iSpy uses your webcam and microphone to detect any movement or sound (or lack thereof)
and record and/or perform any other action when detected. Typical applications include security, surveillance, ghost hunting, home automation, baby monitoring, staff activity supervising, general surveillance and more. You can schedule iSpy to run whenever you like. iSpy can also stream live video over the web and can send out email and SMS alerts. iSpy supports an unlimited number of cameras and microphones and can run simultaneously on multiple PC's. iSpy is free.
A PC with a web cam and microphone attached.
Recommended Spec: 1.0Ghz Processor, 1GB of RAM.
.Net framework 2.0 installed
A working broadband internet connection (for remote access).
Ability to open ports on your router or home PC (for remote access).
To add a camera, either click on "Add Camera" on the tool bar, or right
click on the workspace and click "Add Camera". You will see a screen like the
one shown on the left here. Click "video source" and select either your local device or another source, ie a network IP camera, an MJPEG camera etc. If you have webcams attached to other computers on your network you can use the iSpy server installer (available from the File menu) to set up a JPEG source on the other computer and then connect to it from here.
For
optimum results setup your camera in a well lit room, or altenatively use an
active infrared camera. The camera and microphone should not be sitting on top
of other electronics as these can cause signal noise and degrade your results.
Ensure that your microphone recording levels are set high and it's not muted.
Also check that iSpy has exclusive access to your camera and microphone, as
other programs like Skype and Instant Messenger can block access to these
devices.
Give your camera a name, eg "Office Cam" or "Hallway Cam". For other options on
these pages, mouse-over the controls to see contextual help. Most of the
settings affect the camera in real time, for example checking and unchecking
"overlay time" will immediately switch on or off the time display (as long as
your camera is active). The greatest impact on performance is the frame size and
frame rate you select (and of course the number of cameras you add).
iSpy has four different movement detectors. Each one has different performance
impacts. You can monitor the performance of the motion detector by causing
movement in the camera and watching the CPU and RAM counters in the status bar
(bottom of the screen).
Depending on which motion detector you select some of the three checkboxes below
may be greyed out. These options only apply to specific motion detectors. There
is an option on the Alerts tab, "Alert on object count" that is only available
if "Track" is selected as the movement detector. This option will cause alerts
to only be sent if iSpy detects the set number of objects, regardless of the
level of movement.
The Detector sensitivity bar sets the level at which alerts are raised.
Depending on your camera model and lighting conditions you will need to play
with this setting to ensure that movement alerts are not continuously being
reported due to signal noise. This can take a bit of experimentation. The
control affects the camera in real time and the camera will flash red when
movement is detected, so adjust the slider until you are happy with the level of
movement required to set off an alert.
The sound detector controls are very basic - just set the slider to the level
(volume) at which you want to set off a sound detected alert.
iSpy
can record video from your webcam when movement is detected. It can then
compress it to flash video (.flv) files and you can access these files over the
internet or locally on your computer/ network. Audio captured by microphones is
compressed to .mp3 files.
Calibration Delay: The number of seconds to wait for the camera to settle
before raising movement alerts. When the camera first switches on it may take a
while for the movement detector to calibrate itself to the image.
Pre-buffer Frames: iSpy stores the last few frames in memory, so that
when it records to disk it captures the entire event rather than the last few
frames of it. Set the number of frames you would like to capture here (you
should base it on the current frame-rate of the camera).
Inactivity Record: The amount of time to record after movement has
stopped.
Max. Record Time: The maximum amount of time to record. This should not
be set to too long to conserve disk space and resources.
Record Timelapse: iSpy can save a frame every few seconds and then save
the movie to disk once an hour. Enter the desired interval to save a frame here,
or enter 0 to turn off timelapse recording.
You can set any program to be run when audio or
movement is detected, make a system beep sound and optionally restore the window to the foreground.
You can also set alerts for when sound or movement is not detected so for
example you could monitor machinery and receive alerts if it stops working, or
you could monitor your office and be alerted if everyone went home early.
We also provide SMS and email alerting services for iSpy although we charge for
these services (it costs us $ to provide them). SMS services enable you to leave
iSpy running, safe in the knowledge that you'll be notified instantly if
something is happening. We also provide services that notify you if your iSpy
web connection goes down.
Distinct alert interval: The minimum time to leave between raising
alerts. For example a setting of 60 seconds means that if there is constant
movement you will receive an alert every 60 seconds.
Alert on object count: This will only be enabled if you have selected
Track as your movement detector. Alerts will only be raised if iSpy detects at
least this number of distinct objects, regardless of the actual level of
movement.
Every camera and microphone you add to iSpy can be scheduled to start and stop at specific times. Scheduling controls are available on the
final tab page when adding a mic or camera. If your camera or microphone is
inactive but scheduled you will see a summary of the planned stop and start
times for your camera or mic.
iSpy includes its own web server, so you can access live and recorded
video, and recorded audio over the web. Click the web access button to set up the inbuilt server.
You will need to specify a port to use. The default port is 8080, although you can change this to any port number up to 65535.
You will need to ensure that your firewall
isn't blocking this port and any routers on your network forward traffic to this
port to the PC that is running iSpy. To view your captured audio and video over
the web you will need an iSpy account - create an account at
http://ispy.developerinabox.com/newuser.aspx. If you want to connect multiple instances of iSpy to the website you will need to specify a different port for each instance.
For a walkthrough of how to connect iSpy to the web and view live video and
saved video remotely please
click here.
We also provide a mobile site (
here) - where you can login, view live feeds, saved video and audio and remotely control iSpy. We use flash 8 to display saved video so your mobile device will need to support flash 8 for this functionality.
If you are connected to the web, you can use our email and SMS services to
notify you when movement or sound is detected. We can also notify you if your
web connection goes offline. We also provide grabs of your cameras at set
intervals by email.
When you click on the close button, iSpy continues to run in the System Tray. To bring it back, double click the iSpy icon. To password protect the application, click Options->Settings, check the password protect box, enter a password and click OK. When you double click the system tray icon now, you'll be prompted for an unlock password before you will be able to use iSpy.
With one iSpy account you can access and control cameras and microphones on multiple computers; Use the same login details for each computer and just specify a different port. All connected cameras and microphones will be fully accessible from our website as long as your router is setup to forward those ports to the relevant computers on your network.
Use iSpy server (also open source and free) to provide JPEG feeds from other
computers with webcams attached.
You may have problems using two identical webcams simultaneously on the same PC. The reason is that the moniker string which identifies the hardware to the underlying classes is identical for each camera. A workaround is to use two different types of camera.
We're looking into a fix for this. If you have any ideas, please contact us!
Constant movement detected: Sometimes when webcams have automatic exposure
control set they can get into an infinite loop dimming and brightening the scene
which causes iSpy to constantly detect movement. Click on the Adv. Properties
button in the camera setup and turn off automatic exposure control.