holds colour longer than expected and gives excellent situational awareness. But out front of the office in
IR in night mode
Full wide in 80,000 lux
Full zoom
Anyone who’s owned a Panasonic camera knows its engineers do good work and this lens doesn’t break the mould. Sharpness is excellent. patchy low pressure sodium streetlight with intermittent car headlights, it switches to night mode and fires up IR, which I didn’t expect after the extended colour performance out the back. In the lane test, brightness levels drop off relatively early as light levels fall. The image darkens and I increase brightness by a couple of clicks. After this, the image unexpectedly holds and holds and holds from about 500 lux to sub-2 lux at the lens with surprisingly little loss of colour but at the cost of some noise, which I notice from about 740pm onwards. There’s some blooming and associated veiling flare from the streetlights in this scene but it’s very well controlled. An increase in image swim associated with elevated ISOs is the most noticeable result of falling light levels. Interestingly, I have DNR set to high but I don’t see that digital rebuilt look you often see in cameras struggling with very low light. Personally, I’d prefer to see noise than noise reduction artefacts. In any case, the work in the lane in colour is the best 4K performance we’ve seen. The camera holds colour under 3-lux and at around
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● Product review
Panasonic
High resolution remains useful in monochrome – the digital zoom lets me reel in details I could never have seen otherwise.
815pm just as I measure 0EV (sub-2 lux) at the lens, we go into night mode and the IR fires up. This camera’s IR array is made up of a ring of small LEDs and offers a good spread of light – enough for widest angles of view the lens is capable of. It’s hard in my external application to get a sense of range thanks to the streetlights and floodlights in my scene. When I head into the office and switch all the lights off I find IR is strong out to about 8m and then becomes more diffuse to give situational awareness deeper in. It’s a wide spread and provides considerable detail with high levels of contrast to 8m. With no visible light I’m getting Norman from the C-Line but have no face recognition of him. What I do have, however, is face recognition of myself and it’s possible that Panasonic’s SmartIR is adjusting LED output downwards to take into account my presence in the foreground. Out the front of the office at 8m and with a headlight in the scene I retain excellent colour and full detail of Norman, including face recognition. I am getting a license plate at 10m and another at 16m and could readily guess one as far away as 25m from the lens. Robbing the image of sharpness is noise but again, some ISO noise is a price worth paying for court admissible evidence closer in and deep situational awareness. As I’m moving Norman to 12m, the helpful car headlights drive away and the cameras flicks over into night mode and monochrome. I have great contrast on the target from the B-Line at 12m. There’s IR flare on the closest number plates, which is normal. Face confirmation is available on digital zoom. As I move out to 16m and then 22m, contrast in monochrome with IR light is excellent – one thing I can clearly see is that IR is reflecting from tail light reflector prisms and license plates at more than 20 metres. High resolution remains useful in monochrome – the digital zoom lets me reel in details I could never have seen otherwise. Without moving the camera, which is on a cradle rather than a tripod, I wind in the optical zoom and now I get license plates easily at 22m and can use digital zoom to hunt them at 30m, which is excellent work. But when I move Norman to 22m, and return to 1.3x zoom, which I consider to be about 5.56mm, he’s in shadow and noise has blurred his face. I can still make out details of his number plate, however. Down the hill, the camera stays in black and white in 7 lux but there’s more ambient light down here and there’s loads of detail. Usually, I can only make out general details down here when I use digital zoom within a scene. The WV-SPV781L does better than that and when I apply some more optical zoom, the focal point zooms 80m down to the Foveaux St and over 3 lanes to cars and posters on the far side. This is the strength of the camera – if you need this sort
