Cameras are one of the most critical trigger mechanisms to add to your alarm site because cameras help an agent review footage. Camera alarm triggers provide additional information to the agent to determine if the event is a threat to a person or property.
Previously, you could only have a person detection as a trigger when you add a camera. Verkada has now introduced new and improved ways to trigger a detection.
Use cases for camera alarm triggers
For cases where you require more than one person being detected, triggers are used in these scenarios:
Person detection: Detects the person in a configured region and triggers a verification event for the monitoring agent to determine if it's an actionable threat (and to notify or call the police).
Line crossing: Allows you to set a line and then the direction you expect people to not move. The trigger is tripped if there is detection on the line crossing you set, depending on the vehicle or people. You can set unidirectional or bidirectional lines, depending on your use case. Line crossing is the all-around recommendation for configuring a trigger.
Loitering detection: Allows you to define a region with a freeform polygon and define how long a person has to stay in that region before a detection occurs. This trigger type is intended for any area with expected public activity. For example, outdoor cameras facing a public space or walkway, or where there are opportunities of people loitering near shop premises. You may want to detect a person who is loitering near a business rather than someone who is just walking by.
How to configure camera triggers
In Verkada Command, navigate to the Alarms > Home page and click Settings.
Under Alarm Triggers, click Cameras and select a camera to configure.
Select a trigger type (see image shown below): Person detection, Line Crossing, or Loitering detection, depending on your use case to configure, and click Done.
Loitering detection and Line Crossing are only available on the following camera models: CF81, CD62, CD42, CD52, CD32, CD22, CM42.
Person detection
Person detection detects the person in a configured region and triggers a verification event for the monitoring agent to determine if it's an actionable threat (and to notify or call the police).
To set the Person detection trigger:
At the top left of your selected camera, select Person detection and follow the instructions to define a region and enable person detection. Once you have defined a region, the camera has been enabled as a trigger.
To remove the Person detection trigger, click Clear regions or delete the region of interest with the (x) at the bottom right.
The example (shown below) shows how a person detection region is set to monitor the building entrance and ignore the public walkway, where you might expect a lot of normal activity.Click Done when you’re satisfied with the settings.
Line Crossing (recommended)
Line Crossing provides more control and granularity in a trigger by allowing you to draw a line and defining a direction that a person has to cross before a detection occurs.
To set the Line Crossing trigger:
At the top left of your selected camera, select Line crossing and follow the instructions to draw a line and define a direction.
The example (shown below) shows a scenario where if any person crosses the line— in either direction (towards or away from the building)—it causes a trigger event.
Click Done when you’re satisfied with the settings.
Loitering detection
Loitering detection allows you to define a region with a freeform polygon and define how long a person has to stay in that region before a detection occurs.
To set the Loitering detection trigger:
At the top left of your selected camera, select Loitering and follow the instructions to draw your region.
The example (shown below) shows a scenario where there’s been some experience with a lot of issues where people in the public are loitering around benches and seating areas. Because this camera is in view of a public walkway, you only want a detection to occur if a person stays in one of these two regions for more than one minute.
Click Done when you’re satisfied with the settings.
Learn more how to configure your alarm’s site settings.
Confirming the Configurations
Once you have finished configuring a camera as a trigger, a trigger badge will show up on camera to indicate which camera and trigger type has been enabled.
You can also quickly see and edit cameras that have been enabled from the alarms cameras settings page.
When should a detection occur?
When a Verkada camera detects an object, green bounding boxes appear over the detected object(s). You can see these bounding boxes when scrubbing through a cameras people and vehicle motion search or scrubbing through a cameras historical video.
Line Crossing and Loitering detection
Recommendation. Use Line crossing and Loitering detection instead of Person detection whenever you configure a camera model that ends in "2" or higher (for example: CD42, CD52, CD62, etc).
Detection is determined when the center bottom of an persons bounding box crosses a line or sits inside a loitering region.
The example below illustrates where that point would exist. (In a majority of cases, it is a person's feet).
In the example below:
Once the person's trigger point intersects the loitering region, the timer begins.
If the trigger point remains in this region for the configured time (one minute) a detection event occurs.
If the person trigger point briefly exits and re-enters the loitering region within 4 seconds, the counter continues.
If the camera loses track of an individual (for example, walking out of frame) or the trigger point is outside the loitering region for more than 4 seconds, the counter resets.
Person detection
Detection is determined whenever any part of a persons bounding box intersects with the configured region of interest.
Recommendation. We always recommend using Line crossing and Loitering detection instead of Person detection whenever you configure a camera model that ends in "2" or higher (e.g. CD42, CD52, CD62, etc).
Need help? Contact Verkada Support.