Video recording your Haunt

[ruafraid]

I am looking for suggestions on setting up cameras in this years haunt to record the scares and to make a dvd. I was thinking of using my computer and a dvr card to record to disk the activity. One card I looked at was by Geovision. Has anyone else done this ? pro's con's which types of camera's to use. Will the ones they sell at harbor freight work ok ? Wallmart here has Homeland brand security camera's that are night vision capable and have sound ?

[noahbody]

I also would be interested to know what vid cams people have, or do, use for the recording their haunt.
Ease of use, quality, cost, and of course night time recording.
I am going to buy one this year and would really appreciate any input.
Thanks.

[ruafraid]

I cant believe no body else has done this ? I guess I need to take this question of to the MOM forum but I might die waiting on a response there as well :(
anybody ?

[trishaanne]

Try sending a message to Vlad. He bought something to tape his haunt with and he may be able to answer your question. Just a suggestion.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

I was just waiting to see how much interest was going to be in this thread.

I install commercial camera systems. I haven't dabbled in any of the home (non commercial ) units.

I would be willing to have to do a good deal for someone to put a home version together.

[ruafraid]

Jeff I knew it ! I could feel you were holding back on me. So I understand from one person I know that does this for a living the card I asked about is the card they use for systems they install at Car Washes. I know he has some camera's and they are fairly expensive. Ok I don't follow this " I would be willing to have to do a good deal for someone to put a home version together."

Thanks trishaanne I will send a message to him.

[Technical Terror]

You might want to check out some of the cameras that deer hunters use to film deer moving patterns at night. I don't think they are real expensive and record good night shots.I would go to a hunting supply site and look around.

[DeathTouch]

I have sony camera. I just hook up to my compter via firewire. The software I have is really nice but it takes up alot of hardrive space. Even a small segment could be 15 gig at least. I had to buy to big hard drives just to handle a few weddings that I did.

[Dr Morbius]

Don't even get me started about my camera.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

I agree, I like Sony. Real expensive for stand alone cameras though.

Ok RU, typicaly, you would have a cpu just for the video capture, nothing you would use to do your bills on. That's all it does. That's commercial.
But, you only want to use it a few nights, so as long as your hard drive is big enough....well size does matter here.

Can you friend buy at wholesale?
I do, so if you have some specs of what you want, just shot them to me.

Like I said before, not really sure what we can do to put a good clear picture on a DVD from a standard PC. Really depends on the compression. Less is better.

Anyways, just let me know.

[ruafraid]

Jeff, I got computers everywhere thats what I do for a living. LOL I don't know what I am looking (by brand) for specifically. The card is one that my friend told me about and it has 8 channels. (425.00) on e-bay. That's why I posed the question to see what others have used and the results. From what I am told there is a plug in that coverts the recorded video to Microsoft's media format. So with that I could burn /edit that to a DVD. Last year one of the guys that helped me out used his digital camcorder and dumped it to his disk drive. I have used USB camera's connected to computers and I even have a TCPIP camera running at one data center that saves images to a webserver every min but that wont work for a haunt. So what brand of card and camera's that work in the night vision mode do you work with. Maybe if we start there we can get something going. When I place my order can I get it supersized. :)

[Frighteners Entertainment]

Not fond of eBay myself for buying...ive me a link to see what it is and I'll tell how much it's worth and what the quality is.

[heresjohnny]

I was hesitant to answer because I am no expert in this area, but I have owned a Sony MiniDV DCR-TRV19 camera for a few years and am very happy with it. I seem to remember it cost around $500 or so. MiniDV is a digital format, so you can transfer it directly to your computer and its ready to burnto DVD. It has night shot (night vision) that works pretty good, and it uses Firewire to transfer to the hard drive. It came with software, and I have also used Microsoft MovieMaker (free online last I checked). I used all of this to build a DVD of my Sons soccer season, and had several hours of video captured on a 30G hard drive. I was able to cut and edit scenes, preview, overlay soundtracks, and use some special effects (like slow motion) with the Movie Maker software. Buring the final DVD took several hours, but once it was done it turned out nice. My computer is nothing to brag about, Pentium 3, 833 MHz, 70G hard drive.

[ruafraid]

Not fond of eBay myself for buying...ive me a link to see what it is and I'll tell how much it's worth and what the quality is.
Here is the e-bay link. The adapter he told me about is the GV-650
http://cgi.ebay.com/GeoVision-GV-650-8-Camera-CCTV-DVR-Card-Version-7-05_W0QQitemZ9737267402QQcategoryZ116224QQssPageNam eZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Also direct to the company http://www.geovision.com.tw/english/product/GV-System_Feature.htm

Thanks Jeff

[Frighteners Entertainment]

HJ, I agree. We're using about the same equipment on both ends.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

I've contacted GeoVision. I'll let you know when I hear back from them.

[ruafraid]

Jeff Thanks for looking into this.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

I have heard good things about the ARM Electronics cards.
I've installed their cameras, worked well.

