I know this topic has been mentioned before. I use the wyze cam pan v3 to monitor my tree frogs eating habits at night. The camera is placed on a wooden platform outside the glass. Every morning I have a few motion events but more and more are just the typical “ghost orbs” floating around the IR camera.
I have very little fruit flies or other flying insects because my frogs each crickets and I use FF traps. Of course there is moisture in the air because they need it to live.
What can I do/settings can I change to help minimize this phenomenon and focus more on the actual frogs? Pics below:
Thanks in advance!
Welcome @boujidupree1990
Looks like you are using the Pan Cam v3. I believe what you are seeing is the reflection from the IR Lights or something similar.
you can try turning off the IR Lights in the Advanced Settings area. Basically turn off Night Vision Mode. then if you leave an ambient light source in the room, your camera will take in that light and provide a decent picture.
I think that’s part of it, and that’s certainly not helpful to the view because of the glare that it’s producing, but those IR reflections off the glass are static, and I don’t believe they’re triggering the motion events. What I see as the “orbs” are moving particles, like dust in the air or something—at least that’s my suspicion here.
I totally agree with setting Night Vision Mode to Off and providing another source of illumination, as this would accomplish at least two things:
- Eliminate the IR glare off the glass and back into the camera.
- Provide images in color as long as there’s plenty of ambient light for the starlight sensor. This could be something as simple as a 4 W (or equivalent) night light, which is what I’ve used overnight in rooms with Cam Pan v3s, and I’ve been pleased with the results.
If you don’t want the frogs to have visible light at night (I don’t know what’s ideal for them or if they should have a certain number of hours of darkness) but still want to have night vision images from your camera, then I’d still consider toggling Night Vision IR Lights OFF with Night Vision Mode set to Auto and then try to provide a separate source of IR illumination from above the vivarium. This could even be something like mounting an inexpensive (especially if you can catch one on sale) Cam OG nearby and set it up to use its IR lights.
If it’s dust or something else floating around between the Cam Pan v3 and the glass, then I’d also wonder about using an air purifier and/or regularly changing your home’s HVAC filters and just generally keeping things clean in order to minimize what you’re seeing. Please note that I’m not saying that this environment looks unclean at all! I think the picture and videos you provided are very helpful in allowing us to understand the situation. Thank you for posting those!
Welcome to the Forum, @boujidupree1990! 
