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Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

critter.camera

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Re: Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

#3

Post by Tade0 »

This takes me back to the time when I wanted to determine which of my two cats is the one who makes the first move in their daily game of shess (it's like chess, but both the colours are black/brown and you don't move pieces - you just place them) in the bathroom.

I hooked a webcam to an old netbook and downloaded an app which would take a picture whenever it detected motion.

What I didn't take into account was the mirror in the hallway which during sunset would reflect sunlight at just the right angle to hit the toilet bowl.

In the end my results were a time-lapse of the sun shining on porcelain, because the mirror was far away enough to make the sun's movement trigger the motion detection sensing done by the app.

Re: Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

#4

Post by rewq4321 »

This is cool! Would be ever cooler if it could record a video clip rather than just images. You wouldn't have enough space in localStorage/IndexedDB, but you can use File System Access[0] (currently available in Chrome and Edge, strong chance of making it into Firefox and Safari in the next couple of years) which allows the user to select a folder which the clips can be saved into.

[0] https://web.dev/file-system-access/

Re: Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

#7

Post by TN1ck »

I love this! We once had this exact use case when there was a weasel ravaging in the kitchen - I downloaded some software and wired it up, but it was quite involved and the weasel sadly never showed up. I'll definitely use this the next time an animal finds its way here. Thanks for building it!

Re: Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

#8

Post by jambo135 »

kranner wrote: post #2

Works great on Safari on iOS! But it seems to replace the actual image of the moving object with a red mask/silhouette. Is there an option to retain the original frames, even if the moving object is blurred?

Yeah the original image is retained, when you open the image full size there is a button in the modal that lets you toggle the motion highlights on and off. The downloaded image will also just be the original as captured by the camera

Re: Show HN: Critter.Camera – Browser based motion detection and image capture

#10

Post by jambo135 »

Tade0 wrote: post #3

This takes me back to the time when I wanted to determine which of my two cats is the one who makes the first move in their daily game of shess (it's like chess, but both the colours are black/brown and you don't move pieces - you just place them) in the bathroom. I hooked a webcam to an old netbook and downloaded an app which would take a picture whenever it detected motion. What I didn't take into account was the m…

haha I have experienced lots of these problems while testing and tried my best to build in logic to detect 'real' motion. However since I wanted it sensitive enough to detect things like a slow moving woodlouse there will always be false detections unfortunately. One of my tests I couldn't work out why tin foil was flagging as motion, turned out it was the moon outside the window hitting it at different angles during the night!
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