[BuriedAlive]

I've been debating on using this for my haunt. The only drawback is that the least expensive system as of yet does not record audio. I contacted them awhile back and they said that will change in the near future, whatever that means.
http://www.cctvwholesalers.com/home.php

[Haunted Neurons]

I have a Sony camera with nightshot too. I shot some last Halloween and unless you are close up to the action the built in (I think its infrared, not sure) light doesnt give you much range. If you do go that route you probably need a infrared spotlight sold seperately. Also I think dark video doesnt look as good as well lighted areas when they are copressed so it takes more work to make it look nice.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

I've fpund that for the cost the sony cam does do agood job for the cost.
During editing turn your film to B/W. It will look much better.

[BobC]

Last Summer I was walking around a local Computer show and one of the vendors had All in one Wireless Home Security Camera systems put out by (Philips Magnavox) The kit includes everything you need to get started 1 camera, 1 Receiver, 2.4GHZ Transmitter, and Power Supply. I think this set up is perfect for watching and taping your Halloween display. It has LED Night Vision, Picture in picture Compatible, Has Multiple camera connections (up to 4 wireless cameras) It does not record in color it is Black and White and connects to TV, VCR or Both. and is totally (Weather Resistant). I paid $25.99 for this I think its a steal. I just need to buy the 3 seperate cameras and Ill have a haunt recording and security machine..lol You might be able to find this same system on the internet or if anyone is interested I can look for them at the next computer show for you. The Product # is (PM61750) and lists on the box as MulitiCAM ALL-IN-ONE wireless system. Let me know what you think and how you make out. Hope it helps. :jol:

[ruafraid]

Thanks for the idea BobC I have one of the wireless camera's but the model I have does not support more than 1 camera and it works ok but not very well in low light. One thing it does is kill the wireless Internet in my Home when its "on" even if I change the channels on it and the access point so that is one thing to consider if you use one of these. I have not tried with with a 54G Access Point yet.

[Frighteners Entertainment]

You might be limited to 25 ft with the cameras.
It will also make a difference on how much inference from any other 2.4 GHZ units you or your niehgbor are using (phone, X-10 units, fogger remotes, ect...)

Have you tried it out yet?

[Empress Nightshade]

I was hesitant to answer because I am no expert in this area, but I have owned a Sony MiniDV DCR-TRV19 camera for a few years and am very happy with it.
Ditto!
I bought one last season and it recorded my haunt footage just fine. You can see one of the haunt videos on my website.
I also bought a Homeland security camera from Wal*mart for recording scares. It looks and sounds VERY good. Even in a no light situation. My son took it in the closet and closed the door. I could see him perfectly including the lettering on his shirt. I am purchasing two more of these cameras. All three will be set where there are scares and one will be displayed for the que line to see the scare while waiting to enter. They come with a 60' cord and takes less than nothing to hook up to your TV, monitor or VCR.

[DeathTouch]

I have a sony with night vision but it doesn't give me the image that I want. Yes, I can see everything but it doesn't do it for me. I think the best way to do it is setup your shot a head of time and put some green or red lights or just soft white light on the side of your camera. out of the way but pointing at your target. This should light up the area but it won't be so bright that it looks like it is daylight out and I am going to turn off the cameras auto focus. Sometimes the camera has trouble in the dark and thinks it has to refocus when it really doesn't. Just focus your prop first and start film; then go to the next prop. You only get so many second per prop anyway right?

[Empress Nightshade]

Sometimes the camera has trouble in the dark and thinks it has to refocus when it really doesn't.
Yeah, it does, DT. That's really been the only problem I've had so far. I like to follow tours through the haunt to get their reactions and sometimes they take off when they're scared which means I have to quicken my pace also and it looses it's focus.

[DeathTouch]

I guess what meant is that the camera thinks the person is either further away or closer and changes the focus when it shouldn't. I turn auto focus off and it seems to do better.

[Empress Nightshade]

Aaaah. Auto Focus, hmmmm? I'll have to read up about that in my manual.

[landrvr1]

I too have the Sony TRV19, and it worked excellent last year. I'll post a video link later. That camera, and other Sony models, do surprisingly well in low light situations.

Here's a big tip for everyone thinking about video:

If your camera and PC are capable, ALWAYS use a Firewire connection when capturing your footage from the camera to the PC. A standard USB 2.0 fast connection won't cut it. I tried the USB connection, and the quality (especially at full screen playback with NO compression) was medium to poor. I then went out and purchased a Firewire connection. The difference was astounding! Crisp, clear image. The Firewire cable is faster and able to handle all that data much better. :)

[slightlymad]

Okay I dont know much about all this stuff but i do want to upgrade next year so lets keep this fresh and get some more feed back on digital recording direct to computer.
In the past were have set our little sharp camera on a tri pod and let it run with recording hooked directly to the VCR. Now what would be the best way to transfer this material to a hard drive for editing and burning.
Then what would be the best in anyones opinion system to upgrade to.
I tend to shy away from sony for night vision since they had that problem with seeing through clothing they have realy back off with its advancement.

[Vlad]

This morning we went out and bought a DVD recorder. We'll be hooking our night video surveillance cameras directly to the DVD recorder, and then hopefully transfer that into the PC, and use a movie editor to make some sort of watch-able video to submit to the Hauntforum.com DVD set. If anyone knows of any reason why this won't work, please say so now so I can make some sort of other last minute arrangements.

We also intend to take our digital camera and use it to record 20 second clips in color. Then I believe that we can splice some of that in with the B/W from the surveillance cameras footage.