IP SECURITY INTEGRATOR
Video Analytics
Video analytics software was created to help review the growing hours of surveillance video that a security guard or system manager may never have time to watch - your video surveillance system is only as useful as the incidents you can actually capture and watch, and video analytics will help you find them.
Using video analytics makes your surveillance system more efficient, reduces the workload on security and management staff, and helps you capture the full value of security video by making your IP camera system more intelligent in its work.
How Video Analytics Software Works
Video analytics software for security cameras is available in several forms: installed on your camera, on your NVR, or as 3rd party software you buy. Each version will do the same thing, however - monitor your videos to search for and alert you to activity.
Each video analytics solution will work a bit differently depending on the manufacturer and application. They all work in the same basic way, however - when setting up the software you set up parameters to the activity the software is looking for, set up the alert notification system, and when the software detects something that meets its search criteria it alerts you.
For example, many businesses use surveillance systems to detect motion in their store after hours. You can set your system to motion detection during the hours your business is closed, so if it detects motion it will send you an email - a quick response that may help you react quickly to a break-in or accident.
How Video Analytics Can Help You
The old idea of a video surveillance system is of a security guard sitting in a booth watching the security camera feed live, hoping to catch suspicious activity. This model relies on having a live person watching and reviewing all your video, however, which is not practical or efficient. Different security guards may have differing levels of focus or different ideas of suspicious activity.
Video management software changes this system by using software to monitor your video feed around the clock, alerting you to activity so you only need to watch the cameras when something happens. This will help you best utilize your surveillance system, saving you time and effort.
Video analytics can be used for:
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Motion detection
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Facial recognition & license plate reading
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People counting & dwell time monitoring for retail stores
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Recognizing long lines at checkout and sending alerts
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And more - Contact our video surveillance experts today to get personalized recommendations for your needs!
Video analytics software comes with a wide range of features, making them easy to fit into any surveillance system. Choose from software that supports every system, from the smallest systems to large multi-campus systems. A variety of leading manufacturers create video analytics software, including Milestone.
How Video Analytics Create Value
Depending on how long you have worked in the physical security industry, you have probably seen your fair share of evolutions ivideo surveillance technology. Some of us may recall attending security trade shows where attendees could see multiplexers and quads on display along with VCRs and the tapes used to capture thousands of hours of footage — a Herculean effort we have thankfully done away with, thanks to the adoption of digital and networked video.
Other notable shifts in the technology include the ongoing transition from analog to IP video; increasingly advanced video compression; standards-based industry protocols such as ONVIF; the introduction of HD, multi-megapixel and 360 cameras; mobile access to video using smartphones and tablets; cloud-based storage; and, of course, the appearance and advancement of video analytics.
The advancement in today’s video analytics are more complex than the initial tripwire, camera obstruction and motion detection applications that are now fairly common. While many of the newer generation analytics are still very security-centric, another set is much more business-focused. Rather than triggering a security alarm, these video-based business analytics are designed to provide insights into a business over time to help organizations identify performance trends and areas for improvement. They are tightly integrated with data from other systems, such as retail point-of-sale or banking transaction systems, and they open up an exciting range of applications that extend far beyond security. They also enable organizations to get more value out of the investments already made in video surveillance.
The Benefits of Analytics
For systems integrators and dealers, these business analytics represent an opportunity to provide additional benefit to customers. The first step is being able to paint a clear picture of what today’s analytics can deliver.
To help, here are three ways retail and banking organizations can use business analytics to improve their overall performance, profitability and ability to compete. systems integrators and dealers, these business analytics represent an opportunity to provide additional benefit to customers.
The first step is being able to paint a clear picture of what today’s analytics can deliver. To help, here are three ways retail and banking organizations can use business analytics to improve their overall performance, profitability and ability to compete.
For systems integrators and dealers, these are the benefits
1. Faster Loss/Fraud Detection and Investigations:
Many retailers, banks and credit unions are already using video-based software applications to combine their surveillance video with recorded audio and transaction data. The integrated data and software tools enable faster loss detection and investigation capabilities by enabling users to search on exceptions such as transaction type or amount and click through to the associated video to further review suspicious events. The best applications also allow data searches across all locations simultaneously, further reducing investigation times and costs. analytics represent an opportunity to provide additional benefit to customers. The first step is being able to paint a clear picture of what today’s analytics can deliver.
To help, here are three ways retail and banking organizations can use business analytics to improve their overall performance, profitability and ability to compete. systems integrators and dealers, these business analytics represent an opportunity to provide additional benefit to customers.
The first step is being able to paint a clear picture of what today’s analytics can deliver. To help, here are three ways retail and banking organizations can use business analytics to improve their overall performance, profitability and ability to compete.
