AXIS XPQ1785 Explosion-Protected Camera

To find Axis devices on the network and assign them IP addresses in Windows®, use AXIS IP Utility or AXIS Device Manager. Both applications are free and can be downloaded from axis.com/support.

For more information about how to find and assign IP addresses, go to How to assign an IP address and access your device.

You can use the device with the following browsers:

If you need more information about recommended browsers, go to axis.com/browser-support.

1. Open a browser and type the IP address or host name of the Axis device.

   If you don’t know the IP address, use AXIS IP Utility or AXIS Device Manager to find the device on the network.

2. Type the username and password. If you access the device for the first time, you must create an administrator account. See Create an administrator account.

For descriptions of all features and settings in the web interface of devices with AXIS OS, see AXIS OS web interface help.

The first time you log in to your device, you must create an administrator account.

1. Enter a username.

2. Enter a password. See Secure passwords.

3. Re-enter the password.

4. Accept the license agreement.

5. Click Add account.

The device password is the primary protection for your data and services. Axis devices do not impose a password policy as they may be used in various types of installations.

To protect your data we strongly recommend that you:

• Use a password with at least 8 characters, preferably created by a password generator.

• Don’t expose the password.

• Change the password at a recurring interval, at least once a year.

This video gives you an overview of the device’s web interface.

Preview mode is ideal for installers when fine tuning the camera view during the installation. No login is required to access the camera view in preview mode. It is available only in factory defaulted state for a limited time from powering up the device.

This section includes instructions about configuring your device. If you want to learn more about how certain features work, go to Learn more.

To improve image quality for specific surveillance scenes, use exposure modes. Exposure modes lets you control aperture, shutter speed, and gain. Go to Video > Image > Exposure and select between the following exposure modes:

• For most use cases, select Automatic exposure.

• For environments with certain artificial lighting, for example fluorescent lighting, select Flicker-free.

  Select the same frequency as the power line frequency.

• For environments with certain artificial light and bright light, for example outdoors with fluorescent lighting at night and sun during daytime, select Flicker-reduced.

  Select the same frequency as the power line frequency.

• To lock the current exposure settings, select Hold current.

To reduce noise in low-light conditions, you can adjust one or more of the following settings:

• Adjust the trade-off between noise and motion blur. Go to Video > Image > Exposure and move the Blur-noise trade-off slider toward Low noise.

• Set the exposure mode to automatic.

• Note

  A high max shutter value can result in motion blur.

• To slow down the shutter speed, set max shutter to the highest possible value.

• Note

  When you reduce the max gain, the image can become darker.

• Set the max gain to a lower value.

• If there is an Aperture slider, move it towards Open.

• Reduce sharpness in the image, under Video > Image > Appearance.

• Go to Video > Stream > General and set the compression as low as possible.

• Below the live view image, click and in Video format, select MJPEG.

• Go to Video > Stream > Zipstream and select Off.

Dynamic range is the difference in light levels in an image. In some cases the difference between the darkest and the brightest areas can be significant. The result is often an image where either the dark or the bright areas are visible. Wide dynamic range (WDR) makes both dark and bright areas of the image visible.

1. Go to Video > Image > Wide dynamic range.

2. If you still have problems, go to Exposure and adjust the Exposure zone to cover the area of interest.

Find out more about WDR and how to use it at axis.com/web-articles/wdr.

Image stabilization is suitable in environments where the product is mounted in an exposed location where vibrations can occur, for example, due to wind or passing traffic.

The feature makes the image smoother, steadier, and less blurry. It also reduces the file size of the compressed image and lowers the bitrate of the video stream.

1. Go to Video > Installation > Image correction.

2. Turn on Image stabilization.

You can add an image as an overlay in the video stream.

1. Go to Video > Overlays.

2. Click Manage images.

3. Upload or drag and drop an image.

4. Click Upload.

5. Select Image from the drop-down list and click .

6. Select the image and a position. You can also drag the overlay image in the live view to change the position.

You can show the pan or tilt position as an overlay in the image.

1. Go to Video > Overlays and click .

2. In the text field, type #x to show the pan position.

   Type #y to show the tilt position.

3. Choose appearance, text size, and alignment.

4. The current pan and tilt positions show up in the live view image and in the recording.

A guard tour displays the video stream from different preset positions either in a predetermined or random order, and for configurable periods of time.

