Bosch MIC IP Fusion 9000i is another spectacular camera from Bosch. It combines all the power of the MIC IP 7000i optical PTZ with an integrated thermal camera. But what makes it special is that the 9000i synthesizes these camera inputs using metadata, making the transition between thermal and optical viewing operationally seamless and supporting one technology with the other inside the management system.
The first question I ask myself when looking at the 9000i on the balcony outside the Bosch Experience Centre at Baulkham Hills in Sydney is what’s different? Certainly, the appearance of the MIC 9000i is bulkier than the 7000i mounted beside it. The 9000i is taller and has wider shoulders to cater for optical and thermal camera systems. But it’s when you start mining the 9000i specifications list that the power and depth of this solution become apparent. The functionalities are deep and wide.
Look at the wide angle at top – this corner of the walkway is centre right, far end of the lake.
During the test, daytime performance is very strong, which is just as I expected. The scene really allows an operator to make the most of all the digital zoom, to take advantage of compression. PTZ performance is rock solid and the autofocus charges along behind with virtually no latency at all.
Night performance as we go day into night is surprisingly good, given the enormity of the scene. The transition is managed very nicely by the 9000i, with no sudden cross-over, no great loss of detail, of colour, or the introduction of noise. Even at the end of our test in full dark, we’re clinging to general identification and situational awareness at hundreds of metres.
We’re getting the heat signatures of ducks, so no trouble with people at 200m or more.
We spend plenty of time looking at thermal performance – you swap from thermal to optical with mouse-click selection. The 50mm lens is surprisingly wide in a scene this deep with such a high mounting point and we get high levels of detail deep in.
Something else that’s sweet is the way the pan and tilt works with the fixed 50mm lens – everything we view is always in focus from front to back and you move this relatively wide angle of view around the big scene without missing anything.
According to Bosch’s Will Hasna, metadata fusion between optical and thermal camera systems is the key to the 9000i.
“Metadata fusion gives operators full situational awareness across the entire angle of view of the thermal camera, no matter what the focal length of the 30x optical camera is – no matter what the operator might be examining elsewhere,” Hasna explains.
Don’t miss the full review in the August issue of SEN!
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