Suggestion how about a Kickstarter to upgrade Village Square snowcam to HD

[Richard]

Who's in?

Me for one.

@DbSki what would you need? What would a practical fund goal be?

also, I forgot who's apartment it is??

 

[Jellybeans]

Who's in?

Me for one.

@DbSki what would you need? What would a practical fund goal be?

also, I forgot who's apartment it is??

@luvthabumps

 

[Richard]

Ta

 

[CarveMan]

What would the cost be?

 

[Richard]

What would the cost be?

I reckon around $1k for something half decent.

I’m prepared to match $1 for $1 up to $500 on a funding campaign.

 

[CarveMan]

I’ll kick in $500

 

[willsnow]

<fundraising over>

 

[climberman]

That was quick!!!

 

[Richard]

I’ll kick in $500

Right then

@DbSki @luvthabumps

When you are ready!

 

[CarveMan]

Seriously, I live on that camera, it’s an integral part of how I watch the conditions unfold.

 

[CarveMan]

Plus I won $600 on myself at golf on Saturday, perfect way to spend it!

 

[luvthabumps]

great job can do any time

 

[luvthabumps]

what would it look like to have a real time, controllable cam that could pan ? ($$ wise and logistics )

 

[TOFF]

MtBuller images proudly brought to you by ski.com.au aussieskier.com and snowhomes.com, love it.
Thanks guys

 

[Richard]

what would it look like to have a real time, controllable cam that could pan ? ($$ wise and logistics )

$2k+ on the cam. $400~$800 on an enclosure. Technically a lot more mucking about getting it right. Because of the need for a dome enclosure instead of a cannon enclosure they are a shitload harder to keep defrosted and clear vision.

Would not do it knowing the available vantage of your location.

 

[luvthabumps]

MtBuller images proudly brought to you by ski.com.au aussieskier.com and snowhomes.com, love it.
Thanks guys

and rvv.com

 

[Richard]

Streaming static like Thredbo much easier to manage v’s the streaming PTZ at blue cow. The key is bandwidth for streaming. Note the lessor clarity of the blue cow image. That’s the poly dome. They suck. They quickly develop fissures in the high UV environment.

 

[CarveMan]

LTB has ADSL like me with a mere 1Mbit upload. Streaming would make his internet unusable and no point with PTZ I reckon. Just a nice clear HD image.

 

[Jellybeans]

LTB has ADSL like me with a mere 1Mbit upload. Streaming would make his internet unusable and no point with PTZ I reckon. Just a nice clear HD image.

Is that the same across the mountain?

 

[CarveMan]

Is that the same across the mountain?

I know they put a fibre optic line up under the road when the uni was built so now that is occupied by RMB / BSL etc, and I also know that BSL has connected all their lifts and buildings on the hill with ethernet or similar.

I don't know how quick it us but the rest of the mountain generally has ADSL2 and of course 4G, both of which get terribly congested on busy weekends. My ADSL2 sync speeds are good, @luvthabumps would have even better sync speeds as he is 50m from the Telstra exchange.

@Dave Clark has mentioned that all the BSL owned snow cams are good enough to stream HD but the issue is getting the bandwidth off the hill.

 

[djam]

I connect at 26Mb/s to the exchange, but the ADSL 2+ upload is limited to 1Mb/s.

Strange as the last two tests say it is doing 2Mb/s, Modem says it is 1Mb/s.

We can get NBN at Buller now, but it is Sat connection

Download speeds are about the same, 25Mb/s, upload is better at 5Mb/s, but you
would need to make sure the dish didn't have snow on it.

I'm sure there are many unused fibres in the mountain connection.

In Winter, on weekends, the download speed drops, some times to under 1Mb/s.

You're ready to connect
Contact a phone or internet provider and order an nbn™ powered plan.

Planned technology
nbn™ Satellite (Sky Muster)*

https://www.nbnco.com.au/residential/learn/network-technology/sky-muster-explained

 

[CarveMan]

I'm acquainted with the owners of an ISP that got acquired by iiNet, I was on their BBS way back in the early 90s. They're now Buller skiers, one of them owns an apartment there. I should talk to them about the viability of some sort of VDSL network, see if there's viability for a village level micro-ISP.

I think satellite NBN is pretty rubbish, I'll stick with the ADSL2 as I don't need it to be super quick, just as long as I can stream sport via Kayo.

I've done a bit of research and fixed line internet won't be turned off anywhere that had it, and hasn't been replaced by fixed line NBN.

 

[djam]

I was expecting we would get FTTN tech, as the NBN offering, which is using VDSL to
go the copper leg. This should cover almost all the village, from the current exchange.

I'd go 4G before Sat.

 

[Jellybeans]

Well that's not good. They should have brought in fixed line NBN. Sigh....

BTW happy to chip in a little something if the grand doesn't cover the optimal product.

 

[willsnow]

Well that's not good. They should have brought in fixed line NBN. Sigh....

BTW happy to chip in a little something if the grand doesn't cover the optimal product.

Ditto.