1. Go to PTZ > Guard tours.

2. Click Guard tour.

3. Select Preset position and click Create.

4. Under General settings:

5. • Enter a name for the guard tour and specify the pause length between each tour.

   • If you want the guard tour to go to the preset positions in a random order, turn on Play guard tour in random order.

6. Under Step settings:

7. • Set the duration for the preset.

   • Set the move speed, which controls how fast to move to the next preset.

8. Go to Preset positions.

9. 1. Select the preset positions that you want in your guard tour.

   2. Drag them to the View order area, and click Done.

10. To schedule the guard tour, go to System > Events.

This section includes instructions about configuring your device. To learn more about how streaming and storage works, go to Streaming and storage.

1. Go to Video > Stream.

2. Click in the live view.

3. Select Video format AV1 if your device supports it. Otherwise select H.264.

4. Go to Video > Stream > General and increase Compression.

5. Go to Video > Stream > Zipstream and do one or more of the following:

6. • Select the Zipstream Strength that you want to use.

   • Turn on Optimize for storage. This can only be used if the video management software supports B-frames.

   • Turn on Dynamic FPS.

   • Turn on Dynamic GOP and set a high Upper limit GOP length value.

1. To store recordings on the network, you need to set up your network storage.

2. Go to System > Storage.

3. Click Add network storage under Network storage.

4. Type the IP address of the host server.

5. Type the name of the shared location on the host server under Network share.

6. Type the username and password.

7. Select the SMB version or leave it on Auto.

8. Select Add share without testing if you experience temporary connection issues, or if the share is not yet configured.

9. Click Add.

1. Record video directly from the camera

2. Go to Video > Stream.

3. To start a recording, click .

   If you haven’t set up any storage, click and . For instructions on how to set up network storage, see Set up network storage

4. To stop recording, click again.

1. Watch video

2. Go to Recordings.

3. Click for your recording in the list.

You can create rules to make your device perform an action when certain events occur. A rule consists of conditions and actions. The conditions can be used to trigger the actions. For example, the device can start a recording or send an email when it detects motion, or show an overlay text while the device is recording.

To learn more, see Get started with rules for events.

1. Go to System > Events and add a rule. The rule defines when the device will perform certain actions. You can set up rules as scheduled, recurring, or manually triggered.

2. Enter a Name.

3. Select the Condition that must be met to trigger the action. If you specify more than one condition for the rule, all of the conditions must be met to trigger the action.

4. Select which Action to perform when the conditions are met.

This example explains how to set up the camera to start recording to the SD card when the camera detects an object. The recording will include five seconds before detection and one minute after detection ends.

Before you start:

• Make sure you have an SD card installed.

1. Make sure that AXIS Video Motion Detection is running:

2. Go to Apps > AXIS Video Motion Detection.

3. Start the application if it is not already running.

4. Make sure you have set up the application according to your needs.

1. Create a rule:

2. Go to System > Events and add a rule.

3. Type a name for the rule.

4. In the list of conditions, under Application, select VMD4.

5. In the list of actions, under Recordings, select Record video while the rule is active.

6. In the list of storage options, select SD_DISK.

7. Select a camera and a stream profile.

8. Set the prebuffer time to 5 seconds.

9. Set the postbuffer time to 1 minute.

10. Click Save.

Shock detection allows the camera to detect tampering caused by vibrations or shock. Vibrations due to the environment or to an object can trigger an action depending on the shock sensitivity range, which can be set from 0 to 100. In this scenario, someone is throwing rocks at the camera after hours and you would like to get a video clip of the event.

1. Turn on shock detection:

2. Go to System > Detectors > Shock detection.

3. Turn on shock detection, and adjust the shock sensitivity.

4. Create a rule:

5. Go to System > Events > Rules and add a rule.

6. Type a name for the rule.

7. In the list of conditions, under Device status, select Shock detected.

8. Click + to add a second condition.

9. In the list of conditions, under Scheduled and recurring, select Schedule.

10. In the list of schedules, select After hours .

11. In the list of actions, under Recordings, select Record video while the rule is active.

12. Select where to save the recordings.

13. Select a Camera.

14. Set the prebuffer time to 5 seconds.

15. Set the postbuffer time to 50 seconds.

16. Click Save.

To read about all the features and settings available in the web interface of devices with AXIS OS, go to AXIS OS web interface help.

