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Webcam Tech Talk

How to Put Camera Images on Your Website

So you think that you want to put web camera images on your website? Husband Don and I made the agreement when we started this project that I would set up the website and he would install cameras in the coop. What we didn’t bargain for was that neither of us had any idea how to get the camera images to work on the static first page of the site. We’ve written the information below to help, should you want to put your camera images on a website.

Outside Camera

The Panasonic BL-C140A network cameras that we installed have built-in web software, and other nice features. They have a proprietary Power over Ethernet (POE) feature. If your camera is 100 feet or less from a power source, you can use the standard Cat 5 cable to power your camera. Unfortunately, our coop was about 200 feet from the nearest power source, so we had to extend a separate power line to the coop. Other cameras can be placed about 300 feet from the power source if they have industry standard POE specifications.

The cameras are wired from the coop with Cat 5 cables through a Trendnet network switch to our Airport Extreme router. Panasonic cameras are packaged with a set-up CD for PCs only. They are compatible with Mac, and the tech folks at the help desk will patiently guide you through the set-up, operation for the cameras, and router configuration.

 

Panasonic provides a free DDNS website for all of its cameras. By registering on the site, the camera is given a unique name (like having its own website), and can be accessed over the internet by anyone of your choosing. The images are displayed real time and with full motion. We access this site on a regular basis to see how our hens are doing, checking out who is laying, and making sure the local foxes are not harassing the hens. We also use this site as the source for our website images.

Inside Camera Facing Nest Boxes

Our website includes HTML code and Javascript to direct your browser to capture our images from the Panasonic DDNS website. By using the Panasonic website, we avoid having our own server, web and video software, and static IP. The three-second refresh of the images is a compromise because of bandwidth and web hosting cost.

The image capture and display code was the most difficult, frustrating, and a time consuming part of the website construction. However, if you know how to write code, it takes no time at all. We were able to make it work through the efforts of family techies and an expert.

We hope that this explanation will be of help to some of you. If you find it difficult to understand it might be because we find it hard to explain. If you get a website up and running with a similar camera, please let us know, we would love to see it!.

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17 Comments to “Webcam Tech Talk”

  1. LesaJuly 26, 2010 at 4:29 pm

    Lee,
    Thanks for sharing the details on how you’re doing your hencam, our first camera is a different brand so we can’t use the Panasonic service, but we do have a Panasonic ordered so it should help us figure out ways to get that one up and running. You did a terrific job on your hencam, love to see what your hens are up to, and they’re just beautiful birds!

  2. Larissa BerryJuly 27, 2010 at 9:12 am

    Aunt Lee & Uncle Don, Wow, what a wonderful website you have here!! Very detailed—LOVE IT!! The hens look very happy & content.
    Larissa

  3. Larissa BerryAugust 7, 2010 at 3:20 pm

    Aunt Lee, Werner has a cousin Brigitte & her husband Zepp who has a profession egg hatching farm with 10,000 hens & 1,000 roosters. She lives in CANADA & has 4 grown children. She is also my facebook friend & is on it all the time-everyday. If you need to ask her anything, check it out & chat with her. I have pictures of her farm, chickens, eggs on my fb-wall.

  4. LeeAugust 8, 2010 at 6:00 am

    Hi Larissa. I “met” your cousin Brigitte on facebook and we had a nice “chat”. She gave me some good advice to try to help Daisy get well. She has quite an chicken operation in Canada! Thanks for the contact! Love and cheers.

  5. Steven SumrallDecember 29, 2010 at 9:18 am

    I like your site, enjoy checking it each day several times a day. I was wondering why you don’t add some overhang to the roof so less rain gets in the run. looks muddy

  6. LeeDecember 29, 2010 at 10:36 am

    Hi Steven,
    The outdoor run is 2/3 covered with lucite so most of it usually stays dry. We’ve had so much rain this fall that the water is draining from the hillside behind the henhouse into the chicken yard. It makes me sick! We got it diverted and drained on the weekend, then along came another storm. We’re going out this afternoon to see if we can make a drain. Poor hens! It breaks my heart to seem them wading around in the muck!

  7. Steven SumrallDecember 29, 2010 at 12:45 pm

    how about building it up with gravel and sand. raise the coop if you can

  8. Steven SumrallDecember 29, 2010 at 12:48 pm

    Is the coop on concrete or wood floor looks low I bet concrete , hard to raise

  9. kelziDecember 15, 2012 at 1:20 pm

    Do you know if it is possible to have one of these cameras hooked up to wifi and have the video posted on a blogspot website? If you know •• how?

  10. LeeDecember 27, 2012 at 11:24 am

    Hi Kelzi,
    Sorry for the delayed response, but the holidays have kept us busy. I’ll (Lee’s husband) try to answer your questions. These are relatively inexpensive cameras so they are not wireless. They are connected to our wi-fi router, an Airport Extreme, with Cat 5 cable from the coop through a network switch. They are internet protocol ready, which means they have their own IP address. You can view the images directly from the cameras with this IP address, or have others view the images if they have the address. Ours are sent to Panasonic’s free website (for Panasonic cameras only) that allows you to give the cameras unique names rather than the IP address.
    Putting the images on a website is a different process. You must have computer code embedded in your website that tells a browser to look for the images and display them. The code on this website was written by an expert, not us. The bandwidth for live streaming video is quite large, so I’m not sure you can display the live video through a blogspot. I have not seen live video on a blogspot – don’t know. I think the only way to display live streaming video is to have your own website with a hosting service that allows the bandwidth, or send viewers to a live streaming video service website (such as the Panasonic DDNS website, ustream, or dacast) through a link. I’m sure there are other solutions. We really are novices and found the process frustrating at times, but worth it. Hope this helps.

  11. DanDeFarterOctober 12, 2013 at 6:25 am

    Hi ! Nice cam… Thanks for taking the time to present it to us.. Dan

  12. How to Put Camera Images on Website « Central Coast GardeningFebruary 25, 2014 at 7:21 am

    […] displayed across the top of the first page of our website. You will find the explanation under Hencam Tech Talk on the menu bar across the […]

  13. Mary ClendeninMarch 3, 2014 at 3:07 pm

    I’ve been watching the hencam today and one of your hens laid two eggs…..is that possible??? WOW!

  14. LeeMarch 6, 2014 at 7:50 am

    I don’t think that that is possible! Did you look away for a minute? Sweetpea (six years old) still lays and she looks so much like Penny that I can hardly tell them apart. Did she sneak in when you weren’t looking? We did get three eggs yesterday which means they all three laid (or one, as you say, laid two eggs). I’m still fascinated watching them dutifully lay in the next boxes. Good girls!

  15. NolaMay 30, 2014 at 10:41 am

    Try getting a ‘safe trap’ and putting cat food in it. I have turtles outside and last year caught 11 possums. Year before that two raccoons. Better safe, than loosing one of your babies. Good luck!

  16. Lynn IwamotoNovember 13, 2017 at 1:43 pm

    Are the cams off for a reason? Nothing is appearing.

  17. LeeNovember 13, 2017 at 6:02 pm

    Hi Lynn,
    Yes, the cameras were off for about 6 hours today. I was cleaning the coop inside and out. I squirted water inside and out and must have gotten water in the GFI outlet and the power was kicked off. A good thing. It was easy to reset once I figured what I’d done. Thanks for alerting me. If I hadn’t checked it, it could have been some time before I’d discovered it.
    Lee

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