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6mm in 80,000 lux
3 x optical zoom
6 x optical
6 x optical and 4 x digital
of performance from a fixed bullet, it’s wonderfully capable. People walking in the street towards the lens confirm resistance to motion blur in night mode. Generally, 4K cameras with their smaller pixels use slower shutter speeds and can be vulnerable to motion blur but this Panasonic is performing well in that regard. Next morning, I head out into a very bright day – it’s 80,000 lux out the front – and with plenty of light and plenty of backlight, the WV-SPV781L shows its class. No flare, no ghosting, no CAs, easy face recognition, lovely colour rendition and natural skin tones – all these things add depth to a scene and with all those pixels along for the ride, it’s hard not to be pleased with the results. At 12m, I still have separation from the A line and while it’s no longer perfect face recognition, it’s more than enough for identity confirmation. At 16m, I still have separation of whites and blacks from the A line, as well as identity confirmation. When I move Norman to 22m, I zoom in to about 2.5x zoom and now I have full detail back again as I would have had using optical zoom on the shorter target distances. Down the hill, performance is excellent. I try full wide, which exchanges some depth of field for a more than 100-degree angle of view. Next, I go back to 5.5-6mm – the depth of field is amazing to see. This focal length is a nice balance on the street with the Panasonic. And when I roll the optical zoom in, it just swallows that 80m walk to the corner without flinching. Optical zoom is a wonderful thing and after you’ve used it with this camera, there’s still 4x digital zoom to tease still more detail from a scene. Next comes the WDR test and this camera doesn’t disappoint there, either. Forget about chromatic aberration and take a look at the detail in the reflections on shiny surfaces. Colour rendition is particularly good and the transition from dark to light is handled extremely well, too. I have the camera set up on a truss outside the kitchen door and don’t move it as I would a fixed camera on a tripod in this part of the test. Instead I just nudge the zoom in one step at a time. It’s a little darker at the long end – there’s some light fall-off at the tele end, but sharpness and overall image quality are extremely high at all times.
Conclusion This camera is designed for topical applications – it’s too good for basic duties in small applications. But for larger sites, or for public space, the WV-SPV781L has serious benefits. There are some security applications in which compromise is not an option and this camera delivers. It’s wonderful in the day, oblivious to WDR, has low motion blur in snapshots and loses none of its detail to weaknesses of lens design. Night performance, which is not a strength of 4K cameras at this time, is supported by a larger sensor and what seems to be a high signal to noise ratio. The camera does go into night mode earlier than a 1080p camera will, but in the applications that suit it, this is a compromise well worth accepting. The WV-SPV781L can still see much further than a 1080p camera can, even in monochrome. Along with all-
6mm
4 x digital zoom
round performance, its great strength is the addition of that powerful digital zoom, which lends the camera considerable operational flexibility, as well as ensuring there’s no need for the expense and inconvenience of undertaking refocusing of lens drift. n
Features of the Panasonic WVSPV781L include: l
Progressive scan 1/1.7-inch MOS image sensor
l
4K resolution (3840 x 2160 pixels) at 30ips
l
.2-25.2mm f1.6 remote varifocal with Rainwash 4 coating
l
6x optical and 4x digital zoom
l
30 metre IR range with Smart Depth of Field
l
3D digital noise reduction
l
IP66, IK10, NEMA 4X ratings
l
Auto backfocus, VIQS
l
High Light & Super Chroma Compensation.
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● Regulars
Products
Editor’s choice
What’s new in the industry.
