Got a new Wyze Pan Cam today via amazon and been messing around with the settings. My primary use will be for indoor security. I do have a cat but I’m hoping to find a good spot that will keep her movement out of my view.
I turned off Motion Tracking and Motion Tagging because it seems to go haywire if I move by. It will follow me and then tag something else as moving even when it isnt and then go back to my moving body just to jump to a completely different inanimate object.
I have turned on Event recording for motion only and schedued it for all day.
Notifications are on for Person and all other motion.
Sensitivity is raised to 70 for both motion and sound (although i keep sound off)
And finally I have my local storage set to record events only (as playback doesnt have fast forward features and looking through 2 hours of footage at real time seems like a headache)
So my problem is when I move past my camera I expect to get an person/movement notification and a small clip of it in my events folder.
It seems like I only ever get that notification 1 out of 10 tries.
If i walk past the camera it sends me a notification, upon watching it only captures the last second of my body walking off screen. Then if I walk back across the room it doesnt send me any alerts nor event recordings. I have to walk back and forth several times for it to send me another alert.
Is there some sort of time interval for when it triggers or is my pan cam nonfunctional?
I have also updated to the newest firmware.
After every time it sees movement and records the 12-second video it goes into a 5-minute cool down where it will not notify of motion. You did say you have an SD card that will continue to record as long as it sees motion you will just not get a notification during the 5-minute cool down,
That 5-minute cool down is the main drawback and one of the reasons it is not intended for security. Although many use it for that, me included.
I was not aware of a cool down period. Is there a way to turn off the 5 minute cool down?
The 5 minute cool down is for the event video I assume? Is there a way to send myself a notification just anytime there is motion detected rather than having it set as an event?
And finally, will it immediately set off a event once the 5 minutes are up even if its one long continuous video? For example, someone walks in frame, alert goes off, starts dancing for 10 minutes, once 5 minutes are up it will trigger another alert even though there was no pause in motion?
There is not currently a way to turn off the 5 minute cool down, there is a wishlist item that you can vote for to address this though:
Within the camera the notification is currently tied to the event recording, there is a Wyze sensor pack however that has a great motion sensor that will notify you when motion begins, and when it is clear again:
it will set off an event once the 5 min cool down is done, even if it is one long motion… these clips however are limited to 12 sec (unless you have an sd card in the cam, then they will be 1 min clips until the motion is done, with no cool down period - recorded locally on the sd card…this does not change the 12 sec event clips in the cloud).
there is also a wishlist item that can be voted on for longer options than the 12 sec event cloud recording:
It’s unfortunate that there is no way to turn off the cool down or to get a simple motion sensor without having to purchase another device.
Your last response confuses me a bit. So I have an SD card inserted and you said with an SD card I am able to get a 1 minute clip rather than the normal 12 second clip. Are you refering to the event video?
So like say in my example someone triggers my camera and dances for 10 minutes straight, alert triggers, event video records a 1 minute video, and then will alert again after 5 minutes and records another 1 minute video?
The event video, accessed via the “events” tab at the bottom of the home screen, will show the 12 sec clips subject to the 5 min cool down - this is the trigger for the notification.
SD card video is a separate set of settings - from the home screen, click on the camera you want to access, once the live stream is up and running you can click on the “view playback” button at the bottom to view the video saved on the sd card. This can be setup to do event recording (which will not trigger an alert, but will record 1 min clips for as long as motion is detected with no cool down…or can be set to record continuously, no trigger needed.) To change these settings from the live stream screen click on the “gear” icon in the upper right, the click on “advanced settings”, then “local storage”
The main difference is where the video is stored, the “event” video is stored in the cloud on servers, while the sd card video is stored locally on the sd card. The limit of 12 sec and 5 min cool down is to not overcrowd their servers - there is talk about creating a subscription service to allow longer event video with shorter or no cool down, the link above is where you could go to cast your vote for this feature.
Ah I see, so the event video is always going to be 12 seconds whereas the SD record is on the playback function.
I do have mine setup as event record only rather than the continuous recording as I didnt want to sit through hours of footage.
This event playback can only be 1 minute though? What exactly do you mean by no cool down though?
If someone triggers my camera and it starts recording on my SD card, will it only show 1 minute videos or the entire 10 minutes of dancing?
As I understand it… Someone walks in frame, my event records a 12 second video and alerts me. Simultaneously it starts recording on my SD event playback. Once 5 minutes are up my event alert will re-trigger but my playback will show just 1 long 10 minute playback, correct?
It will record the entire 10 minutes of dancing. Then if they leave the room to get a drink of water (because they have been dancing so much ) it will stop recording… if they come back after only 3 min the sd card will start recording again, because there is no “cool down” period that makes it wait for 5 min.
) it will stop recording… if they come back after only 3 min the sd card will start recording again, because there is no “cool down” period that makes it wait for 5 min.