Camera Selection for indoor use with Zoneminder & Ubuntu

[norous]

Can you guide me towards an indoor camera which i want to use monitor my shop's sale counter so that i can have a look (remotely) that each and every costumer has paid the shopping bill to the sales man.

I want to use zoneminder along with text base ubuntu server. ubuntu and zoneminder are installed on a vmware workstation (winXP). initially i want to use the same computer (winXP) which is currently used for billing but a separate system can also be installed (i also have a spare P-ii system with 256-MB RAM). I am trying to configure a capture card but ubuntu at VMware is not detecting the Philips 713x capture card (Tv tuner) which is i think due to conflict between WinXp (host) and Ubuntu (guest) at Vmware.

 

Regards.

[Secware_Tech6]

we cant support zoneminder here (but vmware does not support pci pass though so your card will never work as a virtual machne) but to choose a camera you need to consider a few factors.

 

what do you want to capture (also any system that captures PAL composite images will be capturing an interlcaed image. This doenst work well with digital capture so most machines use a format called CIF or 2CIF. Both only capture the ODD or EVEN lines. see http://www.axis.com/products/video/camera/progressive_scan.htm for a full explanation as to why

 

so you can only really capture up to 288 vertical pixels with normal composite cameras. So dont do your calculations on capture res at 576 pixels (most pal can support) as you will not be capturing at that res.

 

Its difficult to advise how to work this out (it takes a lot of training and experience) on a forum in a few lines. but a good quick way is to use your camera phone at its lowest res or the ress that closly matches your capture resolution to work out views required.