Milestone Solution Partner Snap Surveillance has achieved Milestone Certified Solution status with its integration to XProtect Corporate IP video management software (VMS), a Winner of the 2016 ‘ASTORS’ Homeland Security Awards Program.
Snap’s unique User Interface (UI) software allows customers to get more effective use from their medium-to-large (100+ camera) networks.
It automatically finds relationships between the camera fields of view; both overlap and near overlap. It then presents the camera network to the user in a variety of ways that reduce information overload.
(See Snap in Action! Courtesy of Snap Surveillance and YouTube)
Snap uses straightforward video analytics on individual video streams as a pre-processing step (to determine scene occupancy), then processes the occupancy signals from across the camera network in concert to determine the inter-camera relationships.
As such, Snap is what could be called “multi-camera analytics”, whereas the vast majority of existing analytics process single cameras in isolation. Snap’s patented technology allows this learning approach to scale across thousands of cameras.
Snap’s integrated solution provides the user with a highly intuitive video UI allowing seamless tracking of persons-of-interest from camera to camera across widespread locations like an airport or shopping center – for both live and recorded video.
Key Snap capabilities include:
Peripheral vision
- The camera that is the current focus of attention is presented with visually related cameras laid out around it, giving the operator visual context to the scene.
- Video streams are thereby seen in the context of neighboring video with the unique “Peripheral Vision” display – improving the situational awareness for security personnel.
Video pursuit
- As a target moves out of the current focus camera, they will appear in one of the peripheral cameras.
- Clicking on that camera switches focus to it, allowing the target to be followed easily throughout the network.
- The neighboring video streams act as a menu for navigating the network, improving operator ability to follow the action moving around a site without needing to memorize camera names or positions.
Evidence videos
- just by following the action, users can produce consolidated videos of everything suspects do while on site, providing rapid and compelling support for investigations.
Virtual walkthroughs
- Security staff can browse around an area of interest, moving from camera to camera, without needing to be physically present or to know each camera’s location.
Scalability
- Snap scales to networks of thousands of cameras.
- The larger or more complex the camera network, the greater the benefit for operators in understanding and navigating through that network with Snap.
Camera-agnostic operation
- Snap’s software requires no special camera functionality and interfaces only to the VMS platform – if Milestone supports the camera, then Snap also will.
The Snap back-end middleware is integrated with live or archived video so it can analyze the video to determine the relationships between camera fields of view.
Snap’s end user functionality is integrated with the Milestone XProtect Smart Client user interface, and for both the archived and live video signals, to deliver the peripheral vision, video pursuit and other functionality.
How Snap Works
Using patented tracking algorithms based on information theory, Snap Network Intelligence engine automatically finds the relationships between cameras’ fields of view, without requiring time consuming and often unreliable manual configuration.
Operating continuously at the sub-camera level, Snap finds which parts of those fields of view relate to every other camera. In practice this means two vital types of relationships are continually discovered:
1. Pairs of regions within cameras that have a high probability of overlapping; and
2. Pairs of regions within cameras that have a high probability of NOT overlapping.
This powerful analysis operates at large scale. For example, with a network of 1,000 cameras, each divided into 100 regions, there are 10 billion possible relationships; Snap finds the “relationship” needles in the haystack.
Armed with the information it has learned about the camera relationships, Snap is able to support key applications delivering real customer value, such as the ability for operators to track activity as it moves from camera to camera across the network, using Snap’s video pursuit feature.
What the Operator Sees…
With Snap’s user interface, the operator is able to focus completely on tracking a target, without needing to scan across multiple monitors or rely on detailed local knowledge of camera names, groups and locations.
Snap Force Multiplier operator screen
Centre of screen is the current camera view with person of interest. The highlighted pink box shows the relationship with another camera. A view of that camera appears on the left hand side.
You can also see a green box, and that relates to the green camera view on the top left. As the target moves, the operator is prompted via this system of colour boxes to know what camera view is best to look at next while tracking a target.
Certified for Confidence
Certifying this software integration provides the assurance that the solution functions, operates, performs and easily integrates with Milestone XProtect VMS.
It guarantees the interoperability of the certified solution and is a distinguishing feature in the marketplace. A proven, certified solution delivers confidence to those specifying, implementing and operating it.
This distinction indicates that the solution has been certified with the Milestone XProtect Platform (advanced products from 2014 onward).
The certification focuses on testing the solution’s functionality, performance impact and usability.
“As a relatively new entrant into the global security sector, Snap draws significant value from working with a market leader in Milestone, and being an active partner within the Milestone Open Community,” says Simon Langsford, CEO, Snap Surveillance.
“Snap helps deliver a more comprehensive and effective solution for large and often mission-critical security systems, and having our solution certified is an important validation for Milestone integrators and end users of our software – they can be confident in the reliability, stability and performance of the integrated solution.”
(Hear from Simon Langsford, courtesy of Security Guy Radio and YouTube. Published on Sep 30, 2016)
The Certification documentation includes test parameters and a results summary as well as specifications for optimal installation/operation.
The tested versions of the products from both Milestone and Snap Surveillance which were included in the solution certification were Milestone XProtect Corporate 2016 video management software in operation with the Snap Surveillance Force Multiplier.
See it in Action
Snap will be presenting the solution in Milestone booth #18053 at the ISC West security trade show in Las Vegas April 5-7. Snap Surveillance offerings are available in Australia, New Zealand, EMEA, North America, and various territories throughout Asia.
Milestone Systems is a global industry leader in open platform IP video management software, and a three time Winner of the 2016 ‘ASTORS’ Homeland Security Awards Program.
Milestone technology is easy to manage, reliable and proven in thousands of customer installations, providing flexible choices in network hardware and integrations with other systems.
Sold through a community of partners in more than 100 countries, Milestone solutions help organizations to manage risks, protect people and assets, optimize processes and reduce costs.
