AD410 Snapshot Quality Low

[LMANNING]

I have an AD410 that works really well with Home Assistant. The Video Quality is amazing. Very clear and the camera works so well.
The snapshot quality is very low though. Even when I go to http://username:password@ip/cgi-bin/snapshot.cgi the snapshot looks very low quality. It looks like other cameras have a snapshot quality setting of 1 through 6. But the Amcrest Smart Home app doesn't have a setting for that and the AD410 doesn't have a web interface like other Amcrest cameras. Is there any way to make the snapshots full resolution? Thank you

[Robertus]

Hi,

i have the same issue, and also you said:
"The Video Quality is amazing."

Not for me.

I use Home Assistant and Frigate with Google Coral.

Anyway my quality is very poor too compressed.

I use this link, but maybe i'm wrong and I need to use another URL ?

rtsp://admin:[email protected]:554/cam/realmonitor?channel=1&subtype=0&authbasic=64

As you can see is too compressed, and is very worst when there is movement.

[Revo2Maxx]

@LMANNING Hello and Welcome to the forum

So there are some issues when it comes to people trying to run programs and or access a device that may or may not offer the info that your looking for. So when it comes to the AD410 there is something that I think is missing when it comes to this Device, When I try to get into the Snapshot area of the camera on ASP the ASP crashes and this only happens when I try to access snapshot for this device. If I try any other camera from Amcrest that I know has snapshots in the device there is no issue and the page loads. However AD410 always crashes the app...

Next people talk about the Quality of the Device to to be low and for what the camera is and what it offers it is Right on par with other systems on the market, Now Amcrest has RTSP and other things that others don't offer but this don't mean that we can make the Device do what it isn't able to do.. The AD410 is a 15FPS (It don't do anymore even if you Tell it too and most likely will just make the camera unstable. Out of the box it loads up in H.265 and if the software that your trying to run it on isn't able to RUN H.265 then you will want to make changes to H.264 however it seems that making most any changes to the camera as when the AD110 first came out it was not happy when making these changes and for some people even Bricked the device..

So I would tread lightly when it comes to trying to get what you think the device can do and make sure to read the Specs for the AD410 and don't put it past what it really is able to do..
Edit: so I found that ASP does crash with a few other devices, It might not have anything to do with the AD410, and just a flaky ASP... Anyway personally not sure what the Snapshot ability is able to run on the AD410.. Just don't try to push past it limits...

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[GaryOkie]

@LMANNING - I have not paid much attention to AD410 snapshots until you pointed this out. I concur - they are not close to the full resolution of the 2K camera but instead the snapshot resolution is hardcoded to 720x576 - even if the quality in the SH app is set to HD.

I tried to view and/or change the snapshot resolution via ASP and SmarPSS apps but both CRASH when selecting the Snapshot Encode menu! I also tried via the NVR and it didn't crash, but said "failed to obtain config".

This command will show the snapshot configuration when HD mode is selected:
<ip>/cgi-bin/configManager.cgi?action=getConfig&name=Encode[0].SnapFormat[0]

Code: Select all

table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Audio.Bitrate=64
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Audio.Compression=AAC
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Audio.Depth=16
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Audio.Frequency=8000
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Audio.Pack=DHAV
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].AudioEnable=true
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.resolution=720x576
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.BitRate=1024
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.BitRateControl=VBR
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Compression=MJPG
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.FPS=1.000000
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.GOP=60
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Height=576
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Pack=DHAV
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Priority=0
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Profile=Main
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Quality=5
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.QualityRange=6
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.SVCTLayer=1
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].Video.Width=720
table.Encode[0].SnapFormat[0].VideoEnable=true

You can clearly see the default "HD" resolution settings here. The SD settings (when [1] is specified instead of [0]) are the same resolution!

It should be possible to change the resolution via the API, but given that the Amcrest Surveillance Pro app crashes just trying to view snapshot encoding, something very fishy is going on in the API.

@Robertus Your issue is very different from the OP. There is nothing wrong with your URL - you have selected subtype 0, which is the 2K UHD stream. Generally, with good lighting, the video stream is quite good.

