Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters New Target Camera

After Chemo, my eyes went wonky. My prescription changed dramatically, especially my nearsightedness. I was told it was going to fluctuate, and be patient. After a year, I had a change of glasses, That was last fall. I see better, but. . .

About the only thing that it really affects is when I'm shooting. My spotting scope just isn't cutting it like it used to. I found that out trying to squint my way through a session of .223 REM at 100 yards-- the reduced game loads thing. I thought about buying a scope, but what I wanted was one of those fancy target cameras. Then it hit me: I've messed with a bajillion security cameras. Why not make my own.



What I have is an Amcrest 2MP camera mounted on a cheap tripod. The white ovoid thingy is a wireless point to point bridge. It talks to its mate back at the cabin. It's rated to 1 KM, but so far I've only tested the connection to 500 yards. The other piece in the range bag is a 12 Volt sealed lead acid battery and a 12-120V inverter. I ran the whole thing for over 4 hours during testing yesterday, and it was still going strong when I shut it down.

I'll be doing a write-up on my weblog soon if y'all want details. The camera cost $50. The battery $20. The bridge was $40. I have this tied into the cabin's home security system, but it could just as easily be stand-alone with batteries at both ends for portability.

For testing, I threw up the targets from my last session and tried to see what I could see. I can display the camera on my cellphone or on a laptop at the bench. Using just the cellphone, I could zoom in and see all the holes with the camera positioned about 10 feet back and off to the side of the target frame. The camera pans and tilts to fine tune positioning and move from one target to the next.

I like it, much better than a scope and having to walk/ride to check targets!

I was doing more of the latter, more and more. I've got a bit of a hill between the house and the 100 yard target. In wet weather, it can rut up. I was tearing up the ground between the two with either the riding lawnmower or the truck. This does away with most of that. At 65, I'll save every step on that hill that I can.

The bonus is that, as I said, this solution takes me out to 500 yards easy. The one drawback with the bridge is that it is line of sight and it doesn't like cedar trees. My 500 yard range is a straight shot over open pasture. I wanted to test this bridge as a way of linking the campground to the house (1/2 Mile) or at least my luxury box (a little less than 1/2 mile) so that I could run a 24/7 live game camera. However, when I hit the first line of cedars, the signal died. I believe the 1 KM rating on the bridge. The caveat is that it's 1KM with nothing in between.

I'll update this thread when I have the weblog entry with all the details. Some of it was tricky even for a guy that has been doing networking for 30 years and dealt with Amcrest cameras for close to a decade. I wore a path between my place and Kohl's-- the place that takes free Amazon returns. I went through 3 cameras and 2 bridges and a bunch of other odd pieces getting what I needed.

If budget was no object, it would have been a breeze. However, I was picking from what Amazon has to sell as refurbs from Amcrest. It saved about 50% on the camera, but each time I tried, something was not up to spec. This is not throwing shade on Amcrest cameras. It's that they have such a wide range of products, it's hard to tell sometimes what's going to work with my system. Luckily Amazon allows free returns and 2 day shipping for Prime Members.

I see a lot more readers than answerers on this thread. I took a shower yesterday, so I know it's not that.

Probably some of you are not all that into networks and such. Here's basically the same thing in a turnkey package from Caldwell:
Ballistic Precision LR Target Camera

Caldwell lists it for $550, but Amazon has it for $360.

So is your setup as good as the Caldwell?

Tag for updates

I've not seen what the Caldwell can do. However, $550 was above my DIY price point, and I knew I could slap my idea together, test it, and send it all back to Amazon if I didn't like the result. I didn't see the Caldwell system until I was done. If you look, you can see they're using the same type of bridge components.

The other thing is the quality of the camera. I knew Amcrest cameras from having used them at work and at home for about a decade. They aren't the best out there, but they get the job done at a good price point and they are reliable. I've never had to send one back for repair. I just picked the cheapest refurb that would get the job done.

There's an Amcrest Camera , IP8M-2779EB-AI , that is twice what I paid for mine that would be better, but I'm going to stop with what I've got for now. When I build the addition to the cabin and move in, I'll be buying more cameras, and I'll upgrade then. The one I've got is a 2MP camera. That one is 4MP. The technology is generally better and cheaper the longer you wait.

Another thing is that my DIY system does not need remote power to both sides I'm plugging into my home security network, and the house 110V power on the near side and just using a 12 V battery on the far side.

Lastly, I spent 30 years of 40 years in IT doing stuff like this on a much bigger scale with other people's money. For me, it's recreation. The next guy might not want to putz with the finer points.

The again, we just might want to

Can you use a baby monitor with camera? I have heard that as a suggestion? Haven't tried it myself. Shaman, I always enjoy your posts. Thinking you probably already bought better quality components than a wobblety mart store camera. Bless you all Shaman, RZ.

Be careful on two things: Range and resolution. The 2 MP camera I ended up buying is fine. The 720K camera that I borrowed out of my reloading room proved to be too low a resolution for my eyes. Range? I don't know how far a baby cam will reach. I decided to press the Easy Button and resort to the WIFI bridge even though I knew I might get a marginal wifi signal at 100 yards from the house.

Now that I think of it, there's another issue: the lens. I sent back an Amcrest camera that had 4MP resolution, because it had an ultra-wide 28 mm lens. The fish-eye distortion was way too much.