Where the Cameras Are Now – and What Is Coming Next

Now that Birds And Visitors is running again, this is a good moment to show how everything is set up right now, and what I am planning to add to keep it interesting.

Where the cameras are right now

At the tree there are two cameras. One is pointed at the feeding place on the ground. The other hangs about 1.5 metres high and is pointed at the standing feeder pole.

Then there is one nest box with a camera inside. It is a big 4K Reolink camera. Does it bother the birds? Not as far as I can tell: they fly in and out all the time.

At the back hangs the top-view camera, which looks out over the whole garden. I have also put up a real sky cam: another Reolink 4K camera, pointed straight at the sky.

And now and then I stream live from a small nest box, using a small Wi-Fi camera.

How the Reolink cameras hold up

The cameras at the tree and the one in the nest box are all the same Reolink 4K PoE model. They are reasonably good cameras. Here and there I have had trouble with lenses fogging up, but overall I am happy with them.

Why I am not using the Blink cameras

I still have a lot of Blink cameras. I cannot use them for the live stream, because they have no RTSP, the video feed that streaming software needs. They also run on lithium batteries, and those are expensive: roughly 10 euros for four. They are nice for quickly making a short recording, though.

How the picture gets to YouTube

The live stream runs through OBS on a separate mini PC that does nothing else: a GEEKOM A8 with an AMD Ryzen 7 processor.

What I do differently now

Looking back, I did a lot to make my picture more interesting. I have stopped doing that. I look at the animals first again, and that is how I will keep doing it from now on. We will see whether people like it or not.

Coming up: a weather station

The next step starts tomorrow: I want to connect my weather station. It will hang next to or above the shed.

The plan is to show all seven of its functions on the stream: temperature, rain, wind, sunshine and more. How exactly still has to be worked out.

So there are plenty of plans. All the equipment, with links, is on the Equipment page.