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What our experts say

The camera's key features are a fisheye lens, three-megapixel image sensor and ground breaking IMTERA digital processing, which generates two independent video outputs and turns the panoramic 360-degree image from the lens into four 'virtual' camera views that look and behave as if they were coming from separate PTZ cameras.

It's a remarkable piece of equipment, but now the designers have taken it one stage further, with a new version of the camera, teamed up with a dedicated hard disk-based digital video recorder. The DVR module captures the whole panoramic video output from the camera's 'high definition' video output port. When a recording is played back it is processed and displayed in exactly the same way as the live image, with the same twin video outputs and up to four 'electronic' PTZ camera views.

The DVR integrates seamlessly with the Vista camera's alarm and video motion detection and tracking systems, with the option to make event-triggered (with pre and post-alarm recording), scheduled or continuous recordings. The recorder uses a proprietary compression system and depending on frame rate and image quality setting the 400Gb hard drive can capture several months worth of scheduled recordings or run for over a week in continuous mode before unprotected recordings are overwritten.

The key component in the system is the DVR so we need not spend too much time on the Eclipse camera – for a full description refer to the review in the May 2005 issue of Security Installer – however, there have been a few changes, which are worth noting.

From the outside the only obvious difference is the previously mentioned high definition video output socket on the topside, next to the power, video and telemetry connections. This connects to the DVR using a dedicated RJ45 cable. It's important to use the correct cable for as we discovered (and wasted some considerable time trying to troubleshoot...) a normal 'straight' LAN patch cable does not work.

Otherwise the camera looks and behaves just like its predecessor, though clearly there have been some major revisions to the firmware for the new features, and these appear in a separate section of the on-screen menu.

The DVR is built into a small module, roughly the size of a house brick, with thick cooling fins on both sides. The fins, like the ones on the top of the Vista Eclipse camera, are not just for show as neither unit has any internal fans and rely entirely on circulating air for cooling. This also means that like the camera the DVR runs quite warm, almost hot to the touch, but it is virtually silent. The case is made from two cast alloy 'shells', separated by a rubber gasket that provides the internals with protection from the elements and sound insulation for the drive. A small base support is supplied so it stands upright and allows cooling air to circulate freely.

Inside the case there is a single PCB that handles data processing and power supply and a standard hard disk drive. The drive unit has only three connections to the outside world in the shape of two RJ45 sockets (one for the camera, the other for a network connection) and a plug for a 24v AC mains adaptor.

Setup and operation

Our test sample was paired with a Vista NPX/KBD/J3DE keyboard. It's an old 'friend' and we've commented in the past on this device, which can be quite hard going at times due to its idiosyncratic design and layout. Nevertheless, installation is almost effortless, and once the DVR has been connected to the camera and powered up it's ready to use.

The first step is to configure the recording options from the Eclipse camera's on-screen menu, and as before it is necessary to wade through the annoying PIN code logon. This is one of the things we really dislike about the setup. It requires the user to hold down an ambiguously labelled button for several seconds then enter a four digit code by waggling the joystick to pick numbers; the logon pops up with monotonous regularity, even for something as routine as switching to playback mode.

Once the main menu appears selections are made using a combination of joystick movement and button pressing, none of which is very intuitive and until you get used to it navigating the menu can be a frustrating business.

The Recorder menu has four options: Display Mode, Continuous Setup, Event-Based Setup and Advanced. The Display Mode sub-menu simply toggles between Live and Playback display, though this is largely superfluous since there's also a button on the control unit that does precisely the same thing.

Selecting Continuous Setup displays a sub-menu with four choices: Continuous Recording (On/Off), Recording Rate (1, 2 or 4 frames per second), Quality (1-10), Preview (calculates recording time according to frame rate, quality and compression settings) and Set Schedule (to enable and configure schedule recording times).

Event Based Setup leads to a sub-menu for setting the camera alarm options, adjusting pre and post alarm recording times, alarm recording frame rate and quality, plus another Schedule Screen for setting event-based recording times.

Vista's Eclipse DVR is a sophisticated and highly versatile surveillance and recording system...

Finally the Advanced menu. This contains a number of housekeeping functions, for enabling or disabling the recorder, setting DVR display status, Disk Operations (check disk, repair database, format disk, reboot and shutdown recorder and delete all recordings).

There is also a switch for selecting compression mode (optimised for quality or image size and noise filter on/off) and Network Settings, which covers the IP address and submask configuration for unspecified network connectivity functions. Last but not least a display screen shows the software Version number and CPU information.

The DVR operates in triplex mode for simultaneous live view, recording and playback. Pressing a button on the control unit (or wading through the menu to the Recorder section) switches between Live view and Playback, and once in the latter mode a taskbar appears at the bottom of the screen. This is split into three sections, selected by moving the joystick up and down. The top section contains a pair of selection buttons for Event or manual selection, recording protect and VCR style transport controls.

The centre part of the taskbar is a timeline display and this has a very useful facility that expands or contracts the scale so that the divisions switch between minutes, hours days, weeks or months by twisting the zoom control on top of the joystick.

Navigating the timeline by moving the joystick to the left or right is also very simple and recordings and alarm events are clearly colour coded. A set of time and date displays on the lower part of the taskbar can be used to quickly locate a particular part of a recording.

Performance

Labelling the camera and DVR's video connections 'high definition' is a tad misleading since by any reckoning both live and playback quality are fairly ordinary by current standards.

As we commented in the initial review of the Vista Eclipse the image from the fisheye undergoes a significant amount of processing, and whilst picture quality is surprisingly good it is nonetheless below that of a conventional CCTV camera. The DVR degrades the image a little further and even at the highest quality settings there is a small but noticeable drop in resolution and highly saturated colours loose a little vibrancy.

However, it's important to see this in context; recording quality is not as good as current mid-range and top of the line DVRs but it still looks a lot better than most analogue tape-based recording systems.

What the manufacturer says ...

The Vista Eclipse DVR records the entire 360 degree 3 megapixel sensor image so, when played back via a Vista Eclipse, the recording contains all the information from the original scene. This makes it possible to ePTZ (electronic pan/tilt zoom) as if viewing images live, all while the Vista Eclipse continues recording.

By using retrospective ePTZ the whole recording can be examined in detail ensuring that critical information is not overlooked. A particular event can be reviewed time and time again using different views and screen formats to make certain that the event has been witnessed in its entirety.

The Eclipse DVR is unique in that it doesn't need an external PC to run the de-warping software and so can be integrated with a standard CCTV control system. Operation of the Eclipse DVR has been designed to be intuitive to minimise any training requirements. For example, searching by events or data/time is achieved, accurately and efficiently via a zooming, scaling timeline.

Additionally, the activity detection feature can be used to automatically search recordings for specific events such as object removal, or video motion detection.

Further features include immediate watermarking to prevent any future tampering of the image and configurable recording modes that can be adjusted to meet your exact requirements.

The VCR style interface provides operators with familiar controls, enabling fast natural operation without any training requirement.