DAHUA’S IPC-EBW8600 l DAHUA’S IPC-EBW8600 Mini-Dome Camera, now certified ImmerVision-enabled, is capable of delivering 360-degree video standard, offering users the ability to instantly capture and navigate within high resolution 360-degree panomorph images. Dahua’s latest mini-dome has 6 megapixels of resolution and a built in 360-degree panomorph lens enabling 360-degree panoramic surveillance. This technology provides immersive views without blind spots and increases resolution of distant objects compared to other camera models. The IPC-EBW8600 Mini-Dome Camera complements Dahua’s family of fixed IP cameras, providing users with 360-degree situational awareness and the ability to capture every angle on video for live playback forensic analysis. Distributor: QSS Contact: +61 3 9646 9016
Panasonic Introduces Smart Coding Technology to Reduce Bandwidth Demand l PANASONIC has introduced Smart Coding, a new technology that enhances the encoding algorithm in standard H.264 video streams, yielding up to a 70 per cent improvement in bandwidth reduction. The technology lessens the bandwidth demand and the amount of storage needed for surveillance video images while maintaining high picture quality and full compliance with the H.264 standard. It is available as an upgrade for all new generation Panasonic 3, 5 and 6 Series Models. Smart Coding technology uses a variety of advanced noise reduction processes and algorithm advancements: Frequency Divided Filter (FDF), 3-D Multi-Process Noise Reduction (3D-MNR) and Group of Picture Control (GOP). Those advancements achieve a lower bit rate for images without degrading the captured and transmitted video stream, according to Panasonic. FDF and 3D-MNR act to reduce both fine picture noise and video-grain generated under low illumination, improving picture quality before compression. GOP Control removes unnecessary information in a scene which results in a lower bit rate. These features combine to reduce bit rate in the recorded video without a loss in image quality. Distributor: Hills Contact: 1800 685 487
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Quantum Xcellis Scale-out Storage l XCELLIS scale-out storage from Quantum provides a simple-tomanage surveillance storage foundation that can grow under a single file system designed specifically for video applications. This foundation enables a tiered approach to storage architectures for surveillance and security applications, which leverages highperformance disk, high-capacity disk, file-based tape and the cloud. The tiered system enables customers to meet their total capacity needs more cost-effectively and optimize their storage infrastructure based on budget, retention policies and access requirements, yet make it easy to manage under a single file system, reducing IT intervention and management costs. Distributor: Quantum Contact: +61 417 254 360
Bosch DINION IP Bullet l NEW from Bosch is the DINION IP Bullet in 720 or 1080p variations, with IP66 ratings against dust and water, automatic varifocal for remote lens and focus adjustment and 30m IR. Initial set-up or downloading latest firmware can be done without removing the camera from the package - simply plug in an Ethernet cable and set-up the camera. DINION IP bullet cameras allow installers to focus on connecting the cables without holding the camera. After connecting to the network, all cables can be stored in the dedicated surface mount box, ensuring fast and easy cable management. The surface mount box ensures the complete installation is IP66-rated against dust and water. Video data can be safely stored in the cloud, on a network video recorder, or on a built-in SD card. All DINION IP bullet cameras are supported by Dynamic Transcoding technology, giving remote access to camera controls, live video streams, recordings and multimegapixel images. To view multiple sites or cameras simultaneously, you can use the Bosch Video Security Client. Distributor: Bosch Security Systems Contact: 1300 1 BOSCH (26724)
Mobotix MxMC VMS l MOBOTIX MxMC video management software has been completely re-developed, with a focus on a providing a simple and intuitive user experience. Mobotix Software is free of charge, with no update or licensing costs, and can support an unlimited number of cameras, screens, and users. Single and double click, support for drag & drop and gestures, and multi-screen or direct viewing of events and alarm messages, represent just some of the advantages of this new software. Functions include the newly developed research and player tools, which provide a high-speed searching facility and fast results. MxMC was designed with MOBOTIX cameras in mind and is the perfect tool for exploiting their decentralized technology, enabling controlled access to recordings via the camera directly at the time, or later via the NAS. A particularly noteworthy feature is the bandwidth manager, making high quality searching possible, even on networks where bandwidth is limited.
New Samsung Cameras From EOS l SAMSUNG Techwin has released its latest 5MP camera series, the SNO8081R bullet and SNV-8081R vandal dome. Both cameras are equipped with 1/1.8-inch 6MP CMOS sensors, and 3.6-9.4mm motorized vari-focal lens with auto-focus. In backlit applications, 120dB WDR allows the camera to perform exceptionally well in a challenging environment, while built-in IR allows images in complete darkness. Features such as LDC (Lens Distortion Correction) and Hallway view, simply add value to the users. Nevertheless, it is not only the performance of the camera which makes it special. The cameras are fully compatible with the H.265/H.264 technology, supporting current and future compression protocols. Distributor: Eos Australia Pty Ltd Contact: +61 2 9749 5888
Distributor: Mobotix Contact: +61 2 8507 2000
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Products
Editor’s choice
What’s new in the industry.
