Video Record lengths

Forum for questions and support relating to the 1.34.x releases only.
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Smack2k
Posts: 8
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2019 1:33 pm

Video Record lengths

Post by Smack2k »

Not sure if this is caused by Zoneminder or by settings on my cameras....

All the videos that get recorded are from 9-11 seconds or less. I was outside in my back yard yesterday doing some things and there 100's of 9-10 second videos of my back there. When one stops, the next one starts up about a second earlier and goes for another 9-11 seconds before stopping for the next one.

Is there a config issue I am missing? Would like it to record longer segments if possible of a single action. I would assume the videos need to be broken up at some point if there is a recording going on for an hour or more, but I'd hope segments would be more than 9-10 seconds.

Maybe its something obvious I am missing?

My section length is set to 450 seconds and MinSectionLength is set to 10 seconds..

Thanks for any assistance.
dave_88
Posts: 34
Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2019 6:15 pm
Location: Northamptonshire, England UK

Re: Video Record lengths

Post by dave_88 »

What is your event_close_mode under options->config?

From the ZM Help...
ZM_EVENT_CLOSE_MODE

When a monitor is running in a continuous recording mode (Record or Mocord) events are usually closed after a fixed period of time (the section length). However in Mocord mode it is possible that motion detection may occur near the end of a section. This option controls what happens when an alarm occurs in Mocord mode.

The 'time' setting means that the event will be closed at the end of the section regardless of alarm activity.

The 'idle' setting means that the event will be closed at the end of the section if there is no alarm activity occurring at the time otherwise it will be closed once the alarm is over meaning the event may end up being longer than the normal section length.

The 'alarm' setting means that if an alarm occurs during the event, the event will be closed and a new one will be opened. So events will only be alarmed or continuous. This has the effect of limiting the number of alarms to one per event and the events may be shorter than the section length if an alarm has occurred.
Maybe you have it set to alarm, in which case if you are using mocord, it will be generating a new event each time it detects motion. I actually have mine set up like this, I increased the Post Event Image Count under the buffers tab for the individual camera settings to increase the length of the alarmed events. If you only want fixed section lengths, I believe this should be set to 'time' or 'idle' depending on if you want to end events in the middle of an alarm or not.
Smack2k
Posts: 8
Joined: Sat Oct 12, 2019 1:33 pm

Re: Video Record lengths

Post by Smack2k »

Thanks for the info, will look into that.
retirementhome
Posts: 11
Joined: Wed Aug 26, 2020 6:34 pm

Re: Video Record lengths

Post by retirementhome »

Smack2k wrote: Sat Sep 12, 2020 12:59 pm Thanks for the info, will look into that.
Did you find a fix for this? I am experiencing the exact same thing. All of my events are 9-12 seconds long. I would like to know how to adjust them to longer recording times if possible.
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burger
Posts: 390
Joined: Mon May 11, 2020 4:32 pm

Re: Video Record lengths

Post by burger »

If the CPU is maxed out, it's possible to get recordings of short lengths (e.g. w/RPI, and or high res/FPS cameras) as zm can't keep up.

In that case, it's managed by lowering FPS / res.
fastest way to test streams:
ffmpeg -i rtsp://<user>:<pass>@<ipaddress>:554/path ./output.mp4 (if terminal only)
ffplay rtsp://<user>:<pass>@<ipaddress>:554/path (gui)
find paths on ispydb or in zm hcl

If you are new to security software, read:
https://wiki.zoneminder.com/Dummies_Guide
retirementhome
Posts: 11
Joined: Wed Aug 26, 2020 6:34 pm

Re: Video Record lengths

Post by retirementhome »

burger wrote: Wed Nov 11, 2020 4:26 pm If the CPU is maxed out, it's possible to get recordings of short lengths (e.g. w/RPI, and or high res/FPS cameras) as zm can't keep up.

In that case, it's managed by lowering FPS / res.
What is the next thing to look at after CPU usage?

Code: Select all

Tasks: 398 total,  14 running, 384 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
%Cpu(s): 42.8 us,  1.2 sy,  0.0 ni, 55.8 id,  0.0 wa,  0.0 hi,  0.2 si,  0.0 st
MiB Mem : 386940.7 total,   1607.4 free,   3272.1 used, 382061.2 buff/cache
MiB Swap: 393180.0 total, 393069.5 free,    110.5 used. 374370.7 avail Mem
This was happening as I was doing some updates.
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