Hi,
Recommend me some better diy cam for HA using Esphome than Esp32-cam, It should have better clarity and more resolution…
Same issue and got a recommendation to acquire better lens(es) which are on their way now …well, the SHOULD be better QED
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There is only one camera component for esphome.
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The M5Stack cameras seem to have better image quality that the generic ESP32-cams.
I have a couple of TimerCams from M5 and they give a much better picture at a given resolution than the TTGO camera. Maybe it’s a slightly better image sensor. Both work with ESPHome.
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Thanks… What are timer cams?
They have a built in battery and a programmable RTC. Unfortunately the RTC isn’t supported by ESPHome, but you can buy the camera module separately without battery or case.
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Okey 
… Okey
Would you care to share your configuration here? I’m curious as to what that entails and I’m about to embark on this journey!
The config is in the esp32 camera docs.
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i recommend ov5640 over ov2640 - for example [seeed_esp32s3_sense] chip (Mini ESP-CAM Dev Board for Edge AI - XIAO ESP32S3 Sense) allows swapping them, got a few in my aliexpress cart…
Regarding software:
is fun:
depending on your HW, you might find pre-made solutions:
use the raw original:
find what you desire
or roll your own (shameless self-promotion, no hate pls)
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I would just suggest people use real cameras for wherever they need that good quality, good resolution, IR and night vision, etc. The esp32-Cam is just for playing around and for prototyping or education purposes if that wasnt somehow abundantly obvios the first time you ever saw one and saw it’s low price. Surely people werent hoping to replace their Ring cameras with the 3$ esp32-cam and were disappointed when you realized how bad of an idea it was because it lacks quantity pics/video.
In my experience, if you use some brain power and a little creativity, you can usually seperate the esp32 and a good camera into individual devices and then combine them via HA or Esphome so that you get sll the functionality you originally wanted except now you dont have to settle with crappy image/video quality or the very common overheating issues that come with esp32-cam.
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so what cameras do you suggest?
Whichever camera meets your individual needs and has the features you want in a camera… Every device has a published spec sheet or documentation that has all the information necessary for someone to make a decision based on that data.
Ill give you an example. A lot of people are happy to get screwed over by paying for a Ring doorbell camera or other similar ones just to get basic functionality like video recording and storing that data for later access.
That’s absolutely dumb IMO and nowadays they are so easy to spot on houses, criminals and porch pirates are just avoiding the camera seeing them or just covering their faces to avoid being recorded by the plainly visible doorbell camera which kind of defeats the point of having it IMO.
The only reason so many people use them is that they do exactly what you just did. They dont feel like doing any due diligence by just doing the bare minimum research on a group of devices or even try doing some basic Google seaches before buying one and instead they play “follow the leader” and just buy things because they heard about it from a friend or some internet stranger recommend it to them…
I decided not to advertise to the world that i have a camera recording any of my doors so that they can try defeating it or succeed in defeating it and instead i mount the cameras up high where they can see people at the door and aren’t easily detectable by potential criminals or thieves so that i can actually get their faces on camera.
So, whenever someone gets within range of my DIY smart doorbell, the camera records and if they ring the doorbell, the same camera takes a snapshot and sends me the image. I get all the functionality of a Ring doorbell camera without paying any subscription fees or paying for storing my data on a third party server over the internet and mine cant be made useless by someone putting a facemask before walking up to the door to steal an Amazon package.
Things like this are actually common sense and essy to come up with if you dont just settle on doing whats easy and relying on others to do critical thinking for you or create your shopping list for devices to use in your home.
LOL, while many of them are probably legally defensible, some of them are fairly fictional.
Since you were poo-pooing the choice of esp32 cam, I thought you might have some insight on at least some that are really good (for at least some dimension) and reasonably priced. There are many cameras advertised and only some of them are good enough to warrant their price.
Thats never been my experience, not once. Now if your talking about a third party datasheet like the shortened, down and dirty ones like on their Amazon or Aliexpress page then, ya you cant take those at their word 100% but, IMO the people that even bother reading those, they already know that, its not a secret.
Hold up! I wasnt “poo pooing!” so take it back! The poo poo is on my shoes dangit! It probably came from your dogs leaving land mines all over the yard too so, ill be expecting an apology or you can forget about receiving a Christmas card from me next year!
Well. Like i said already, they’re all different and ones i like that meed my needs, they not meet your needs and you dont like them like i do. This is why its important that people do their own due diligence and pick out devices that have the functionality they want, the size they want, the price range they want, etc.
Personally, ive had my cameras dor probably 3 years now and im not really up to date on whats available on the market but, the ones I use are the Wyze V3 cameras that ive flashed with their beta firmware that adds RTSP support and thats how i link my cameras to HA, through RTSP. They offer a subscription service but, if you want to use your own MicroSD cards then you can save pictures and video without paying. Its also waterproof, has IR led’s and night vision, as well as 2-way audio and some other minor features but, they have the main functionality most cameras do. They just dont force people to store their data of company servers/cloud and instead I manage it myself.
The few things that they lack is the capability to use is wired connections and POE which some people consider a must-have features and they wouldn’t choose these cameras which goes back to my point about doing due diligence.
Yeah, you might want to review why many publications have put Wyze on the “naughty” list. I liked them when they first came out, but it seems they do take a lot of short cuts.
It is possible to mitigate some of the issues with good network segmentation, but it might be better to just assume everyone has access to your video, so don’t do anything you don’t want everyone seeing.
It is definitely important to do your own research, but many people come here because they have been unable to do that on their own and need some help.
Ya, its mainly about their cloud services and it getting hacked over a year ago. Like i said above, you have the choice whether you use their cloud service to store data and I i do not use it, i use my own local storage. It also has more to do with their newer cameras and last i checked they dont play nicely with HA integrations etc. I was only recommending the Wyze V2 and Wyze V3. Those are the only ones you can use the beta firmware to my knowledge.
At the end of the day i keep going back to my original point. You just gotta do your own due diligence and find the one that checks all your boxes. What i use or someone else may not be the camera for you.