Add video analytics to that mix and the ability to detect potential theft increases dramatically. A dwell time analytic can identify when someone is standing at an ATM for a set time period without conducting a transaction or possibly conducting multiple transactions, which could be indicative of an ATM skimmer installation or cash harvesting. In a retail environment, someone standing in front of a high-value merchandise display for an unusually long period would be worth a quick review of the video. It might be an incident of theft, or possibly a potential customer waiting for assistance. In the case of a theft, the retailer has strong visual evidence to share with law enforcement. If the issue seems to be a lack of customer service, the analytics have helped reveal a gap that can be corrected to directly impact sales at one or multiple stores.
3. Increased Marketing and Promotional Success:
Marketing probably is not a group you think could benefit from surveillance video; however that perspective is changing thanks to integrated analytics and software reporting tools. Using dwell time analytics and POS transaction data, for example, marketers can determine the effectiveness of different retail offers and compare uptake rates across locations.
The analytic also enables marketing teams to see how long someone pauses to read a promotion in a bank lobby or lingers in front of a merchandise display in a store. If a display does not seem to be succeeding in a few locations, or is exceeding expectations in others, they can quickly review the video to check how it has been setup or positioned.
Being able to measure the performance of on-site advertising, promotions and merchandising puts marketing teams at a distinct advantage, enabling them to adjust efforts for maximum benefit.
Video and business analytics can play a key role by providing valuable insights and metrics, as well as the ability to visually verify that campaigns are rolling out consistently in all locations.
2. Better Customer Service:
There’s no question that a positive customer experience is one of the most critical factors when it comes to the success of a retail or retail banking organization.
In a 2014 global consumer banking survey conducted by Ernst & Young, consumers said that their experience at a banking branch was the most important consideration when deciding whether to open or close an account — ahead of fees, rates, locations and convenience. Similarly, in response to a 2014 Accenture retail survey, 40 percent of shoppers said that the experience retailers need to improve most was in the store.
Video-driven analytics can help financial institutions and retailers improve customer service, optimize staffing and identify where more training is needed. A people counting analytic married to POS data in an easy-to-use reporting dashboard makes it easy for retailers to determine conversion rates and run site-by-site comparisons. If a certain location is outperforming the rest, staff can quickly review the video to better understand what’s happening and how to emulate the success at other sites.
A queue length monitoring analytic can provide equally useful data, allowing retailers and financial institutions to adjust staffing schedules to reduce customer wait times. Unusually long wait times can also reveal possible training issues, which can be remedied quickly to improve customer service. Studies show that when a customer waits longer than three minutes, their perceived wait time actually multiplies with each passing minute. Video analytics can help organizations pinpoint service issues, resulting in happier, more loyal customers and improved sales.
Focused Evolution
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Like all relevant technologies, video continues to evolve to provide the capabilities organizations need to work smarter, faster and adopt innovations that contribute directly to their success.
Security will, of course, always remain a key application; however, as more organizations recognize the importance of integrating different data sources to gain better insights into their business, video is poised to play a critical role. It is a major source of real-time data that can capture and replay virtually everything that happens in a store or banking branch and provide immediate context to the viewer.
It is important to understand that video — and video-based business analytics — can offer benefits beyond core security.
Call us to start engaging with loss and fraud prevention, customer service, operations and marketing decision-makers to help you realize the true value of the video already being captured in your retail and banking locations.
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Agent Vi’s market leading technological position is based on three main elements – its patented software architecture for distributed image processing, advanced computer vision algorithms and expertise in software development for large scale surveillance deployments.
At the core of Agent Vi’s technology is its unique and patented software architecture for distributed video analytics, called “Image Processing over IP networks” (IPoIP™). This unique architecture distributes the Video Analytics task between the edge device (an IP camera or encoder) and a server (which may be located on-premise or in the cloud). A light software component is embedded within the camera or encoder and performs a preliminary image processing task of “feature extraction” which requires only limited processing resources. The low-bandwidth “image features” extracted – and not the video itself – are streamed to the server, where the actual analysis and detection are performed. This unique architecture, which is based on streaming and processing the “image features” only, is ideal for low-bandwidth environments and allows the concurrent processing of image features from hundreds of cameras by a single server, without compromising on the quality or accuracy of the analysis.
Building on its patented software architecture, Agent Vi has developed high-performance computer vision algorithms which include advanced machine learning capabilities for real-time event detection, video search and business intelligence applications.
These algorithms perform with high precision due to their ability to accurately separate and classify various targets and objects detected in the scene, so that people, vehicles and static objects are classified and events detected according to the user’s requirement. As a result, Agent Vi’s solutions feature high probability of detection and low false alarm rates, making them the ideal platform for users seeking a broad array of video analytics functionalities in the most challenging environments and in the most demanding situations.
Tying it all together is Agent Vi’s expertise in development of software for large scale installations, which enables smooth deployment and operation in real-life environments. Through thousands of deployments ranging from a few cameras to many thousands in a single installation, Agent Vi has perfected its solutions to allow high-availability and continuous high performance.