360 Vision Technology, the UK manufacturer of ruggedised HD, radar and thermal PTZ imaging cameras, has enabled a flexible, CCTV town centre network extension and replacement programme for Plymouth City Council.

'Starting over 2 years ago, 360 Vision has assisted us to make a painless transition from an analogue camera network to an IP one, by the use of their clever Invictus Hybrid camera technology,' says Stuart Venn, CCTV & Street Lighting Engineer, Street Services, Plymouth City Council. 'To explain, at the time, we were operating a completely analogue network and needed to replace some of our cameras that were beginning to fail. However, we didn’t want to just replace them with the same style of analogue technology, because we had a long-term vision to upgrade to completely IP transmission, once funding and the right technology became available.

'Additionally, and ideally, we wanted a solution we could apply piecemeal, one area at a time, in our vast system. Not only would budgets not allow us to replace the entire camera network in one hit, but we could not afford the system downtime that switching all the network to IP transmission in one go would require.

'So, to bridge the gap and having consulted with camera manufacturers at the time, we found 360 Vision Technology offered the only system that would fit the bill for us, and therefore deployed the innovative 360 Vision Invictus camera, with its high-performance Hybrid technology. This enabled us to procure replacement analogue cameras with all the modern functionality and quality we required, but with the built-in capability to turn them into IP transmission devices, literally, at the flick of a switch once our network had become IP ready.

'Additionally, as well as transmission, we were also looking to update our control room VMS to IP technology, so the ability to "switch" our new cameras’ transmission when we did this was critical to the project.

'The Invictus Hybrid camera technology has proved to be a great solution for us, that really has bridged the gap between the analogue and IP transmission worlds and importantly, meant that we didn’t waste investment on new analogue only cameras that would eventually be replaced long before the end of their service life.

'To date in this rolling project, we have installed 70 Invictus Hybrid cameras across the network, updating an area at a time as and when necessary and our budgets allowed. This meant that we had several small projects of camera replacement, instead of one big one.'

'Each time a camera was replaced, we instantly saw a vast improvement in image quality, with more detail and ease of control for operators. An IP network brings recording and playback benefits too. With an IP network with digital recording, we can send images to other agencies such as Police and departments instantly, dramatically improving our response to incidents and continually improving our service.'

Jason Wyatt, National Account Manager at 360 Vision Technology says: 'Using the Invictus Ruggedised Hybrid PTZ camera in its true dual Hybrid mode (video and control), has allowed Plymouth City Council to add new, cutting-edge camera surveillance to their existing analogue system over the years, without the requirement for an immediate infrastructure upgrade. As their existing infrastructure changes to IP, the council can benefit from stunning HD imaging and IP control at the flick of a switch, with no other camera hardware changes involved.'

For more information on the 360 Vision Technology’s range of ruggedised HD, hybrid, radar, thermal imaging cameras, customers can contact 360 Vision Technology on +44 (0)1928 570000, email: info@360visiontechnology.com, or visit their website at www.360visiontechnology.com