How to Create Alerts

Four types of alerts are available:

Camera Disconnect:  this alert will automatically notify you if a camera is disconnected for some time

Motion Event: this alert will automatically notify you when a camera detects any kind of motion

People Detection: this alert will automatically notify you when a camera detects people

Vehicle Detection: this alert will automatically notify you when a camera detects vehicles

Setting up Alerts

To get started, click on Alerts at the top bar of the dashboard, and then click Create a New Alert button.

On the next page, you're able to select which of the four alert types you'd like to create. Let's dive into what all of them do:

✔️ Camera Disconnect: Camera Disconnect notifies you when any of your chosen cameras go down after a set period of time. We know that occasionally, accidents like power outages happen so we have a powerful feature called Event Trigger Threshold which minimizes false positives so you focus on incidents like camera tampering.

✔️ Motion Event: Motion Event notifies you when any of your chosen cameras detect motion within a set period of time. You're able to set an Alert Time Range for these types of alerts, which means you will only get notifications for motion events that happen during days and times you set, such as after hours, or on weekend.

✔️ People Detection: People Detection sends an alert whenever people are detected in view of the camera.  This alert differs from Motion Event as it works whether the person is moving or not.  Similarly to Motion Event alerts, People Detection can be setup only for specific days and times.  One powerful use case is to setup People Detection to monitor for people entering rooms/areas after hours.

✔️ Vehicle Detection: Vehicle Detection sends an alert whenever vehicles are detected in view of the camera.  This alert differs from a Motion Event as it works whether the vehicle is moving or not.  Similarly to Motion Event alerts, Vehicle Detection can be set up only for specific days and times.  

Configuring Camera Disconnect Alerts

To create a camera disconnect alert, make sure you have Camera Disconnect selected under alert type, then give it a name.

Underneath that, you’re able to choose if you want a once-a-day summary notification or to be notified for each alert.

Event Trigger Threshold is where you can choose how long you want your cameras to be down for before you get notified. You can set this anywhere from 10 minutes to 12 hours. Choose what works best for you (we recommend 10 minutes), and click Next.

In this step, you can select which cameras you’d like to be notified of. Click the blue Camera Select button and the panel on the right containing all your cameras and locations will pop up.

You can click any amount of cameras at any of your sites to create this alert on them. Note the drop-down box on the top that lets you toggle between locations. Once you're done selecting your cameras, click on the arrow to the left of the panel to close it, and click the blue Next button.

In this step, you’ll be able to select what types of alerts you would like to receive: a daily email summary that's sent out to you each day or instant alerts via email, text message, or push notification on the SpotApp. Additionally, you have the option to add multiple users you would like to receive these alerts as well.

Once you’re done, click the blue Create Alert button. Congratulations, you've just set up a camera disconnect alert! 

Configuring Motion, Vehicle and Person Alerts

To create an alert for Motion, Vehicle or Person, select the corresponding Alert type from the pull-down menu and name it. 

For the following example we will show a People alert:

In this step, you can select which cameras you'd like to be sending you alerts.  Click the blue Camera Select button and the panel on the right containing all your cameras and locations will pop up.

You can click one or multiple cameras, though we recommend a small number of cameras to keep the number of alerts reasonable.  Note the drop-down box on the top that lets you toggle between locations.

Once you select a camera, you have the option of specifying which zone within the view of the camera you would like to monitor.  You will only receive notifications when objects or motion are detected within this zone.  This is very helpful to make the alert most specific and reduce the number of less relevant alerts.  You can draw a zone with your mouse, or select a pre-existing zone that you drew earlier.

Once you're done selecting your cameras and zones, click on the arrow to the left of the panel to close it, and click the blue Next button.

In this step, you're able to select an Alert Day and Time Range. This is where you choose which time of day and day(s) of the week are relevant for this alert.  In this example, since this I named this Weekend Alert, I’ll only select all of Saturday and Sunday. Note that the selected days will be highlighted in blue.

Once you've selected which time of day and day of the week you want to be alerted for motion, click the blue Next button.

In this step, you'll be able to select which users you would like to get notified for those alerts. For each of the users, you can choose whether they receive a email with daily summary of alerts or instant email, text message, and push notifications on the SpotApp. This permits each user to receive alerts in the format they prefer. Additionally, you have the option to add multiple users who you would like to receive these alerts as well.

Step Two

Once you're in the Configure Alerts page, you will have to option to turn off/on your existing alerts by clicking on the slider on the right. If you want to modify an alert that was previously created click on the existing alert and it'll direct you to it.

After you're in the alert page that you want to edit, simply make any changes you want and click save.

P.S.: Be sure to check out your Tutorials section in your dashboard for a virtual walkthrough!