What capture mode to choose depends on the requirements for the frame rate and resolution of the specific surveillance setup. For specifications about available capture modes, see the product’s datasheet at axis.com.

Overlays are superimposed over the video stream. They are used to provide extra information during recordings, such as a timestamp, or during product installation and configuration. You can add either text or an image.

A guard tour displays the video stream from different preset positions either in a predetermined or random order, and for configurable periods of time. Once started, a guard tour continues to run until stopped, even when there are no clients (web browsers) viewing the images.

Decide which compression method to use based on your viewing requirements, and on the properties of your network. The available options are:

Motion JPEG

Motion JPEG, or MJPEG, is a digital video sequence that is made up of a series of individual JPEG images. These images are then displayed and updated at a rate sufficient to create a stream that shows constantly updated motion. For the viewer to perceive motion video the rate must be at least 16 image frames per second. Full motion video is perceived at 30 (NTSC) or 25 (PAL) frames per second.

The Motion JPEG stream uses considerable amounts of bandwidth, but provides excellent image quality and access to every image contained in the stream.

H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10/AVC

H.264 can, without compromising image quality, reduce the size of a digital video file by more than 80% compared to the Motion JPEG format and by as much as 50% compared to older MPEG formats. This means that less network bandwidth and storage space are required for a video file. Or seen another way, higher video quality can be achieved for a given bitrate.

The Image tab contains camera settings that affect all video streams from the product. If you change something in this tab, it immediately affects all video streams and recordings.

The Stream tab contains settings for video streams. You get these settings if you request a video stream from the product and don’t specify for example resolution, or frame rate. When you change the settings in the Stream tab, it doesn’t affect ongoing streams, but it will take effect when you start a new stream.

The Stream profiles settings override the settings from the Stream tab. If you request a stream with a specific stream profile, the stream contains the settings of that profile. If you request a stream without specifying a stream profile, or request a stream profile that doesn't exist in the product, the stream contains the settings from the Stream tab.

Bitrate control helps you to manage the bandwidth consumption of your video stream.

Variable bitrate (VBR)
Variable bitrate allows the bandwidth consumption to vary depending on the level of activity in the scene. The more activity, the more bandwidth you need. With variable bitrate you are guaranteed constant image quality, but you need to make sure you have storage margins.

Maximum bitrate (MBR)
Maximum bitrate lets you set a target bitrate to handle bitrate limitations in your system. You might see a decline in image quality or frame rate as the instantaneous bitrate is kept below the specified target bitrate. You can choose to prioritize either image quality or frame rate. We recommend that you configure the target bitrate to a higher value than the expected bitrate. This gives you a margin in case there is a high level of activity in the scene.

Average bitrate (ABR)
With average bitrate, the bitrate is automatically adjusted over a longer period of time. This is so you can meet the specified target and provide the best video quality based on your available storage. Bitrate is higher in scenes with a lot of activity, compared to static scenes. You are more likely to get better image quality when in scenes with a lot of activity if you use the average bitrate option. You can define the total storage required to store the video stream for a specified amount of time (retention time) when image quality is adjusted to meet the specified target bitrate. Specify the average bitrate settings in one of the following ways:

• To calculate the estimated storage need, set the target bitrate and the retention time.

• To calculate the average bitrate, based on available storage and required retention time, use the target bitrate calculator.

• 1. Target bitrate
  2. Actual average bitrate
• You can also turn on maximum bitrate and specify a target bitrate within the average bitrate option.
• 1. Target bitrate
  2. Actual average bitrate

With analytics and apps you can get more out of your Axis device. AXIS Camera Application Platform (ACAP) is an open platform that makes it possible for third parties to develop analytics and other apps for Axis devices. Apps can be preinstalled on the device, available for download for free, or for a license fee.

To find the user manuals for Axis analytics and apps, go to help.axis.com.

Smoke alert is a video analytics feature for smoke and flame detection. It enables the camera to detect and locate fire incidents through continuous real time analysis of the video stream. Upon detection, smoke alert can push live video to security staff, activate speakers, start a video recording, or respond in whatever way the user has set up.

To minimize the risk for false alarms, there are a few things to consider:

• Make sure there are sufficient contrasts in the scene. Avoid white walls or large areas without contrast.

• Avoid a combination of extreme dark spots and extreme bright spots in the scene.

• Avoid direct sunlight or bright reflections of the sun falling straight into the lens.

