Cameras
Add camera feeds to a project and place them on pages, next to the equipment they watch.
Cameras let you see a building’s camera feeds alongside its other data — in a list of their own, and placed directly on pages next to the equipment they watch.
A camera in THMI is a still-image feed fetched over HTTP or HTTPS. THMI asks the camera for a fresh snapshot on a fixed interval and swaps the image, rather than opening a continuous video stream. That’s why an RTSP address won’t work here, and why the picture updates in steps rather than moving smoothly.
Adding a camera
Cameras live in the project, under Cameras. A camera has these settings:
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Name | What the camera is called in the list and in the page editor. |
| URL | The address of the camera’s snapshot image. |
| Username (optional) | The camera’s login, if it requires one. |
| Password (optional) | The password for that login. |
| Allow self-signed certificate | Accept an HTTPS certificate the camera signed itself, instead of one from a trusted authority. |
| Update interval | How often a fresh snapshot is fetched, in seconds. Leave it empty for the default of 5 seconds. |
About the URL
The URL must point at the image the camera serves, not at its web interface —
typically a path like /snapshot.jpg or /cgi-bin/… that returns a single
picture each time it’s requested. Check your camera’s manual for its snapshot
URL.
It has to be an http:// or https:// address. The address is checked when you
save, so a malformed one is refused there rather than quietly failing later.
About self-signed certificates
Many cameras ship with an HTTPS certificate they generated themselves, which no browser or server trusts by default. Turn on Allow self-signed certificate for those, otherwise the connection fails. Leave it off for cameras behind a proper certificate — it’s a check you’re deliberately skipping, so only skip it on a network you control.
About the update interval
The interval is the trade-off between how fresh the picture is and how much load you put on the camera and the network. Five seconds suits most overview purposes. Going down to one second gives a near-live picture but asks the camera for five times as many images per minute; older or busier cameras may not keep up, and the feed will start to stutter or drop out.
Connection status
In the camera list and on a camera’s own page, the Connection status is a colored indicator — hover it for the wording:
- Connected — the last request for a snapshot succeeded.
- Camera not available — it didn’t. The address may be wrong, the camera may be off or unreachable from the server, the credentials may be rejected, or an HTTPS certificate may have been refused.
Opening a camera also shows a live Preview underneath its settings, refreshing on the camera’s own update interval. Use it to confirm a new camera works before you put it on a page. If it can’t fetch a picture it says the camera is not available and suggests checking the physical connection and the camera’s own settings.
Cameras on a page
A camera can be placed on a page so the feed appears in context — the plant room camera on the plant room diagram. In the page editor, add it from the Assets menu, then pick which camera it shows in the element’s Source section:
- Camera — which of the project’s cameras this element displays.
- Update interval — how often this element fetches a snapshot.
Picking a camera sets the element’s interval to that camera’s own interval as a starting point. After that the two are independent: changing the camera’s interval under Cameras does not change an element that has already been placed, and vice versa. That’s deliberate — a wall-board page can refresh a camera faster than the camera’s list entry does, or slower to spare a busy network.
If several elements on a page point at the same camera, each fetches its own snapshots, so a page with many camera elements multiplies the load on that camera. Keep the count low and the intervals modest on pages that are left open all day.