Security DVRs vs. Time Lapse VCRs
Shreveport, Louisiana Police are urging business to upgrade from time lapse VCRs to surveillance DVR technology for the same reasons you may've tossed the VCR, with all those videotapes at home: better quality, easy to use, less time consuming.
When it comes to security video, there's the good, the bad, and the ugly. Many a tape has been deemed useless when the face of an armed robber is masked by the crinkles of the store's old, worn out videotape. Approximately only 25% of the surveillance tapes received by police authorities are useful.
Another common mistake made by shop owners is they place the surveillance video cameras too high or far away to make out the burglar's facial features for identification.
But better quality surveillance video can help catch crooks. In April, a store in Castor, Louisiana released video of a thief who stole from their cash drawer. After KTBS 3 TV News showed the quality surveillance video of the suspect, tips came into investigators, and the man was arrested the next day in Shreveport.
"The police need proof of what happened," says Kevin Townsend of Homeland Safety Systems, a company that offers array of high-resolution cameras for security systems. Some are tamper proof, weather proof, shoot a wide angle, or provide a long zoom. But the key, Townsend says, is linking those cameras to a secure DVR. Most DVRs are motion sensitive, and record only when is sensed. That means with a few clicks of a mouse, the user can go straight to the video he needs. And he can quickly make a copy.
"I can put a DVD in, CD, flash drive, whatever, and immediately archive that and write that to those discs. And if the policeman was standing right here, I could just hand it to him right here. And we're done," Townsend says.
Jason Roberts, restaurant owner, put DVR security systems in the Subway restaurants he owns. At one location off Airline Drive in Bossier City, four cameras monitor various locations: his product storage, a hall entrance, the customer line and food preparation, and, of course, the cash register.
"We have caught several past employees stealing from the register, right here," Roberts says, pointing to a monitor with the camera shot.
