WTI has moved its blog!

WTI has moved its blog!

http://gotowti.typepad.com/

WTI has moved, fully, over to TypePad and will no longer be updating the blog here,

Please check out our blog over there – still updated every Wednesday.

Thank you and have a wonderful 2010!

~ The WTI Team

~~**~~**~~

WTI (Wireless Technology, Inc.)

Video Surveillance Products Dedicated to the Broadcast, Global Security and Transportation Markets!

www.gotowti.com ● www.wirelesstech.com

~~**~~**~~

Intelligent Transportation Systems

Did you know that cars pollute the most while sitting idle at intersections waiting for the light to change?



Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) refers to all of the efforts made to the transportation infrastructure. This includes systems that monitor traffic to control the street signals, internal and car-to-car communications, car navigation systems, collision avoidance, crash detection, electronic speed limit signs, speed and red light cameras and other innovative systems to ensure safe driving and keep pollution to a minimum.



Traffic congestion and the rise of new and better technology started the push for real-time control and more efficient traffic solutions.



Traffic control cameras were designed and built to eliminate the much more costly and unreliable induction loops. Induction loops are installed into the road itself and they detect the vehicle’s magnetic field as the vehicle passes over the loop. These systems are quite costly to install since they either have to be put in before asphalt is poured for a street or cut into existing asphalt. These systems are also vulnerable to extreme temperatures – both hot and cold – which can make them fail. Failure means the lights will not change when a vehicle pulls up to it.

Have you ever pulled up to a red light at two in the morning and no matter how long you sit there the light just will not change? That’s a loop failing to sense your car.

In order to overcome these types of problems, video cameras were created with specialized housings, lenses and software to measure traffic flow, automatic incident detection, license plate recognition, and other traffic related issues.

The video systems are totally non-intrusive as they do not require installing any equipment inside the roadbed; instead the cameras are generally mounted at the top of light-poles with the cables being run through existing paths in those poles.

Video from the camera is fed into processors that analyze certain characteristics of the video. They can be set up to detect lane-by-lane vehicle speeds, vehicle counts, lane occupancy, stopped vehicles, vehicles facing the wrong direction and so on. A single video detection processor can detect up to eight simultaneous feeds.



For over 20 years WTI has designed and manufactured innovative ITS systems – from the camera systems to wireless communication devices. For more information on our complete line of solutions check out our web site at www.gotowti.com.

~The WTI Team



~~**~~**~~

WTI (Wireless Technology, Inc.)

Video Surveillance Products Dedicated to the Broadcast, Global Security and Transportation Markets!

www.gotowti.com ● www.wirelesstech.com

~~**~~**~~

Megapixels and CCTV

The word pixel is derived from ‘pix’ (picture) and ‘el’ (element) and is the smallest item of information within an image. Digital images are made up of thousands of these tiny, tile-like picture elements that each records a specific intensity of a single primary color of light (red, green or blue). The more pixels the image has, the higher the image resolution will be. A megapixel (one million pixels) is the term used to describe a large number of pixels in an image, or the number of image sensor elements in a digital camera or the number of display elements in a digital display.

High Definition (HD) is a type of megapixel camera; it’s just that HD is one specific type of megapixel camera in the megapixel family. For example, HD is limited to a maximum resolution of 2.1 megapixels; it has a slower frame rate and an aspect ratio of 16:9. HD is wonderful for certain applications and other types of megapixel cameras offer many more formats, aspect ratios and pixel numbers for other applications.

More and more security professionals are seeing the true value of integrating these high-resolution megapixel surveillance cameras into the existing systems monitoring their facilities. With higher resolution, the camera images are clean and clear which eliminates the need for overlapping camera coverage of areas, reducing the number of cameras needed to cover a single area and generally providing a better overall situational awareness. Combining megapixel cameras with other specialized cameras (such as thermal image, IR or P/T/Z) creates a system that is very effective, reliable, and cost-efficient.

These cameras are definitely a must in applications where details are critical for identification purposes; banks, airports, government facilities and other high-security areas, and also retail locations requiring point-of-sale monitoring are all good examples. With the high resolution and greater image detail, the security personnel can zoom in on specific portions of the recorded, or live, scene to identify objects, individuals or license plate numbers. Megapixel surveillance cameras can cover a wider area with exceptional detail; these cameras can provide detailed information that would be impossible to make out with a standard analog CCTV camera.

