Software command to trigger a local capture?

Steven Kan

I'd like to put an RLC-410 up by my mailbox and trigger a recording any time my mailbox gets opened, along with the standard pre- and post-trigger time. I can't use motion detection because cars drive by 100x a day.

Some other camera brands have hardware triggers available, so that I could put a switch in my mailbox, and when it's opened, it triggers the hardware switch and captures a recording.

None of the Reolink cameras has a hardware trigger feature, as far as I know, but I was thinking I could detect the switch opening with a Raspberry Pi, if I could then send a software command (e.g. an HTTP request) to my Reolink camera to trigger a recording.

Note that I don't want to capture the recording on the Pi; I just want to send a command to the camera so that the camera does what it would normally do if it detected motion (e.g. record on the internal SD card and send the alert email, etc). Then I can log into the camera later and view the recording.

I've read through the CGI commands and I don't see any way to do this:

https://reolink.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Reolink-CGI-command-v1.61.pdf

Thanks!

carbonita

I agree that it sure would be nice to have an expanded cgi command capability. Brainstorming, one could put the camera inside the mailbox, which would trigger only when opened. Probably need PoE if your mbox is a metal Faraday cage. Alternately, its fairly straightforward to build a rpi zero camera, and then gpio sensors can be added (contact sensor might be easiest in this use case).

Steven Kan

Yeah, everyone suggests putting the camera inside the mailbox. But then I'd get footage of a hand, and maybe a sleeve.

I need faces and license plates, so I need to put the camera a few feet away from the mailbox, and I might even want two--one pointing up the street and one pointing down the street.

I've put together a Pi-based camera system, but the software stack was flakey, and I didn't want to mess with trying to figure out triggered capture, etc.

I can probably figure out how to send an HTTP query via curl based on a switch opening, since I already have a time-lapse loop set up with another Reolink camera and a Pi.

The Reolink cameras are good; I just need a few more features.

Crimp On

The RLC-410 can ignore motion in areas that have "too much", like passing traffic.
It's the grid under "Sensitivity". If you block out the picture except for right around the mailbox, you should get motion only when someone enters that specific area. The "pre" and "post" record would capture walking up to the mailbox, walking away, etc. I have not had much success reading license plates, although my cameras are 30+ feet away from the street.

carbonita

How about a separate sensor for mbox opening, then use that time-stamp to check the video? An ESP8266 has gpio and wifi. Probably not good for real-time alerts (but IFTTT should work), but possibly ok for daily review.