Cameras that produce evidence, not a gray smear at 2 a.m.
Everyone has seen the footage on the news. A shape. A hoodie. A vehicle that could be a sedan or could be a mid-size SUV. The reporter calls it "surveillance video." The detective calls it useless.
Fixed written quote after a free survey — we beat any written competitor quote
Resolution is not the problem. Placement is.
A 4K camera mounted twelve feet up under a soffit, aimed at a driveway, gives you a beautiful high-definition image of the top of somebody's head. That is the single most common mistake in residential video, and it is committed daily by people who bought good hardware and installed it themselves on a Saturday.
Identification happens at face height, roughly five to six feet, at a distance where the face occupies enough pixels to matter. That usually means one camera doing the wide contextual view and one doing the choke point — the gate, the front step, the walkway between the house and the fence where anyone approaching has to pass. Overview and detail. Two cameras placed correctly beat six placed decoratively, every single time.
Night is when it matters, and night is where cheap cameras fail
Roughly two out of three residential break-ins we respond to happen in low light. That is the environment your cameras have to survive, and it is exactly the condition under which the discount hardware falls apart — infrared washing out a face at eight feet, motion detection triggering on moths circling the IR emitter, or worse, nothing triggering at all.
We install cameras with true low-light sensors and, where the site allows, spotlight-assisted color night vision. Color matters more than people expect. "A dark sedan" is not a description. "A maroon four-door with a dealer plate frame and damage to the right rear quarter panel" is the thing that closes a case.
We also tune the analytics. Person and vehicle detection, activity zones drawn around your actual property line and not the street, so your phone stops buzzing every time a neighbor walks a dog. A camera system that cries wolf gets muted within a week, and a muted camera system is a decoration.
Where the video lives
You get a choice, and we will tell you honestly which one fits. Cloud recording is simple, survives the theft of the recorder itself, and costs a monthly fee. Local recording on an NVR is a one-time cost, holds far more history, and keeps your footage on your property. Many of our customers run both: cloud clips for events, local storage for the thirty-day rolling record.
Either way, footage is exportable in a format a detective can actually open, with an intact timestamp. We have handed over enough clips to SAPD and to insurance adjusters to know what they need. It is not a screen recording of a phone app.
What is included
- Overview + choke-point designEvery property gets at least one identification-grade camera at face height.
- Color night visionSpotlight-assisted sensors that capture vehicle color and clothing detail after dark.
- Smart activity zonesPerson and vehicle analytics tuned to your property line so alerts stay meaningful.
- Cloud or on-site NVROr both. We explain the tradeoff honestly and let you decide.
- Weather-rated hardwareIP66/IP67 housings that survive a Hill Country hailstorm and a 105° August.
- Court-ready exportTimestamped files in a format law enforcement and insurers accept.
Questions people actually ask
- How many cameras do I actually need? +
- For most single-family homes, three to five. One at the front approach, one covering the driveway and vehicles, one on the back door or patio slider, and one covering the side gate if you have one. More than that is usually selling, not securing.
- Can I view the cameras from my phone? +
- Yes, live and recorded, on iOS and Android, with the option to share access with a spouse, a neighbor or a property manager without giving up your own credentials.
- Do the cameras keep recording if my internet goes down? +
- With a local NVR, yes — recording continues and syncs when the connection returns. Cloud-only systems will have a gap, which is one of the reasons we often recommend running both.
- Will the cameras work with my existing alarm system? +
- In most cases yes. If your panel is Alarm.com-powered, video and alarm live in one app and one login, and camera clips can be attached to alarm events automatically.
Security Cameras & Video Surveillance across Texas
We install and service this in all four metros, and in every community within fifty miles of downtown San Antonio. Service calls carry no trip charge regardless of how far out the address is.
Free survey · No obligation
Bring us a written quote. We will beat it.
Any competitor, comparable scope, in writing. A licensed technician walks your property, maps the real entry points and gives you a fixed number — whether or not you hire us.
TX DPS PSB Lic. #B16898 · Serving San Antonio, Austin, Houston & Dallas since 2010