Baby camera with a webstream for the grandparents using a Raspberry Pi

Creates an MJPEG stream which can be served via a web domain using Motioneye for Python.
Contains the number of viewers via a text-overlay on the bottom-left.

Buy the hardware

• Raspberry Pi Zero W
• Night Vision Camera
• Articulating mobile phone holder

Install Raspberry Pi OS (Buster)

Download the Rapsberry Pi OS 'Buster' 32-bit version and install it to an SD card. Why not 'Bullseye'? At the time of writing Bullseye changed to a different camera stack which didn't work with the infrared camera I had purchased. I suspect bugs will be ironed out eventually.

• 2021-05-07-raspios-buster-armhf-lite.zip

You can install it to an SD using the Official Raspberry Pi Imager

Configure the software

Boot up, log in, then update everything

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y

Using raspi-config, turn on the Camera module, expand the filesystem and increase the memory allocated to the GPU.

sudo raspi-config

1. Interface > Camera
2. Advanced > Expand Filesystem
3. Performance > GPU > 256

Download this repo by cloning it with git

sudo apt install git -y
mkdir -p ~/babycam
git clone https://github.com/george-edwards-code/babycam.git ~/babycam/

Run the installer

~/babycam/install.sh

Setup cron jobs

crontab -e

Replace crontab with the following

# Edit this file to introduce tasks to be run by cron.
#
# Each task to run has to be defined through a single line
# indicating with different fields when the task will be run
# and what command to run for the task
#
# To define the time you can provide concrete values for
# minute (m), hour (h), day of month (dom), month (mon),
# and day of week (dow) or use '*' in these fields (for 'any').
#
# Notice that tasks will be started based on the cron's system
# daemon's notion of time and timezones.
#
# Output of the crontab jobs (including errors) is sent through
# email to the user the crontab file belongs to (unless redirected).
#
# For example, you can run a backup of all your user accounts
# at 5 a.m every week with:
# 0 5 * * 1 tar -zcf /var/backups/home.tgz /home/
#
# For more information see the manual pages of crontab(5) and cron(8)

SHELL=/bin/bash

# Example of job definition:
# .---------------- minute (0 - 59)
# |  .------------- hour (0 - 23)
# |  |  .---------- day of month (1 - 31)
# |  |  |  .------- month (1 - 12) OR jan,feb,mar,apr ...
# |  |  |  |  .---- day of week (0 - 6) (Sunday=0 or 7) OR sun,mon,tue,wed,thu,fri,sat
# |  |  |  |  |
# *  *  *  *  * user-name  command to be executed

# turn the LED OFF at 8pm each night
  * 20  *  *  * sudo systemctl start babycam-led-disable.service

# turn the LED ON at 6am each day
  *  6  *  *  * sudo systemctl stop babycam-led-disable.service

# reboot the system at 2am each day
  *  2  *  *  * sudo reboot now

Reboot machine

sudo reboot now

Accessing the admin interface and the stream

Admin interface: Username: admin Password: password

http://<ip-address-of-pi>:8765

Stream: Username: stream Password: password

http://<ip-address-of-pi>:8071

I suggest setting a DHCP reservation so your raspberry pi's local IP address doesn't change.

Create a website to allow grandparents access

Register a domain from Google Domains.
Setup a Dynamic DNS 'A' record for your domain. Current instructions can be found here.
Google will issue a random username and password which will be used to update the DNS using client software.

Setup the DNS updating client software on the Raspberry Pi

sudo apt install ddclient -y
# installation comes with a config wizard. Satisfy the wizard with any settings you want, we will overwrite them later.

Configure the client appropriately.

sudo nano /etc/ddclient.conf

Delete everything in that file and replace it with the following, being sure to add your username and password(s) issued by Google

# Configuration file for ddclient generated by debconf
#
# /etc/ddclient.conf

protocol=googledomains
use=web
server=domains.google.com
daemon=100

# yourdomain.com
login=
password=''
yourdomain.com

# www.yourdomain.com
login=
password=''
www.yourdomain.com

Now restart the service

sudo systemctl restart ddclient

And you can test your config using the following:

sudo ddclient -query

And finally, setup a port forward on your home router. Forward all incoming TCP traffic from port 80 to <ip-address-of-pi>:8071.

Infra-red camera fix

If you have an infra-red camera and the picture looks purple/pink, then cleanup the image with the following command and reboot:

sudo systemctl enable babycam-infrared-cleanup.service