Tyco Releases Kantech EntraPass v.6.05 l TYCO Security Products has announced the release of version 6.05 of Kantech’s EntraPass security management system featuring Microsoft Active Directory (AD) integration to simplify the management of EntraPass operator profiles, and enhancements to the mobile and Web interfaces for remote video viewing and playback. EntraPass v6.05 uses the LDAP protocol to import and synchronize Active Directory users with EntraPass operators, thus eliminating the need for manual creation and synchronization of operators in the EntraPass database. This upgrade also enables single sign on, where EntraPass operators are automatically authenticated and logged into EntraPass via their Windows credentials with one simple click. EntraPass v6.05 also enables backups by the mirror database, improving performance. New pan/tilt/zoom (PTZ) functionality in the improved web client of EntraPass v6.05 gives users the capability to perform joystick controls on the screen. Cameras with dome control features can be operated with a virtual joystick that provides pan, tilt and zoom in/zoom out features as well as a preset control option. Video playback functionality means users can view specific event-related video by accessing color-coded blue video motion detection or red alarm detection boxes on each camera’s playback timeline. Distributor: Hills Contact: 1800 685 487
Ness ALIEN-G Touch Screen Keypad l AN important part of the Ness SmartLiving smart control panel family, Alien-G touch screen keypad offers an extra-large 7-inch colour touch screen display and two programmable Input/Output terminals as well as an-board proximity reader and temperature sensor. Alien-G connects on the proprietary high-speed SmartLiving bus with full interconnectivity, fast installation and reduced cabling. As a SmartLiving bus device Alien-G can be remotely diagnosed and configured – that makes troubleshooting very smart. Alien-G’s 7-inch colour touch screen has display brightness and contrast control, transparency adjustment, compact size at 219 x 143 x 34mm, as well as 2 input/output terminals and a USB port for system programming and saving images on the SD card. Distributor: Ness Corporation Contact: +61 2 8825 9222
Axis Site Designer l NEW from Axis, Site Designer
software provides system integrators and installers with an intuitive and efficient new web application that reduces the time and effort needed to design complete security solutions. The tool saves time when specifying and designing end-to-end solutions for sites with up to 100 cameras. Axis Site Designer works online and offline to recommend cameras and recording solutions for small and mid-sized systems. It includes easy to use templates for a variety of security requirements and gives interactive guidance on the selection of cameras, recording products and accessories needed for a complete surveillance solution. The app features a selection of templates for common installation scenarios. A visual camera selector recommends cameras based on operational requirements such as required resolution, camera coverage and light conditions. It is easy to find the right mounts and other accessories for any camera, since the tool only presents compatible components. A storage calculator provides recommendations for suitable recording solutions based on typical scenarios. Finally, the tool produces a complete bill of materials that includes all components in the system. Distributor: Axis Communications Contact: +61 3 9982 1111
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IndigoVision HD Adaptive IR PTZ-BX
Tyco C•CURE 9000
l NEW from IndigoVision is the HD Adaptive IR PTZ-BX Range
l TYCO Security Products’ C•CURE 9000 security and event management platform, includes open supervised device protocol (OSPD) support for reader-to-panel communications, increased system capacity licensing and enhanced visitor management functionality that allows personnel to easily create and manage scheduled visitor appointments. The enhanced visitor management capabilities of C•CURE 9000 allows authorized personnel to create and manage scheduled visitor appointments from their desktop or mobile device browser using C•CURE 9000’s visitor management web portal. Personnel who are hosting visitors are able to create appointments in advance, define visit instructions, attach visit policy documents and assign pre-authorized clearances for temporary access to expedite the visitor check-in process at the front desk. C•CURE 9000 v2.50 provides open supervised device protocol (OSPD) support for reader-to-panel communications on all iSTAR Ultra series controllers.
