Celium integration, more battery support and bug fixes.

The newly released software for the DOC AI Cam includes integration with the low bandwidth network Celium, support for a broader range of batteries and bug fixes that improve reliability, including the common 10 minute recordings that happen in low power mode. This includes an updated version of Cacophony Sidekick v3.17.

Celium integration

For those of you that are using the Celium network, the DOC AI Cam now integrates with this network. The camera connects to a Celium node through the blue auxiliary port on the bottom of the camera. When this mode is selected the AI will run on the camera and it will send out a stream of the animals it is seeing in real time. The videos will still be stored on the camera and can be retrieved by using the Sidekick app or connecting the camera to WiFi. Note: the camera needs to be in high power mode for this to work. We plan to support a low and medium power mode in the future. Now we have released this Encounter Solutions will test this and roll it out to their first customers.

To turn on the Celium mode, click on the camera tab, select on-device processing at the bottom, and then select Celium.

Integration with the Celium network allows you to receive reports of what animals have been detected when the camera otherwise has no other connectivity. We plan to include additional features in the near future such as thumbnails of the animals detected.

Support for more batteries

The DOC AI Cam will now display battery percentages and voltages for a wide range of battery types, including Lithium ion (Li-ion), Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePo4), Lithium Polymer (LiPo) and Lead Acid.

The camera will automatically detect the type of battery based on the voltage. If you have a battery supplied by us then it should get this right. Some battery configurations have overlapping voltage so you can manually set the battery chemistry and the number of cells in series. Combined these determine the expected voltage range.

If you think your battery % is reading incorrectly you can see what battery configuration has been automatically detected and change this by clicking on Advanced in the General Tab, then selecting Advanced, then Battery.

This page shows you the current battery voltage, the battery chemistry and number of cells. You can change the chemistry and number of cells in series on this page. Please contact us if you're unsure about this.

You can also see and change this on the Cacophony Portal. By clicking on your device name and selecting Setup.

You can also see your battery voltage, along with the percentage on the device page.

Bug fixes & reliability improvements

The main change you will notice here is that the DOC AI Cam will take a lot fewer 10-minute recordings in low power mode. There was a bug that caused the camera to assume there was motion when there wasn't and the recording would go for the maximum time of 10 minutes. These recordings would take up bandwidth and storage for offline cameras, increasing the time required to download all the recordings to your phone. These 10 minute recordings would also often falsely identify an animal. This fix to remove them should significantly improve the operation of the camera in low power mode.

The other major change you should see with this fix is the camera will be more responsive when you try to connect your phone to it. Before this change, when you turned a camera on that had been in low power mode it would often be busy transferring recording from its low power storage and would be slow to respond the the Cacophony Sidekick app. The camera now prioritises communications with the app, meaning it should be more responsive and quicker to see the camera preview.

The other reliability improvements are behind the scenes and will result in fewer errors. The main impact for you should be improved reliability at detecting animals and making audio recordings. 

We have managed to reduce the size of the software packages significantly. This makes updates faster, saves bandwidth, and gives you a little bit more storage space for recordings.

The update also includes a potential fix to the Wi-Fi issues that were stopping some Android phones from connecting to the camera's Wi-Fi.