P.I.G.S. Spotlight -Infrared Camcorders, CCTV
Camcorders, Infrared & CCTV
Camcorders / Cameras (CCTV)
I’ve seen many different types of camcorders used in different ways on investigations. The most important part of using a camcorder effectively is that it has the ability to shoot footage in the dark. A lot of camcorders have a function the manufacturers call ‘night shot’, however there are a few different techniques the manufacturers use to achieve this. Only one in my view is truly suitable.
The first is ‘Night Shot’ achieved by slowing the camcorder’s shutter speed down. This works by making the picture brighter by letting in more light to the camera. Unfortunately, the actual footage will be blurred if anything moves in the shot. This makes it almost useless as a hand held device and unsuitable as a static cam waiting to capture paranormal activity.
The second is ‘Night Shot’ achieved with a lamp at the front of the camcorder. This has a small light on the front and has the same effect as having a torch on during filming. Apart from people being almost blinded, it’s pretty ineffective as a hand held cam as the range is very short, and as a static cam, you might as well just turn the lights on.
The third ‘Night Shot’ is the most effective at night vision - infrared. The way this works is the camcorder in ‘Night Shot’ turns off the infrared light filter and turns on an infrared LED or bulb at the front of the camcorder. Infrared is a light source invisible to the human eye. The camcorder however can see this light frequency. Because of its different light frequency allows the camcorder to see through darkness, unlike our eyes.
Sony are currently the only manufacture that fits its camcorders with infrared night vision. Most Sony models also have a button to slow the shutter speed as well as the infrared. However you will still suffer from blurry images with a slower shutter speed so my advice would be not to use this button and just use the night shot on its own.
CCTV cameras
There are some great cameras on the market intended for CCTV. These are ideal for monitoring locations. You can pick them up for around £40 each, Most of them have infrared capabilities, and the more expensive ones will typically have a longer infrared range and longer viewing distance.
These types of camera usually come in either wired or wireless varieties. Wireless cams are very easy to use and quick to set up. However, they can easily suffer from interference from other electrical devices and have a limited range. Wired cams obviously have more set up involved (placing of cables etc), but are less prone to interference and the only limitation on their range is the length of cable available to you.
Lights
Once you have chosen your preferred type of camera, you may want to consider infrared lighting in other areas. This will help to improve the range that the night shot cameras can ‘see’ to, and help the camera with auto focusing. An ideal way to do this is an infrared floodlight. These can often be found on ebay at around £30 each
One thing to be aware of using infrared lighting for a camera it’s a bit like shining a torch in the dark, it will only give a fairly narrow field of view and wont light up the whole room, you might want to try deflecting some of the illumination with a mirror to cast infrared across the room.
Also be careful to place these where people can’t walk in front of them, the result on your cameras will look like a distinct black shadow of a person - whilst looking impressive it won’t be the ghost you are looking for!
Recording
If you would like to be able to view your footage, edit it to the best bits, or even monitor it during the investigation, there are a few pieces of software / hardware available. In our experience, the Rapid OS Mobile Surveillance is on of the best way to do it.
The Rapid OS USB2 RM1060s costs just under £80
This unit comes with its own PC software and BNC connectors for up to four wired cams / wireless receivers with an AV output. Installation is as easy as plugging the unit into the USB socket of your PC / laptop, attaching your cameras and installing the software. You can then view and record all four cameras on a split screen, or just record from one camera. Other features include motion triggered recording with text or email alerts, capturing still images and the ability to remotely view the video feeds. All video footage for each feed is saved as an AVI file. It is important to remember that video files require a large amount of memory. Therefore it is worth investing in an external hard drive. These cost around £50 for 500 gigabytes, this should be ample for a nights investigation.