camera, which offers the benefits of Adaptive IR technology in a traditional PTZ dome. When using standard infrared (IR) illumination, identification can be difficult due to a very narrow area of IR illumination. When a subject is too close, or too far away from the camera, standard IR cannot give the correct illumination, resulting in compromised image quality and making subject identification difficult. With Adaptive IR technology, the IR illumination level is calibrated to match the zoom level of the lens. If the camera zooms in, the IR illumination is increased. Similarly, if the camera zooms out, the IR illumination level is adjusted automatically. Adaptive IR delivers the correct amount of IR illumination, wherever the operator is viewing, giving superior image quality and easier identification. Giving calibrated IR illumination up to 200m, the IndigoVision Adaptive IR PTZ also delivers HD video at up to 60 frames per second, making it ideal for fast moving scenes such as traffic and city monitoring, as well as protecting areas that have minimum lighting.
Distributor: Hills Contact: 1800 685 487
Distributor: Integrated Products Contact: 1300 055 164
Morpho Face Authenticator
Avigilon H4 cameras
l MORPHO’S biometrics authentication solution has been
l AVIGILON has released its new H4 line of security cameras and Avigilon Control Center (ACC) 5.8 video management software. The new Avigilon H4 camera line delivers high image quality while minimizing bandwidth and storage requirements. The line features advanced installation and configuration capabilities as well as self-learning video analytics. “Avigilon is continually developing new security solutions designed to help protect our customers and their most valuable assets,” said Dr. Mahesh Saptharishi, CTO at Avigilon. “The new H4 camera line with self-learning video analytics is our most comprehensive camera line to date, which, along with Avigilon Control Center 5.8, enables powerful and proactive security solutions.”
certified by FIDO (Fast Identity Online) Alliance. Morpho’s Face authenticator utilizes face recognition for smartphones and tablets to replace traditional user verification methods like PIN and password. The certification validates the quality of the Morpho’s implementation of FIDO standards and ensures interoperability among other FIDO compliant products and services. With this solution, service providers can easily deploy facial authentication to secure access to their services for all customers on devices currently on the marketplace. With its ‘liveness’ detection technologies, which ensure that the face submitted is captured from a live user (and not a photo, for example), Morpho’s solution provides universal, strong authentication that replaces passwords with easier to use, secure and private authentication.
Distributor: Central Security Distribution Contact: 1300 319 499
Distributor: Morpho Contact: +61 2 9424 3500
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● Regulars
Help desk ■ Below are the approximate recommendations for rest times (complete rest, that is) between sets according to your goal, per the National Streng th and Conditioning Association (NSCA). *Note that since fat loss depends primarily on diet, there is no official rest-period prescription for it, although we feel that both short and long rests work, depending on the program.
Q: Help Desk has made some interesting points about lensing lately but wouldn’t you agree that even with relatively low cost lenses attached to compact cameras there’s a sweet spot in the centre which offers universally high performance? Given this, is lens selection as important as you suggest? A: We’d reiterate that low cost lenses with good, simple designs without too much internal tolerance and with suitable coatings against internal reflections can offer unexpectedly high performance. So we may well agree with you. But if you mean that poor performing lenses with excessive barrel distortion, vignetting, chromatic aberration and flaring from lens elements and/or camera housings can be excused their deficiencies thanks to a portion of admissible image that comprises say, 50 per cent of the camera view, we think not. Yes, flaws can be accommodated by adjustments to viewing angle to ensure redundant parts of the scene are those worst affected but there are going to be open-ended compromises in your image streams which might deny face recognition at short ranges, or at night, or at wider angles of view. Cramp bit rate and/or frame rate over a mediocre network or storage solution, and reduce levels of light, and the performance of poorly designed lenses will be weaker still.
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Our panel of experts answers your questions.