 

[CarveMan]

Yeah my place is in a Telstra black hole so I got a backup prepaid Optus dongle, but that's redundant now I have ADSL. Wouldn't bother with satellite.

 

[Jellybeans]

I just use 4G (telstra) during the season. I really only use this site anyway up there. Family has never bothered with hooking the apt to ADSL or otherwise.
Maybe in a few years.

 

[luvthabumps]

I haven't checked our speeds in recent times but we have no issue streaming down , no idea what the uplaod speeds are. It's iiNet ADSL

Mrs LTB also suggested that maybe now that the building is renovated we should consider relocating to the building and we could probably get it up a bit higher with potential for a wider view across the new Square.

Thoughts? (also gets the cable feed off the balcony as well as we could hide it behind the internal pemet we have that runs around the living room)

 

[luvthabumps]

speaking of the cam, I'm seeing a frozen image from 08:41 this morning which is pretty freaking amazing so I can only imagine what it looks like as we've had showers drifting through all morning

 

[CarveMan]

I haven't checked our speeds in recent times but we have no issue streaming down , no idea what the uplaod speeds are. It's iiNet ADSL

Mrs LTB also suggested that maybe now that the building is renovated we should consider relocating to the building and we could probably get it up a bit higher with potential for a wider view across the new Square.

Thoughts? (also gets the cable feed off the balcony as well as we could hide it behind the internal pemet we have that runs around the living room)

Given you're near the exchange you'll have the theoretical maximum speed to the exchange of 22-24 down and 2 up but in reality all I manage to achieve is 13 down and 1 up to the wider internet. As long as I can shitpost and watch sport on Kayo it's plenty.

 

[LiveToSki]

...watch sport on Kayo it's plenty.

Will the 4G up there be good enough to watch Kayo?

 

[CarveMan]

Will the 4G up there be good enough to watch Kayo?

It's fine except for Saturday arvo/evenings in peak season. Chews the gigs though, make sure you've got enough and/or watch in SD.

 

[currawong]

I'm acquainted with the owners of an ISP that got acquired by iiNet, I was on their BBS way back in the early 90s. They're now Buller skiers, one of them owns an apartment there. I should talk to them about the viability of some sort of VDSL network, see if there's viability for a village level micro-ISP.

I think satellite NBN is pretty rubbish, I'll stick with the ADSL2 as I don't need it to be super quick, just as long as I can stream sport via Kayo.

I've done a bit of research and fixed line internet won't be turned off anywhere that had it, and hasn't been replaced by fixed line NBN.

some businesses at falls were looking at a village vdsl solution. technically looked good but there was a bureaucratic obstacle (ACMA?). now looking at a fibre and wireless solution. I can probably find the company name if you are interested - just not now

 

[Richard]

no idea what the uplaod speeds are

Web cams are 100% about the upload speed and even more critically, upload reliability. Otherwise you get those half images which look like a thread got pulled from the bottom of a woolen sweater.

 

[CarveMan]

Web cams are 100% about the upload speed and even more critically, upload reliability. Otherwise you get those half images which look like a thread got pulled from the bottom of the woolen sweater.

Plus if you have something saturating the upload speed of a connection it renders the whole thing pretty much useless.

 

[Alfred14]

Plus if you have something saturating the upload speed of a connection it renders the whole thing pretty much useless.

Unless you have a router that uses some sort of QoS like smart que management on a ubiquiti edge router x for example.

 

[DbSki]

I was thinking about this the other day and looking over cams.

Came to the conclusion that the simplest way to upgrade without any interruptions or mods required would be the just buy a newer model of the Sony SNC cameras.

Like https://pro.sony/en_AU/products/fixed-cameras/snc-eb630

The ones at VS and APIRA are Sony SNC10 which are very old.
That said they have been there since about 2011 and the cams have never failed (the WiFi did but now both are hard wired)

I had a look over the range of SNC cams and there are some on Amazon with nice prices,
They come with lenses and are the same housing so I would just do a fast swap of them on the spot and setup the software on site as it is much the same as the old ones to config.

It would bring the images up to 1080p True HD with still images same as now. (currently 640x480)

 

[DbSki]

I haven't checked our speeds in recent times but we have no issue streaming down , no idea what the uplaod speeds are. It's iiNet ADSL

Mrs LTB also suggested that maybe now that the building is renovated we should consider relocating to the building and we could probably get it up a bit higher with potential for a wider view across the new Square.

Thoughts? (also gets the cable feed off the balcony as well as we could hide it behind the internal pemet we have that runs around the living room)

Option I was looking at last year (I think I mentioned) was to stick a dome camera on a mast extending from the corner upright of the balcony.
Using a dome camera we could run a PTZR camera inside it and have the option of multiple views.

Such a cam would cost a good deal more and something we could do a crowd fund for.
Id suggest maybe we can look at that for next season and for now just upgrade the existing cam with a newer model as mentioned in the other post which would fit inside the current housing and takes the same power so would just hook up to the cables already there.

 

[Chaeron]

Plus I won $600 on myself at golf on Saturday, perfect way to spend it!

Legitimate business expense!

