Czech Republic Shopping Complex Deploys IP Video System

  • Mar 09, 2010

Excalibur City, a themed shopping and entertainment complex in the Czech Republic, has deployed IndigoVision’s IP video solution to enhance the security for its customers and staff. The new upgrade has transformed the surveillance operation, having replaced poor-performing analog/DVR equipment with a distributed network-based digital video system.

Excalibur City is situated near to Znojmo on the border between the Czech Republic and Austria and is home to specialized shops, restaurants, wellness centers, Children’s World and the duty-free outlet ‘EXCALIBUR Free Shop.’

The project also includes the monitoring of a new satellite shopping centre located 18 miles away on a different border crossing. The 130 camera system was specified and installed by IndigoVision’s local approved Partner, KPZ electronics s.r.o.

“We set out very demanding requirements for the new CCTV system,” said Dalibor Perinka, facilities manager at Excalibur City. “The original cameras were to be reused; the images had to be indistinguishable from high-quality analog pictures and be recorded for a minimum of three months; transmission from the satellite shopping centre was not to affect the picture quality or frame-rate; the operators interface had to be intuitive and simple to use and the system had be able to be easily and cost-effectively expanded in the future. Following a live demonstration from competing vendors, IndigoVision was chosen as they were the only company that could meet all of these essential requirements.”

Excalibur City faced many problems with its old CCTV system. The images were poor quality and recorded video held very little useful information. The DVR storage capacity was small and the control room equipment consisted of many different monitors and control units. However, one of their biggest problems was the cost and quality issues associated with relaying video from the new satellite centre 18 miles away, using a leased line. All of these issues have now been solved with the upgrade.

Operators use PC workstations running ‘Control Center’, IndigoVision’s Security Management Software, to view live and recorded video. These workstations have replaced all of the original outdated control room equipment and because the system is fully distributed, workstations are also located on the desks of the facilities manager and the head of security.

IndigoVision’s advanced H.264 based compression technology allows high-quality video to be streamed across the network with minimal bandwidth requirement, allowing video from the satellite store to be displayed alongside the local cameras without any degradation. This also allowed the entire system to be implemented on the center’s existing IT network, eliminating the old coax cable and removing the need to install new wiring.

“The features offered by ‘Control Center’ have transformed the way we use the CCTV system,” Perinka said. “The use of an interactive map allows us to easily select the right cameras and we can quickly find clips from the recorded video using the advanced motion search facilities. In the event of an incident we can export evidential quality video for the police.”

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