As security managers know, many incidents take place at the edges of scenes. Assaults in particular, unfold at unusual angles to the expected traffic flows that governed camera view selection during system design and commissioning. And attackers often wait in areas of low light on the edges of public space for victims. End users may have to tolerate poor lenses – especially in compact domes or bullet cameras bought en masse on the basis of price – but they’ll pay an operational cost during investigations – that’s just a given. The fact quality PTZs from practically all manufacturers offer such excellent performance suggests it’s not that quality lens technology doesn’t exist but that low price and low performance are directly related. Of course, that’s not always the case. There are some excellent lenses in compact cameras. Objective testing tells which is which. Q: What performance issues should we look out for with VoIP alarm communications? A: The first issue with alarm controllers sharing the same path as VoIP comms is signal distortion. Alarm systems were designed to transmit alarm signals as a series of beeps and tones over analogue phone lines. Because VoIP systems utilize digital communications, the conversion of the beeps and tones may not always be translated correctly. This can result in an
alarm signal not being recognized by its central monitoring station. Something else to consider relates to IP solutions in general - power failure. You need to bear in mind that in the event of a power failure, cable modems and DSL lines will not work unless there is a UPS backup. Losing power will mean losing communications. Not only will the alarm system not be able to communicate with the central station, it will not be able to dial emergency services (if they’re connected) either. Next, comes line seizure. All alarm systems are designed with line seizure capabilities enabling them to take over an open phone line to communicate with the central monitoring station in case of an emergency. Often, the VoIP modem will be installed by ‘back-feeding’ the copper circuit and disconnecting the old telephone circuit as it enters the premises. Because the alarm control panel is configured to have the telephone circuit connected first, ahead of any telephone instruments, it can interrupt and disconnect an existing call to give the alarm signal priority. Service outages, server malfunctions, router issues, system upgrades and regular maintenance are just some of the reasons that VoIP systems may not be as reliable when it comes to transmitting alarm signals. Secure IP comms are still a good primary comms path for alarm panels but they should be supported by at least one 3G modem.
Q: Last issue SEN pointed out that hardwired alarm sensors were more reliable than 433MHz sensors that could be jammed in a way that prevented them from reporting alarm events or tamper alarms. Are there wireless technologies that are not susceptible to such jamming? A: Common wireless protocols used by consumer devices like wireless handsets, intercoms and garage door remotes will be susceptible in various ways, to local jamming. Typical jammers are low power and have a diameter of around 20 metres. Technically, an intruder holding a jammer could access a door and then move through a site within a bubble of wireless ‘silence’. However, any access control door will still report a wire tamper if forced and a wired reed or wired sensor installed as part of a wireless system (close to the controller) would provide an alarm event without the need to hardwire an entire site. CCTV cameras can also be set up to report movement. When it comes to wireless technologies that are not susceptible to jamming, spread spectrum springs to mind – you can’t jam the entire noise floor. There are also proprietary wireless formats that may lie outside vulnerable carrier wavelengths. If you’re a big integrator installing thousands of wireless alarm systems every year, it’s certainly worth buying a jammer and walk testing a secure site to get a sense of the threat potential to your particular wireless alarm system. A: How important are lens coatings when it comes to lens performance? Why do some lenses seem to have so much more trouble with ghosting and flare than others? Do coatings impact on other aspects of camera performance, like colour rendition and contrast? Q: Taken as a whole, the development of lens coatings has made the development of complex lens designs possible. Quality coatings are vitally important – they have a multifarious impact on image quality – not just in terms of controlling internal reflections but overall colour rendition, too. Some low cost coatings are low contrast while others tend to be very high
Technically, an intruder holding a jammer could access a door and then move through a site within a bubble of wireless ‘silence’.
contrast. Coatings are a vital part of any lens design. When it comes to lenses, it’s important to bear in mind that each time light passes through a lens surface it loses 4 per cent of light to surface reflection – that’s an 8 per cent loss per element. More complex varifocal lenses will lose more light than fixed lenses, as they can have more elements. The idea of coatings is to ensure more light passes through a lens element. As well as reducing attenuation of light by surface reflection, coatings that resist reflection also resist image duplication and the transmission of light onto a camera image. A ghost occurs when light reflected from the rear surface of a lens then reflects from the front surface – this creates a displaced second image. Meanwhile, flares occur when light from the back of the lens barrel reflects from the lens’ surface onto the image.
