Camera technology has gone through a revolution in recent years, and today you can cameras in all kinds of shapes and sizes with an almost endless list of features, camera modes, and quality levels. This includes all the different surveillance cameras you can buy for your San Francisco, CA home or business. One of the most popular options today is HD and above image quality, although you can still find plenty of security cameras that deliver SD quality. HD cameras cost more, so what does that extra quality give you? 

Pixel Size 

The main difference between standard definition (SD), high definition (HD), and 4k cameras is the number of vertical pixels in the footage they create. The SD range goes from 144p to 480p, and the HD range is 720p and 1080p. “4k” gets its name from the number of horizontal pixels, so the range actually starts at 2160p and goes up from there.

Detail Level

Every camera of the same basic design will show you the same area if you place them in the same spot. However, a camera with a high resolution can provide more details because it has more pixels for each part of the image. These details can be important when you need to figure out what happened or what someone looked like. 

For instance, imagine you put a camera in your retail store and it can see a shelf towards the back. With a 480p SD camera, that shelf is about 100 pixels across and 50 pixels tall. Each item on that shelf would only be maybe one or two pixels in size, so you’d have a hard time figuring out if something moved or what someone is doing next to it. An HD camera with 1080p would give you more than four times as many pixels, which is enough to make out important details. A 4k camera would quadruple that again. 

Facial Recognition 

Between HD cameras and AI developments, facial recognition has gone from a science fiction concept to a very real way to identify guests, burglars, robbers, and anyone else who steps in front of a camera. Some homeowners have started installing biometric cameras for their homes that use facial recognition software to decide who can enter their home, and police in San Francisco, CA are using facial recognition to spot suspects and track their movements. Even without the fancy software, HD cameras in your workplace will let you clearly identify who is doing what while on screen.

HD is an added expense compared to SD cameras, but the extra image quality is worth it since it lets you identify people close to the camera and keep track of what people are doing on the other side of the room. You may need to pay a little extra to update your surveillance system if you haven’t already, but the benefits are definitely worth the extra costs. Be sure to contact a local security company in San Francisco, CA when you upgrade since they can point you at all the best cameras and help you install them correctly.