HomeHelper to trigger recording
The main thing I would like to use HomeHelper for is to have recording being triggered not by motion detected in the video stream, but by a HomeKit motion sensor instead.
I have a storefront window that has constant traffic outside, which would trigger motion-based recording. I can't really block it off as an ignore zone because everything I WOULD want to capture is between the camera and that massive window.
So I would love to set up a PIR motion sensor which can't see through glass and have THAT trigger recording instead. Does that make sense?
Comments
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Yes, this makes sense, and this is exactly the kind of thing that HomeHelper is for.
You would add a trigger in HomeHelper that is associated with the PIR sensor, and then choose this under Preferences > Cameras > Triggers for this camera in SecuritySpy, while turning off the "Video motion detection" option.
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Thanks! In retrospect, I think it was probably a kind of dumb, obvious question. I think I was just confused because I couldn't "play" with it myself right now, to see how it all works because the Mac mini currently running my system is not logged into iCloud and has no Apple ID associated with it, so HomeKit is not active on it at all.
There are some logistical concerns because I currently only have 1 mini running cameras which will ultimately belong to 3 separate unrelated homes and I want to make sure not to "configure myself into a corner" when it comes to Apple ID's and everything, so I had just held off on any HomeKit/iCloud setup on the mini running SecuritySpy for now.
Ultimately, each home will be on its own separate mini, with its own separate Apple ID so it will be easy then.
So after going to Preferences... > Cameras > (one of my cameras) > Triggers and UNchecking the "Enable video motion detection" option, I would then at the bottom of the window on the "HomeKit trigger" line, select the relevant trigger(s?) I created in HomeHelper instead. Seems very simple and well designed.
Does disabling the "Enable video motion detection" option free up any/many resources on the host Mac? Or is the non-AI motion detection fairly lightweight? Seems like it would be pretty intensive, but I don't know about that stuff.
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There are no dumb questions here :) These things are quite reasonable to double-check if you aren't currently in a position to test them directly yourself.
Yes, you have described the setup correctly. Note that you can only select one HomeKit trigger per camera, but in HomeHelper you can associate multiple accessories with the same trigger, so I hope this gives you the flexibility you need.
The non-AI motion detection is lightweight - on an average-speed Intel Mac this takes around 4 ms of execution time per video frame. But if you have lots of cameras and/or you are running at high frame rates, this can add up - for example, with 10 cameras running at 10 fps each, this adds up to almost half a CPU core's worth of processing. On an M1/M2 Mac, execution time is much faster, and therefore resource usage is a lot lower (around half).
