1 - Will be purchasing 3 IP cameras for outdoor. I have PoE ready, so this would be ideal. Would love to know what you’re using in HASS.
2 - I would love a hardware or software-only NVR. If I do this, I will have recorded video, but I also need to view the cameras live from HASS. Any recommendations?
-Josh
I edited your title slightly for clarity.
I’m using Foscams and VStarcams with HASS and am quite happy with them. The VStars will do PoE but I’m not using them that way.
You may want to look into iSpy for s/w DVR - one of the users posted this in the Share Your Projects section that may be of interest.
It looks like iSpy is only for Windows – so that’s not an option for me unfortunately.
Of your foscams and vstars, are there any specific models you can recommend? Some models will get stellar reviews, while others get poor reviews. I’m looking for a relatively wide field of view that can go on the side of my house – I presumed a dome style would be better than a bullet style but I could be wrong about that.
I think hardware NVR would be the best option. Redundancy in your camera options always important.
You can integrate camera to Home Assistant without NVR any way. See below the review I wrote on the subject.
I use BlueIris. Clients are available for ios and android, works with a browser and cams are visible on HA using mjpeg camera.
My cams are Reolink and GW security IP 5mp, available on Amazon.
Old thread I know but any updates? I use motion detection on the NVR to automate light via cURL commands (MQTT would work too). Currently Im using MotionEye but its not every reliable. Ive asked for prices on NX Witness but the agents are just not getting back to me.
What else would be decent? Blue Iris support cURL on motion detection?
Just an small update. Ended up demoing NX Witness. Its mind blowingly good. Got the prices in the end but its well worth it.
could you provide some idea what the prices are?
Thanks
Just in case anyone else finds this topic - I’ve also tried zoneminder, motioneye, shinobi, kerberos, blueiris (docker + wine 
) and tried out NX Witness after finding this thread. The NX Witness support was pretty quick in getting back to me with this response:
Our partner Digital Watchdog sells and supports Network Optix’ IPVMS platform under the brand name DW Spectrum. You can get pricing and purchase licenses from the following online resellers:
Please note that DW Spectrum licenses do NOT work with Nx Witness. You will need to install DW Spectrum prior to activating the licenses that you purchase.
Looking at those links, seems like the per-camera license is ~$65-$80 depending on the day.
I’m still figuring out some more details from DW right now (how licenses work, api’s available, etc), but for the most part this looks like a really robust ideal software to run on a linux system with tons of support behind it. Granted i’m about 3 days into my 30 day trial, but i’m cautiously optimistic 
.
My biggest gripe is that their movement detection kinda sucks. (Probably not what they want to focus on) There are third party plugins, but as this is mostly geared towards businesses they’re kind of expensive. However, it is nice that you can select an area on the image and it will filter the movement to that. I’m recording 24/7 so it just adds a lot of flags and then I select for the area I want to look at. The quick review/time lapse feature is quite awesome.
If someone has a good solution for the movement/object detection I’d probably be willing to try it.
That and I just reinstalled Linux on my server (having some issues with the OS because I’m an idiot and don’t do my playing around in virtual os) and the licenses aren’t transferring to the new install so I need to contact support. 
I’ve only had it up for a couple of days, but after tweaking the sensitivity and areas monitored, I’ve found the number flags to be a little better. But during a foggy night, i ended up with probably 30-60 mins of motion flags.
I haven’t done any development against HA specifically, but I’m debating taking the time to make an integration. It would have to be something like…
I’ve already got motion detection and snapshot sending with my foscams as-is, so not sure I need to go down this whole route, but the motion detection on NX/DW seems much more reliable than my foscam sending a photo via FTP.
Hi I’m also thinking about buying an Nx Witness VMS. It really looks super fast in use.
I see it has an open API available. Did you succeed in making an integration within HA?
It would be great to have analytics events from NX pushed over to HA.
I’ve found NX Witness (Though for me it’s Digital Watchdog as the reseller in the U.S.) to be the best solution for a server/remote experience. They provide a good server on linux and then I can use my other machines; Android Mobile App (though weirdly not a tablet or android TV?!?) and a Windows 10 desktop for evaluation. I’ve had another app that did a 10000% better job at detection, but they didn’t do remote viewing and needed a windows computer always running. The other website based ones (at least open source ones) I’ve found to be clunky and slow. I can shoot through video like no business and they release major updates included in your license. Good tech support and software all around.
Oh, I also like that the mobile app has the ability to choose speed vs quality. So, when I’m not on the best network (or in my case upload speed sucks at home) it can give you good general video replay and if you need quality to look at something in particular you can.
I’ve always thought about working on the integration and part of me was hoping they would do it to increase sales. 
I won’t lie; I’m incredibly lazy and just good enough to make it work, but it might not be the best. You can do the RTSP integration of the video streams, but perhaps if enough people that use maybe we can get the right person to work on it? With some support (and a bit more time later this year?) maybe I start work on it again?
Well that would be great 
You have my vote 