Turning your Windows Phone into a surveillance camera with Gotya

Gotya is an interesting app that hopes to turn your Windows Phone camera into a remote controlled, move activated surveillance camera. You can set your front end or rear camera to take pictures when a motion area is breached. Images can be saved locally or to Gotya's Deject Service.

There are a few additional bells and whistles with Gotya that add together to the app's appeal but the movement detection tin exist a little on the sensitive side. The app, which is available for 512MB devices, has potential and a little fine-tuning will assistance Gotya shine a little brighter in the Windows Telephone Shop.

Membership not required, but it'll help

When y'all first launch Gotya, yous'll exist prompted to sign into your Gotya account or create one. Membership isn't required to use Gotya but it will requite you access to the full host of features such as saving images to the cloud and using the remote controller.

Membership isn't free but it likewise won't break the bank either. Your offset sixty-days are free and after that, annual membership is running $11.99. If you but retrieve you lot will demand to use Gotya for a shorter period, monthly membership is running $1.99 per month.

The master page of Gotya has options to launch the camera, launch the remote controller, set up yous cloud service (sign into your Gotya account) and view the assist pages. Gotya's help pages do a decent task of guiding yous through app mechanics and what's non covered, y'all tin can effigy out easily.

Gotya'southward Camera View and Remote Control

Launching the camera from Gotya's chief folio will pull up the camera's viewfinder that only supports horizontal orientation. A yellow rectangle spans the viewfinder, which represents the move detection area.

To the side of the viewfinder you volition find four command buttons and a three-dot menu. The command buttons are used to dim (or blackness out) the viewfinder, toggle between the front end or rear cameras, calibrate the motion detection area and begin the recording session. Calibrating your move detection surface area is key to having any success with Gotya. If your detection surface area is too big, you volition likely observe your Windows Phone full of unnecessary photos. Y'all tin can too tweak the sensitivity of the detection in the settings.

Speaking of which, upward under the three-dot carte you will discover the camera settings and an selection to return the app to its default setting values. Settings for Gotya's camera include:

• Alert On/Off: An aural alert can sound each time something triggers the motion sensor. Turn this feature off for a stealthier surveillance mode.
• Screen Saver Bare or Fake Screen: When y'all hitting the dim button to launch the screen saver you can opt for a blackness screen or fake Windows Phone screen. You tin also Pivot code protect things from prying eyes.
• Scheduler: If you desire to launch the image recording at a specific time during the side by side twenty-4 hours.
• Save Location: This is where y'all desire to save any images captured by Gotya. You can relieve them locally to your Windows Phone or to Gotya'southward deject. Images saved to the cloud are accessible from Gotya's web portal (more on this in a 2d).
• Warning E-mail: Enter an email accost to receive alerts when a photo is captured.

Advanced settings are available to turn on/off the wink, set the resolution of an image (standard or loftier) and set the sensitivity and motion detection values.

At the standard resolution, images are captured from my Nokia Lumia 925 are at 640 ten 480 pixels and those captured at high resolution are at 3264 x 2448 pixels. While the standard resolution was decent, the high resolution is the way to go for decent surveillance photos.

Once you have your Windows Phone positioned in the correct spot (on a tripod, propped in the corner, in a car cradle, etc.) just tap the first push on the camera viewfinder, you will get a v-second countdown and and so anything that breaches your motion detection volition be photographed.

Remote Control

Gotya's remote control feature is a niggling deceptive. You do take the power to command up to four Windows Phone cameras from a Windows Phone or Gotya'due south spider web portal. Command in the sense you lot tin adjust the settings and capture a snap shot from those cameras but at that place is no live view.

It does appear that y'all will receive alerts from the remote controller when an prototype is captured and can review those pictures if saved to the cloud. However, the alerts were not very consequent.

To use the remote controller, gear up up your photographic camera appropriately and so go to either the Gotya web portal or another Windows Phone running Gotya. You volition need to enter your username and password a few times and then you can tweak settings or capture a snapshot from the remotely controlled cameras.

Through the remote controller feature, you lot have access to the full range of settings for the camera. While a Live View feature would do wonders for the remote controller, being able to fine-tune the sensitivity settings remotely is a groovy touch.

I was able to install Gotya on a Nokia Lumia 520 and set the Windows Phone camera near a bird feeder. Gotya captured a wide range of birds partaking in the feeder equally well every bit an annoying squirrel. While epitome quality won't land whatsoever of these images in the most contempo edition of the National Birdwatcher'due south Magazine, they are good plenty to give you an idea of what's going on.

Overall Impressions

I liked the concept backside Gotya but there are some shortfalls to the blueprint. You lot have the obvious issues of leaving your Windows Phone laying around to double as a surveillance camera. I'g fortunate to have a few actress Windows Phones that could be used but how many of you would be able to spare your Windows Phone for a few hours?

So at that place is the battery consumption issue. While Gotya wasn't a major power drain, information technology is going to swallow your battery at a faster clip and any lengthy surveillance time will likely crave an external power source.

Asides from the power and convenience bug, Gotya does a practiced job of capturing images. You lot do have to fine-tune the move detection area to avert hundreds of unnecessary images. I would have similar to have seen a true remote controller with live view merely having the ability to tweak the settings and turn on/off the camera remotely is a plus.

I tin see Gotya coming in handy around the house to catch your teenage child coming in subsequently curfew or to catch the person raiding the fridge in the middle of the night. I could besides see Gotya being used from a motorcar cradle to catch vandals messing with things. Gotya does have room for comeback but as is, it's not too shabby of a surveillance app for Windows Phone.

Gotya is available for low-memory devices.

• Gotya - Windows Phone 8 and 7.x devices - Free - Shop Link

Xbox Insiders Update

This huge Xbox 'Quick Resume' update will requite gamers more than command

Microsoft is calculation a new feature to Xbox consoles, assuasive you to permanently store up to two games in a Quick Resume land at all times. The feature is heading out showtime to Xbox Insiders in the Blastoff testing ring before hitting the full general public.

Source: https://www.windowscentral.com/turning-your-windows-phone-surveillance-camera-gotya

Posted by: readytommand.blogspot.com

Share this post