If you are concerned with megapixel cameras eating up your DVR/NVR hard drive space – worry not! Megapixel surveillance cameras only take up a little more hard drive space on your NVR/DVR that a standard security camera would.

Transmitting megapixel images via IP also requires a little more bandwidth than a standard analog CCTV camera; however you can minimize this increase by using the 16:9 aspect ratio (unavailable from analog cameras) which eliminates the upper and lower portion of the scene, parts that usually contain unimportant details, thus lowering the amount of bandwidth and storage space taken up by useless data.

Megapixel network cameras have a very important role to play in video surveillance applications, although they are more suited for one location over another, these cameras are easily integrated into existing installations, easily added to new proposals for installations, they are easy to use, they are cost-effective and they provide superior image quality when crystal-clear images are an absolute must.


~The WTI Team



~~**~~**~~

WTI (Wireless Technology, Inc.)

Video Surveillance Products Dedicated to the Broadcast, Global Security and Transportation Markets!

www.gotowti.com ● www.wirelesstech.com

~~**~~**~~

Building a Sidewinder Series ~ Part 1: Hydrophilic Glass

Building a Sidewinder Series ~ The Technology of WTI’s Sidewinder Camera:



Part 1: Hydrophilic Glass

The latest in glass technology are “self-cleaning” and “low-maintenance” window glass, two categories which encompass window glass products that are coated or fused with titanium dioxide (TiO2) alone or with under-layers or silicon dioxide (SiO2).

CVD (Chemical Vapor Disposition) is the process of choice due to the inherent longevity of fusing TiO2 to the glass. TiO2 was chosen for use on WTI’s Sidewinder camera for its combined photocatalytic and hydrophilic properties.


Hydrophilicity – This term describes the property of a surface that makes it have an affinity for water. When water hits hydrophilic glass, it flattens and spreads out to form a thin sheet on the glass surface. This sheeting action not only helps rinse away loosened dirt and other organic material it also minimizes spots and streaks by helping the glass dry more quickly and evenly.

A glass surface is considered to be hydrophilic if the contact angle of a water bead on its surface is less than 20 degrees. In contrast, a hydrophobic surface (which promotes beading like that of a freshly waxed automobile) has a contact angle of more than 60 degrees. The contact angle on ordinary glass measures 20-40 degrees.


Photocatalysis – This term describes the property of a surface which allows it to decompose organic material. On a self-cleaning window, the surface of the glass will help break down loose dirt and other organic material. This allows the sheeting action of the water to more easily rinse loosened dirt away. This property also helps the glass maintain its hydrophilicity (ability to sheet water).





For more information on the Sidewinder camera, please visit us on the web at http://www.gotowti.com/.

High Definition P/T/Z Camera for ENG and Broadcast Applications

WTI’s HD Sidewinder



The new HD Sidewinder camera from Wireless Technology, Inc. offers several unique features that make it particularly well suited to the Mobile ENG and Broadcasting markets.

It's sleek, aerodynamic shape allows it to travel well at freeway speeds on the top of an ENG van. The curved outer housing smoothly directs the airflow over the camera tube at the rear of the camera during travel, preventing the camera faceplate from being damaged or contaminated by bugs, dirt, gravel or rain. The light weight 12.5 pound package, when compared with other P/T/Z cameras, presents much less of a load for camera masts to cope with during vehicle motion with the mast extended.

The pan motion of the camera operates through a continuous 360º, allowing the camera to remain on target, even if the ENG van must be in motion around the scene of the action. The 180º range in the tilt axis allows viewing of objects directly overhead or below as well.

The 1080i/720p resolution of the HD Sidewinder provides exceptional video quality. The HD Sidewinder also allows adjustment of critical camera video parameters such as Gamma and color balance. All of the standard features expected in modern cameras, such as backlight compensation are supported in the camera, as well as a wide selection of exposure modes, like shutter priority, iris priority, manual, spot and bright modes. The native YPbPr video output of the camera can be converted to HD-SDI with an optional interface device.

The HD Sidewinder offers an outstanding combination of features suitable for ENG and broadcast applications at a very affordable price.

~Dale Roche, Director of Engineering