Enhanced SCADA video system

Longwatch has added features and functions to its Video System Version 5.0 to make it easier for users to integrate cameras in local and remote areas, combine video data with a wide variety of plant information and enable operators to access video data from HMI terminals, cellphones or on a PC via the internet.

The Video Historian links to the plant’s HMI/SCADA system, making it possible to store video with real-time plant data, so that operators can see what happened during various events.

The enhanced Longwatch Viewer, a web-based user interface, allows live or archived videos to be viewed over the internet on a PC, handheld wireless PDA or a mobile phone. Improvements to the viewer include new viewing, filtering and grouping modes. User Data Field Tagging allows a user to add tags to clips to annotate items such as equipment ID, batch ID, etc. Tag data can be obtained easily via OPC functions.

A digital video recorder function allows a user to search online for any video files stored in the distributed Video Engines, the Video Control Center, or an external computer. A clip on demand function enables an operator to create a video clip from live video via a simple command on the HMI screen.

It provides pan-tilt-zoom for several camera models, including Axis, Pelco and IVC; supports specialty cameras such as the A Series infrared camera from Flir; and supports video analytics from cameras that have the capability. If the camera itself cannot support video analytics, similar capability is provided in the Longwatch Video Engine. Any camera with H.264 video compression protocol and/or HTTP/MJPEG or RTP/RTSP-MPEG4 streaming is also supported.