 

[Richard]

Option I was looking at last year (I think I mentioned) was to stick a dome camera on a mast extending from the corner upright of the balcony.
Using a dome camera we could run a PTZR camera inside it and have the option of multiple views.

Such a cam would cost a good deal more and something we could do a crowd fund for.
Id suggest maybe we can look at that for next season and for now just upgrade the existing cam with a newer model as mentioned in the other post which would fit inside the current housing and takes the same power so would just hook up to the cables already there.

After running 9 PTZ's for Hotham and Falls for ten years plus one at Thredbo, I'm not a fan of PTZ. The biggest issue was the domes and keeping them defrosted. The sheltered ones were fine if they were under an eve or such but the exposed ones were a complete PIA. The other issue is the optical clarity of the dome itself sux balls. I was constantly replacing them and there seemed to be no option to get serious quality and they were almost $200 ea for shitty poly/perspex.

Plus, getting the exact same still from say 5 different shots from a PTZ is waaaaaaay harder than it looks. It's why as soon as I stopped being the service provider the Falls and Hotham cams went pear shaped and are still random snaps on a couple of installs to this day.

I'm 200% onboard for keeping it simple and upgrading the existing cam with something that just swaps in the existing enclosure. The goal is a HD image, not the exercise of upgrading the whole thing for fun.

 

[Richard]

The best way to run a PTZ is as a stream like Perisher does at Blue Cow (and Mountainwatch used to do) and until bandwidth is viable it's simply not worth it.

A streaming cam does not make the exercise any more economically viable. They do not generate any extra interest that is material such that the overhead of running streaming is offset by the return. The reason Mountainwatch pulled out of the mountains is because the cams cost 10~15x to run and no one was on their site any more than if they were stills.

Leveraging YouTube for streaming to the consumer has only been viable for a couple of years and the way Thredbo does it using static cams is perfect. They would still be costing a fair bit in bandwidth to get off the hill and my guess is that they are compressing the video output on their LAN before sending up to YouTube - or possibly the cam unit itself is pushing out web ready MP4.

 

[Jellybeans]

The best way to run a PTZ is as a stream like Perisher does at Blue Cow (and Mountainwatch used to do) and until bandwidth is viable it's simply not worth it.

A streaming cam does not make the exercise any more economically viable. They do not generate any extra interest that is material such that the overhead of running streaming is offset by the return. The reason Mountainwatch pulled out of the mountains is because the cams cost 10~15x to run and no one was on their site any more than if they were stills.

Leveraging YouTube for streaming has only been viable for a couple of years and the way Thredbo does it using static cams is perfect. They would still be costing a fair bit in bandwidth to get off the hill and my guess is that they are compressing the video on their LAN before sending up to YouTube.

If you could do a cam like Thredbo's, it would be perfect. But obviously we cannot, so an HD image is the optimal product.

 

[CarveMan]

Is it worth looking at a PoE camera? That way only one cable needs to be run outside and you can put a simple PoE injector inside.

 

[Richard]

Is it worth looking at a PoE camera? That way only one cable needs to be run outside and you can put a simple PoE injector inside.

Yes, PoE makes life much easier. Even if power is already run it's easy enough to ignore.

 

[djam]

Some of the new cameras are doing H.265, about half the data size/bandwidth compared to H.264
The come in 4k versions, as PoE. An single channel PoE power supply is less then $30, to upgrade
the current non PoE switch.

Example cam

Trade price $350

 

[Richard]

Some of the new cameras are doing H.265, about half the data size/bandwidth compared to H.264
The come in 4k versions, as PoE. An single channel PoE power supply is less then $30, to upgrade
the current non PoE switch.

Example cam

Trade price $350

Like the PoE and the h.265 stream. but you can't put that kind of dome cam out in the weather. Real outdoor ptz's that will last 5~10 years are closer to $2k.

 

[Richard]

Like the PoE and the h.265 stream. but you can't put that kind of dome cam out in the weather. Real outdoor ptz's that will last 5~10 years are closer to $2k.

Actually that one is IP66 but it's ceiling mount and would have no heating.

The requirements for an outdoor PTZ is a pole mount 'teardrop' enclosure and a servo that can lift the lens above the equator. Plus 20x optical. It's the detail that ramps up the expense.

 

[CarveMan]

The thing with this camera is that it's illuminated at night, and has visual points of reference - ie the steps - to watch the snow fall. That's the appeal. Just like the Cedarwood cam at Falls, they help with rulers and the Coke cans etc.

I just don't know how PTZ would enhance that. I reckon we just need higher resolution version of what we currently have.

To be honest the feature I would like most is the old history function so we could watch the steps/shrubs disappear.

 

[djam]

that cam is not a PTZ, just fixed position, yep, it would need a heater.

 

[currawong]

The thing with this camera is that it's illuminated at night, and has visual points of reference - ie the steps - to watch the snow fall. That's the appeal. Just like the Cedarwood cam at Falls, they help with rulers and the Coke cans etc.

* 1000
Information on accumulation, wet vs snow vs dry is much more important than pretty pictures or movies