• Smoke detection require some light in the scene. Flame detection works good in complete dark environment.

1. Go to Apps.

2. Go to Smoke alert and turn on smoke alert. You may need to wait for a few minutes for smoke alert to calibrate.

1. Go to Apps > Smoke alert and click Open.

2. Go to Settings.

3. Go to Smoke alarm or Flame alarm and turn on one or both alarms.

4. Set the smoke and flame sensitivity to match your environment. The sensitivity level determines how easily an alarm is triggered. The higher the value, the more sensitive the detection becomes.

5. To avoid false alarms due to short disturbances in the scene, set the alarm delay to match your environment. An alarm will be triggered after it has been identified for the specified amount of time.

6. Click Save.

You can add a text overlay that shows the smoke alert status in the video stream.

1. Go to Video > Overlays.

2. Select Text and click .

3. In the text field, type #D1 to show the smoke alert status.
   Type %F %X to show the date and time.

4. Select a position for your overlay. You can also drag the overlay text field in the live view to change the position.

You can add an overlay to the video stream to indicate where the smoke or flames are. The overlay is shown as a bounding box that dynamically changes as the incident zone grows or shrinks.

1. Go to Apps > Smoke alert and click Open.

2. Go to Settings.

3. Go to General and turn on Overlay.

4. Click Save.

To limit the detection to certain zones, you can set up one or more detection zones.

1. Click and select Legacy device interface.

2. Go to PTZ > Preset positions.

3. Click to create a preset position.

4. Go to Apps > Smoke alert and click Open.

5. Go to DetectionZone.

6. Draw a polygon detection zone with a minimum of three points. Left-click to add a point. Right-click to close the polygon. You can add one or more detection zones.

7. Click Save.

You can reset parameters to factory default through the web interface. Go to Maintenance > Factory default and click Default.

Axis offers device software management according to either the active track or the long-term support (LTS) tracks. Being on the active track means continuously getting access to all the latest product features, while the LTS tracks provide a fixed platform with periodic releases focused mainly on bug fixes and security updates.

Using AXIS OS from the active track is recommended if you want to access the newest features, or if you use Axis end-to-end system offerings. The LTS tracks are recommended if you use third-party integrations, which are not continuously validated against the latest active track. With LTS, the products can maintain cybersecurity without introducing any significant functional changes or affecting any existing integrations. For more detailed information about Axis device software strategy, go to axis.com/support/device-software.

Firmware is the software that determines the functionality of network devices. One of your first actions when troubleshooting a problem should be to check the current firmware version. The latest version may contain a correction that fixes your particular problem.

To check the current firmware:

1. Go to the product’s webpage.

2. Click the help menu .

3. Click About.

AXIS Device Manager can be used for multiple upgrades. Find out more at axis.com/products/axis-device-manager.

1. Download the firmware file to your computer, available free of charge at axis.com/support/firmware.

2. Log in to the product as an administrator.

3. Go to Settings > System > Maintenance. Follow the instructions on the page. When the upgrade has finished, the product restarts automatically.

If you can’t find what you’re looking for here, try the troubleshooting section at axis.com/support.

When you set up your system, it’s important to consider how different settings and situations affect performance. Some factors affect bandwidth (bitrate), others affect frame rate, and some affect both.

The most important factors to consider:

• High image resolution or lower compression levels result in images containing more data which in turn affects the bandwidth.

• Rotating the image in the GUI can increase the product's CPU load.

• Access by large numbers of Motion JPEG clients or unicast H.264/H.265/AV1 clients affects the bandwidth.

• Simultaneous viewing of different streams (resolution, compression) by different clients affects both frame rate and bandwidth.

  Use identical streams wherever possible to maintain a high frame rate. Stream profiles can be used to ensure that streams are identical.

• Accessing video streams with different codecs simultaneously affects both frame rate and bandwidth. For optimal performance, use streams with the same codec.

• Heavy usage of event settings affects the product’s CPU load which in turn affects the frame rate.

• Using HTTPS may reduce frame rate, in particular if streaming Motion JPEG.

• Heavy network utilization due to poor infrastructure affects the bandwidth.

• Viewing on poorly performing client computers lowers perceived performance and affects frame rate.

• Running multiple AXIS Camera Application Platform (ACAP) applications simultaneously may affect the frame rate and the general performance.

If you need more help, go to axis.com/support.