Page 54 - Security Today, October 2019

an avid crime show watcher may have for their video surveillance system can be unrealistic. This “CSI effect” means that integra- tors should set expectations early on and focus on educating the user what the system can do instead of cannot do.
How Analytics Improve
Return on Investment
Given the innovative abilities of today’s surveillance systems, us- ers should be looking beyond simply getting a clear picture. They should be striving for a system that arms them with intelligence during the process of capturing video. This means not only in- stalling devices with analytical abilities but learning how to use those functions as well.
A simple sales pitch is that video analytics improve the ability of a surveillance system to detect specific events in real time, and permit the user to easily search footage upon playback. Utilizing video analytics has an array of benefits: making the system op- erate more efficiently, reducing manpower requirements, provid- ing business intelligence (such as improving customer service or better understanding staffing requirements), hastening forensic analysis and enhancing detection accuracy.
All of these attributes add up to increased ROI for the user, who can get more out of their security system and share the se- curity budget across multiple areas of the business. This is an incredibly significant selling point to someone who is investing thousands or even millions of dollars into video surveillance.
Analytics at the Edge
Thanks to the hardware improvements and more accurate algo- rithms mentioned earlier, many highly-effective video analytics are available at even the lowest price points. Among the analytics that are most widely available are camera-based analytics, also called edge analytics. These are particularly well-suited to chal- lenging locations or budgets because they require lower band- width and fewer servers. In addition, they are easily implemented in real time. The line crossing / tripwire function is one of the most commonly deployed edge analytics.
Expanding upon line crossing is perimeter protection, where analytics support detection of invasion in a defined area. Well- suited for industrial parks, school campuses, factories and ware- houses; perimeter protection employs algorithms that differenti- ate humans and vehicles. For example, enabling an object filter and selecting “human” will tell the system to send an alert when humans are detected and ignore vehicles and animals. Another filter could detect if vehicles are entering pedestrian areas and vice versa.
Today’s perimeter protection solutions have achieved better accuracy than previous versions, where frequent false alarms were caused by environmental conditions or wild/stray animals.
People counting is another easy-to-use edge analytic. The operational capabilities of people counting give users valuable data to run businesses, such as discerning how many people are gathering in a given area and even keeping track of how much time they have been standing there. By setting rules to trigger an alarm if, say, three or more people stand in line at the grocery store for more than three minutes, store managers can be instant- ly alerted when they need to send more staff to the cash registers and reduce wait times. Using people counting at the entrance to a
“Video analytics are truly chang-
ing the way we use security. They
turn our security cameras into data
collectors that help businesses run
more smoothly.”
nightclub or bar lets security staff know when the establishment is approaching the capacity defined by fire code.
Search and Review
Metadata – a set of data that describes and gives information about other data – collected through video analytics helps cat- egorize and organize footage so that it is easier to search. When there is no known event to search for, surveillance systems pro- duce a seemingly endless amount of camera footage and histori- cal data that is not viewed at all. Now, video analytics allow for certain attributes to get tagged to the footage before it gets stored on the recorder. For example, face capture functionality can also store facial attribute metadata – such as gender, age, expression and whether the person is wearing glasses and/or has facial hair – along with a snapshot of the face. Once such metadata is intro- duced, smart search is possible.
Smart search opens a world of possibilities in locating very specific footage. Operators can find, say, vehicles detected in a tripwire area on a certain evening, or use the facial attributes function to display all clean-shaven people with glasses who passed through a particular train station in the past week. This will yield a thumbnail gallery you can examine in minutes rather than hours. Shortcuts like these let users efficiently review the data they have and glean deeper information from it.
Video analytics have given rise to an exciting advancement in playback: a time-compressed view where moving objects are tagged with the time of day, such as BriefCam’s VIDEO SYN- OPSIS and RapidRecap from Lorex. A report of a thirty-minute sequence, for example, generates a video synopsis that is only 53 seconds long because the view simultaneously displays events that have occurred at different times. People and vehicles that move in and out of the field of view are superimposed on a stationary background along with a time stamp “affixed” to them. It’s a fas- cinating glimpse into the future conveniences video analytics may have yet to offer.
It is Up to Us
Video analytics are truly changing the way we use security. They turn our security cameras into data collectors that help businesses run more smoothly. They save time by only giving us the infor- mation we need, whether we need to know about it as soon as it occurs, or after the moment has passed.
Now that analytics are less likely to produce false alarms and are more widely available in budget-friendly products, a growing number of end users can benefit from them. It
is up to us, the manufacturers and installers,
to clear up misconceptions and show the true
value that analytics can provide.
Jennifer Hackenburg is the senior product mar- keting manager at Dahua.
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