The following settings are required for analog cameras (Ux H264):

Board

Select the appropriate board number of the Picolo Ux H264 card the camera is connected to.

    • For U4 cards from 1 to 4

    • For U8 cards 1 or 2

Connector

Select the appropriate connector on the card the camera is connected to.

    • For U4 cards from 1 to 4

    • For U8 cards from 1 to 8

GOP size

See chapter Glossary.

Frame rate divider

Analog cameras usually provide a video stream of 25 fps (PAL) or 30 fps (NTSC). These frame rates ensure for the human eye an impression of fluid motions in the video. In some cases, when there are only few or very slow motions in the filmed set-up, it might be reasonable to reduce the frame rate. A reduced frame rate can significantly save storage space on the hard disk. As a result, it is possible to cover a longer time range of video recording with the same disk space.

Divider

PAL

NTSC

Frame rate

1 frame every...

Frame rate

1 frame every...

1

25 fps

40 ms

30 fps

33.3 ms

2

12.50 fps

80 ms

15 fps

66.7 ms

3

8.33 fps

120 ms

10 fps

100 ms

4

6.25 fps

160 ms

7.5 fps

133 ms

10

2.5 fps

400 ms

3 fps

333 ms

Standard

Select the TV standard of the camera (see camera manual). Typical settings:

    • PAL in Europe

    • NTSC in America and Asia

Compression mode

    • CPQ (Constant Picture Quality) Select this mode if you want to maintain a constant subjective image quality. The effective bit rate is continuously varying. A value for picture quality can be entered below for further configuration.

    • VBR (Variable Bit Rate) VBR will adjust the bit rate according to the images' complexity. This requires a lot of bandwidth for a high activity in the image and less bandwidth for a low activity.

    • CBR (Constant Bit Rate) When using CBR, you can set a fixed maximum bit rate, which will ensure that the level of bandwidth consumed is predictable and will not change, irrespective of the activity in the image. The maximum value will not be exceeded, irrespective of the activity in the image.

Picture quality (only available for CPQ compression mode)

The value entered here is a measure for compression.

100 = best picture quality, maximum memory requirement.

0 = worst picture quality, minimum memory requirement.

The default value of 30% works for many cases.

Average bit rate

In case of choosing VBR compression mode, you can set an average bit rate with this setting. Experience shows that an average bit rate of 1200 kbit/s produces a sufficient recording quality.

Maximum bit rate

Here, you can set the maximum permissible bit rate for every compression mode. The default value is 2000 kbit/s. The higher the max. bit rate, the higher the image quality of the recording in case of high complexity of the recorded image; however, the higher is also the storage requirement. If CPQ is set as compression mode, the bit rate will be limited irrespective of the selected picture quality. This means a reduction of the picture quality if a bit rate higher than the max. one set was required for achieving the selected picture quality.