Show HN: Clearcam – Add AI Object Detection to Your IP CCTV Cameras in a Minute
39 comments
·August 24, 2025snickerdoodle12
how does this compare with frigate?
diggan
User of Frigate here. Seems these are some pretty major differences of what you can do for free with Frigate, but if you use Clearcam, you need to pay for "Clearcam Premium":
- View your live camera feeds remotely.
- Receive notifications on events (objects/people detected).
- View event clips remotely.
- End-to-end encryption on all data.
What neither of the solutions seem to have, is encryption at rest. But I guess others, just like me, rather encrypt the volume/storage itself, instead of leaving it up to applications anyways, so might/might not matter for you.
sugarpimpdorsey
it's AGPL so you have to give anyone that views your camera feeds a copy of the source
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roryclear
fewer features, easier setup, with more GPUs supported. (I've not used frigate myself though, only watched videos)
diggan
Where can I find the list of supported GPUs? Frigate been able to handle everything I've tried so far, all from Nvidia and AMD GPUs to even Intel iGPUs.
serf
same here -- it's also among one of the only things to support Coral devices and RPi video cores.
I would imagine any GPGPU compute-capable pre-CUDA thing probably won't cut it.
d0ugal
I have used Frigate for years, I think early on it didn't support all of those GPUs. So it might be that said videos are out of date.
bdcravens
Am I reading your README correct, that in order to sign up to use the app on Android, you have to install and sign up using an iOS device (using Apple's payment system) and then login on Android using the credentials you created?
roryclear
Yeah sorry that’s confusing, I need to change or remove it until I’ve a payment system setup.
There is an unfinished but functional APK and android project in the repo, but it’s not on the Google Play store yet, their approval process for new individual devs is long
BubbleRings
So the app is free to download from the Apple site, and will run free, and is open source, but you have in-app purchases, and certain features can’t be used until you pay for them, is that right?
What are the paid features and what are the costs? Do I have to install the app to see the list of paid features and costs?
You might get a better response from HN if you give us more info up front.
roryclear
Paid features are Live and event clip viewing over the internet, and receiving iOS notifications. You're paying for use of my server in those cases though, not for features I've made closed source. You can edit the code to use your own server if you wish too.
I'm new to HN and thought shilling the paid stuff violates the rules, so I didn't mention them.
lukan
"I'm new to HN and thought shilling the paid stuff violates the rules, so I didn't mention them."
HN ain't a non profit charity, but is the forum of a venture capitalist company, so talking about paid things does not violate any rules.
all2
Paying for things does cause some folks to champ at the bit, though, so his assessment is not unwarranted.
jdiaz97
BoquilaHUB also does this, but with Rust: https://github.com/boquila/boquilahub/
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waschl
Anyone can recommend a good quality camera without spyware and ideally open sw stack. I am willing to do it myself with little soldering etc. that’s one rabbit hole didn’t enter yet
dns_snek
Depending on your definition of "good quality", you might find this project useful: https://thingino.com/
Most cameras on that list are low cost, typically with 4-5MP sensors. They don't compete on the high end in terms of image quality but you will have an open source firmware stack with root access over SSH.
Models from Eufy, Cinnado, Jooan, TP-Link, WUUK, Galayou are relatively easy to source on Amazon or Aliexpress.
giobox
The best option is just to assume any IPCam is unsafe and firewall them off in my experience; even with a fully open source camera stack connecting it directly to internet is not that great a practice. Put them on a no internet access VLAN and you can largely buy whatever cheap IPCams you want, etc etc. If you want remote access you should expose the server running the camera management software/NVR securely, not the cams.
This is basically how I run Frigate at home today, with only the NVR able to reach the camera IPs on my no web access “internet of nothing” VLAN.
mysteria
It's not open source but used Axis cameras are pretty cheap and have rtsp and onvif support. Those mostly come from commercial installs and can be configured offline using a web interface.
biinjo
What about the Ubiquity gear? It’s maybe not AS open as you would prefer but no spyware and required cloud services is a big win in my book.
kandelabr
Dauha - https://www.a1securitycameras.com/dahua/hd-cctv/security-cam....
There are bunch of small brands that sell excellent cheap devices with sane firmware, and a few more popular ones who will make your life hell. Blue Iris or Frigate for the NVR software.
This thread is a good reference: https://www.reddit.com/r/SecurityCamera/comments/1lesio1/wha...
awaseem
This is sick! Thanks for open sourcing it!
djfobbz
How come you didn't write the iOS version in Swift?
imglorp
Do we still call it CCTV if it's an IP network?
schobi
Closed circuit television (CCTV) is a term to describe video transmission that is not broadcast. Traditionally with BNC cables going to a control room, monitors and recorders.
I think this software-only post is meant for IP cameras / surveillance cameras. Internet is the oposite of closed circuit.
Maybe CCTV is used as a synonym for surveillance now in some regions of the world, but certainly confusing for a non-native speaker.
diggan
> I think this software-only post is meant for IP cameras / surveillance cameras. Internet is the oposite of closed circuit.
I think in this case, IP is referring to IP from TCP/IP, meaning "The Internet Protocol", not necessarily over/through "public internet links", so as long as you're only within your own local network/WAN, wouldn't that still be CCTV then? Or maybe the "closed circuit" thing is more of a physical property than I read it to be?
I'm also non-native English speaker FWIW.
loloquwowndueo
You can use IP on a LAN with no outside access.
jsheard
It's even recommended when building out a CCTV system with cheap Chinese IP cameras that like to phone home all the time. Stick 'em on a VLAN which can't access anything besides your local NVR.
teddyh
“CCTV” has better optics than “surveillance camera”.
number6
Are there models that accurately register bullet impacts and calculate scores on shooting targets?
This runs YOLOv8 + bytetrack with Tinygrad detections (depending on user config) are saved and can be sent to the companion iOS app along with a notification, all video processing is done locally, all footage is encrypted before leaving your computer, and the sending notifications + videos part is optional. This uses tinygrad, so it runs well on my apple silicon macs and should be able to run on a lot of hardware (or will be able to when I remove other deps).