PSA: The $20 Wyze cam v3 hack for night vision actually worked

Been trying to get decent night footage from my homemade trail cam setup for ages, everything was too grainy. Finally swapped the IR filter on a Wyze cam v3 with a piece of developed 35mm film negative from an old roll I had lying around. The clarity at 15 feet in my backyard in Austin last Tuesday was insane, way better than that $50 module I returned. Anyone else found a cheap material that beats the expensive IR glass?

3 comments

3 Comments

river9522d ago

Oh, I actually saw something about this on a DIY electronics forum last week. Someone was using an old photographic filter from the 90s and getting better results than the purpose-built IR glass from Amazon. Made me dig out my old camera bag to see what I had.

sean_green442d ago

Honestly, that's exactly what happened to me a while back. I was messing around with a cheap IR filter I got off ebay and it was just terrible, all washed out and blurry. Then I remembered I had this old Hoya R72 filter my dad gave me that he used for black and white film back in the day. Slapped it on my digital camera and the shots came out way sharper with way less color cast than the new one. Ngl, it felt like cheating, but it worked so much better.

susansingh2d ago

Totally agree, and honestly its not just filters. I noticed the same thing with old audio gear, like my dads vintage microphone sounds way warmer than anything I can buy new under $200. Feels like companies figured out how to make stuff just good enough to sell, but the real quality was from when they actually cared. Made me start checking thrift stores for old electronics instead of ordering new ones.