Using a webcam as a security camera

[Zipperhead]

My brother has some relatives who have had strange things happen inside their house when they've been away.

They think they know who is causing it (human, no ghost stories) but want to have some positive evidence so that they can take some (legal) action.

My bro rang me last night to ask if I knew of any webcams that had the ability to start recording when they detect motion. It's going to be down to the software rather than the hardware I think.

He is planning to go visit them next week, so his plan is to put a spare computer in a secure area in the basement, and then site a camera somewhere inconspicuous upstairs. This will then be left running when they go away for a month.

Does anybody have any suggestions for software & hardware to use? It must be easy to set up, otherwise I'm going to be doing it at the end of a phone line without having any sight of it.

If it needs wiring rather than using wireless, that's not an issue, he's more than competent to run some cat 5 in.

[Greenbank]

Lots of them do motion-detection.
Some will even email a video clip to you when it detects this (you can set up rules to disable this during specified periods).
Some are wireless, which means you don't have to have a cable anywhere.

I'll try and find a specific make/model for you if no-one else comes up with one.

[Jaded]

The motion detection that I've come across (Mac, not PC) is in the software and allows you to define parts of the screen where motion is detected. You can also set the SW I've seen to carry some footage in cache - then when motion is detected it can record from before the motion was detected, if you see what I mean.

If it is to be used in evidence, you need to consider how the date and time are stamped to the footage and what the evidence trail is after the footage has been recorded.

I'm not sure if a webcam would have a good enough low light sensitivity for that kind of surveillance. Also faces in infrared light are very difficult to identify.

[Phil]

If you get a good quality webcam (£30-ish) it should be perfectly good enough to identify faces as long as it's strategically positioned and there aren't any strong lights about. 

I found a program last year that did everything you say, but I can't seem to find the site now.  I'll keep looking. 

[Zipperhead]

After having a long chat with my bro last night, we decided to use on of these as installing and wiring up (cheap) CCTV cameras will be easier than getting IP based webcams running.