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discussion / Camera Traps  / 16 January 2025

Help Needed with Browning BTC-8E-HP5 Trail Camera Video Settings

Carolina Ugarte

Carolina Ugarte

I am a chilean PhD student working on human-carnivore conflict and coexistence. Currently working with camera traps and automated behavioral response systems.
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Hi everyone,

I'm currently using Browning BTC-8E-HP5 trail cameras and programming them to record 30-second video clips with a 1-second delay between recordings. However, I've noticed that instead of consistently capturing 30-second videos, the camera sometimes records videos of varying lengths, including 20, 14, 7, 4, 2, and even 1 second.

Has anyone experienced this issue or can provide guidance on how to fix it? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

Carolina



Robert (Bob) Zak
@rcz133
Camera Trap Technologist at Large
Conversation starter level 2
Commenter level 2
Popular level 1

24 January 2025 9:45pm

Do the short videos happen mostly at night?  If so, this is likely a problem with low batteries.  The higher power required to power the IR flash can cause the camera to shut-down mid-video.

If this is happening with well charged batteries, it sounds like a camera failure (though I have not seen this).

[The factory firmware also limits night video to 20 seconds.  If you want to work around this, I have developed a firmware image that eliminates this limit.  The firmware also contains some other features that you may find useful.  The firmware is available on my github site at: https://github.com/robertzak133/unified-btc-reverse  ]