Your image shows a low light condition requiring IR illumination. I don't think the quality is lacking due to being over compressed but may be due to the default sharpness setting which is 50. I've changed mine to turn off sharpness to its lowest settingh (0) for the night time profile. This unfortunately isn't possible via the SmartHome app. You CAN safely change it via Amcrest Surveillance Pro, SmarPSS, or via the API. This should help your low light video quality. it has for me and others who have reported the same issue with nighttime video.

[LMANNING]

Thank you @Robertus And @GaryOkie and @Revo2Maxx !

I agree with GaryOkie, the images that get saved are 720x576 which is significantly lower than the sharp video 2560x1920. Other cameras have an option to raise the quality to 6. It should just pull from whatever the video resolution is. Glad I am not crazy. I have also heard of making any changes without the app can brick Amcrest cameras so I am hesitant to do that and I am hoping Amcrest just forgot this setting. You both seem more knowledgeable than me about the issue. Thank you for the input!

Attaching the web interface with the option of a different Amcrest camera

[GaryOkie]

Lmanning - the Quality setting here relates to the amount of compression in the JPEG snapshot. See http://fotoforensics.com/tutorial-estq.php for a good article explaining this.

For the AD410, you can see the setting "video.quality=5" which is 1 level below the best. At this setting, there is not a whole lot of compression and the image retains most of its detail at whatever the full resolution of the image was. The problem here is not the quality setting but the image size (resolution) which is very strangely set far below what it should be.

I can think of no reason why a snapshot with the HD option enabled would have a resolution so low. Maybe Revo can get an answer from his support contacts why it is set this way (or if it was an oversight to be fixed), as well as why ASP crashes just viewing snapshot encodings.

[Revo2Maxx]

So it is Very odd to be honest, Looking in my 2116-HS I get failed when I tried to look at the Snapshot.. However on my 4216E-AI NVR, I can look at the Snapshot page and for me what is odd is that mine is setup for 2560x1920(5M) with Timing and Trigger. I tried to setup my AI NVR to FTP some images, Even though I have setup the camera channels to take snapshots and setup to have them taken every so many seconds it is strange that the NVR only sent me some Images from 2 other cameras from earlier today and nothing was sent in a Timing order.. So I am not sure what is going on. I can setup my 2116-HS to send images to FTP on all channels other then the AD410 channel.

So I then turn them off from being sent in FTP and to take them on the HDD and there is nothing to look at for images on the NVR either outside of the others that was sent on to the FTP server. So not sure why that is but now seems to be another flaw in the 4216E-AI NVR that I have found since I have owned it..

[LMANNING]

I opened a support ticket. Hopefully they know of this issue and have a simple workaround. Thank you for your help!

[Revo2Maxx]

Well crazy thing is I made some changes of my devices for my AD410. I now have it connected to both my AI NVR and I connected it to my 4108E NVR and setup that NVR the same way I have tried to connect to my 2116-HS, 4216E-AI NVR's that would not work outside of just a video.

So after connecting a few cameras to the 4108E, I went through setting up for images to be sent to my FTP. As of right now for this last hour I have had 1 image sent to FTP ever 60 seconds and it is said to be 5mp rescaled what ever that means maybe because of the way I was looking at the photo but that is what the INFO for it says. I will admit the quality of the picture isn't very nice and I am going to guess it has to do with How I have it running. So I will let the Images stake up tonight into the day tomorrow and see if the quality gets better as they sun comes up. The way I have the camera working at night is really only good for close access to the camera past 30 feet out it is quality less desired.

[Revo2Maxx]

So I am thinking it has something to do with the way new hardware and software work with these cameras. I say this because even my 4216e-AI NVR while it is able to bring up the Snapshot page in the NVR it don't want to work well with the task of taking any Sanpshot for any of the cameras I have connected to it on a timing setup or even event wise. Yet my Older 4108E NVR with old FW works just fine and does take full image size.. Also if you right click the image and go to new tab with the picture you will be able to see the picture at full image size. At least with mine I get the click to enlarge to full size in a new Tab.

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