Coatings increase light transmission because light is reflected first by the coating surface, then by the lens surface and they do so using light wave interference phenomena to eliminate reflections. The way this works is that light reflected by the coating surface and that reflected by the lens surface have a phase difference 2x the coating thickness. And if coating thickness is one quarter the wavelength of light, reflections from the coating and the lens surface simply cancel each other out. Lenses that show a lot of flare and ghosting may have only one coated element, or their coatings may be too thick or too thin. Further, it’s worth noting that very fast lenses and very wide lenses are notoriously prone to flare. CCTV lenses tend to be extremely wide and insanely fast. Magnesium fluoride (MgF2) or silicon dioxide (SiO) are the least expensive low index lens coatings – MgF2 reflects red light in the centre of the spectrum – around 550nm – and is very common in CCTV lenses. However, light is made up of many different wavelengths, and one coating can’t eliminate all reflections. More expensive lenses have more coatings on more elements – designers might add a high index coating like zinc sulphide, or titanium dioxide. As well as reducing reflections and increasing transmission, lens coatings can also filter light and can impact on colour rendition, acuity and contrast. n
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events MARCH 2016 ISSUE 374
PP 100001158
EYE IN THE SKY
l Quorum Installs Mobotix at Transit l Council CCTV Systems: A Snapshot l The Lens Maketh the Camera: Fujinon 15-50 l CoastalCOMS Eyes James Cook University
ISC West Date: April 6-8, 2016 Venue: Sands Expo & Convention Center, Las Vegas, NV Contact: 1-203-840-5602 With more than 26,000 industry professionals and more than 1000 exhibits, ISC West is the largest security technology event in the Americas. ISC West’s attendees represent more than $US50 billion in buying power.
l Back to the Future: BGWT’s Rob Meachem l Automation: Coming, ready, or not? l Monitoring: Threats and Opportunities l Review: AXIS P3225-LV Camera Review
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SecTech Roadshow 2016 Date: May 4-18, 2016 Contact: Monique Keatinge on 612 9280 4425 SecTech Roadshow takes up to 20 of Australia’s leading distributors and manufacturers on a national tour – a simple and highly targeted touring tradeshow covering 5 state capitals over 2 weeks during the month of May. In 2016, SecTech Roadshow will visit Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
IFSEC 2016
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Date: June 21-23, 2016 Venue: Excel Centre, London Docklands Contact: www.ifsec.co.uk IFSEC International which took place in London in June 2015, is one of Europe’s largest security expos. The event was a huge success and we're looking forward to 2016, when we’ll be back at Docklands once again.
2016 Security Conference and Exhibition Date: July 20-22, 2016 Venue: Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre Contact: +61 3 9261 4500 Put it in your diary now: 20-22 July 2016. Australasia’s premier security industry event, to be held at the Melbourne Exhibition and Convention Centre.
China International Exhibition on Public Safety and Security
= DAILY, WEEKLY, MONTHLY.
Date: October 25–28, 2016 Venue: China Internation Exhibition Center Contact: 8610-68731710 The 13th China International Exhibition on Public Safety and Security 2016 is the biggest security distribution and procurement event in China, and focuses mostly on the big market in North area of China.
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www.securityelectronicsandnetworks.com
innerrange.com
INTEGRITI SIFER READERS SIFER is a Multi-Drop RS-485 Smart Card reader boasting end to end AES encrypted communications from the users card right through to the door module. With configurable multi-colour LED indicators SIFER provides instant visual indication of both Security Area and Door status, while its multi-tone speaker sounds access granted, access denied and door open too long tones. This OSDP based reader is competitively priced and sure to be a game changer
CARDS SIFER Mifare / DESfire EV1 credentials include a flexible range of ISO cards and Fobs consisting of: • Pre-Programmed ready-to-use stock credentials • User-Programmable credentials using the SIFER Card Programming station • Custom Programmed credentials programmed to order by the Inner Range factory
1300 319 499
www.centralsd.com.au
Canberra Unit 1, 15 Quilpie Cres, FYSHWICK ACT 2609
Product Specialist
Rusty Blake M. 0439 326 757 russell.blake@innerrange.com