DDNS, please help me setup my camera for internet viewing

[sram]

Hi folks.

I bought some ip cameras from foscam and installed them at my home. Everything is fine except that I'm not really able to configure them so that I can view their video while away from home using the internet.

The thing is that my public ip is dynamic(changes frequently), so I have to resort to DDNS to be able to view the camera video from the internet.

I setup port forwarding in my dlink router, and it is actually working. If I input my public ip into my iphone (3G internet connectivity) with the correct port number, I will get into the camera web interface immediately.

This is my camera link:

http://foscam.us/products/foscam-fi8910w-wireless-ip-camera.html

and as you can see from the guides Dynamic DNS is a feature already embedded in the camera software.

From what I understand, DDNS will always allow you to reach your public ip address when entering the given address along with the port number. How is that exactly done, I don't know.

Actually, it worked once but now it is not working anymore. I don't know why. I just entered the address shown in the photo below with the port number and got redirected to the camera GUI. Now, it is not happening !

http://ar7611.myfoscam.org:8090



What am I missing? How does DDNS really works? How does the domain name entered know my public internet ip address which changes?

Hopefully I made myself clear. I wrote this quickly. Please ask if you have questions.


Thanks.

 

[powertower]

Wikipedia has a great explanination but simply, it allows you to have a domain with a dynamic IP. In your example, the foscam camera tells myfoscam.org your public IP address every few minutes. myfoscam.org links your changing dynamic IP with a subdomain "ar7611" hosted on myfoscam.org static server. When you visit "ar7611.myfoscam.org" it identifies you by the sub domain and knows to redirect the browser to you home networks public IP.

Have you setup a static IP for this camera? Did you forward incomming port 8090 to the static assigned IP address of your camera?

I know my camera system requres several port forwards to work, one for http, one for h234 stream, and another for something...

 

[ThirdLeft152]

like powertower said, most cameras are going to use multiple ports to be completely accessible externally. 8090 is probably just web interface. you will need to figure out the port for the video feed. most smartphone apps should know the default port for your specific camera. If not your manual will have it, and if not there will be a setting in your camera to change the commonly referred to "media" port. Also just make sure on your router you don't have any outbound traffic blocked.

DDNS is going to work by having a client, interally, that checks every so often for your current ip address. when it senses a change to your external address, the client will update the DDNS server with your new address. Some DDNS services take up to 10-15 minutes to actually make the change in the DDNS server. Also i have heard that some ISPS block this DDNS traffic because they want you to buy a static IP. Make sure your client, the webcam, is functioning properly.

 

[sram]

The thing is that it worked the first time I set it up, so I don't think it needs more ports to forward.

I think I'll just reset everything and start all over from ZERO, although I hate to do this.

 

[powertower]

Well if you didn't set a static IP on your home router, chances are, it obtained a new address and broke the port forwarding.

 

[sram]

Well, let's see. I'm no expert but the way I understood it is like this:

The ip camera has a DDNS service embedded inside, and from its web interface I can see that it is active till 2014. Because my ip camera is connected to the internet via my router, what happens when its domain name is entered in a web browser is that the browser will go to my public ip (even though it is changing, the camera will always know it because it is accessing the internet using it). And because I setup port forwarding in my router, the port I put in the address bar in addition to the domain name will redirect the browser to the private address of the ip camera.

Is this what's happening or what's supposed to happen? That's my understanding so please correct me if wrong.

 

[ThirdLeft152]

Well, let's see. I'm no expert but the way I understood it is like this:

The ip camera has a DDNS service embedded inside, and from its web interface I can see that it is active till 2014. Because my ip camera is connected to the internet via my router, what happens when its domain name is entered in a web browser is that the browser will go to my public ip (even though it is changing, the camera will always know it because it is accessing the internet using it). And because I setup port forwarding in my router, the port I put in the address bar in addition to the domain name will redirect the browser to the private address of the ip camera.

Is this what's happening or what's supposed to happen? That's my understanding so please correct me if wrong.

Yes that is correct. Although, some DDNS services take a while to update. So for instance your external ip, i.e say from comcast, could change every 12 hours, or every time your modem loses it's connection. It may take time for your camera, DDNS client, to read this ip change and then to update the DDNS service. The DDNS service may also have an update period that may take time to update it's entries, that your camera, the DDNS client, has sent to it.

 

[mwarps]

Can you click on the DDNS settings page?

You have the basics down, it really should work. If you're trying to go to the name with your phone on 3G it should work, but doesn't look like it does

On a computer in the network, do a "whatismyip.com" and it'll give you a number.

Your hostname is currently (2013/10/28 1543) 86.96.96.75

Same/similar/completely different?

 

[Cardinals]

I would personally go for a vpn setup over forwarding ports. Would be a lot simpler setup plus your cameras wouldn't be open to the internet then.

 

[ThirdLeft152]

I would personally go for a vpn setup over forwarding ports. Would be a lot simpler setup plus your cameras wouldn't be open to the internet then.

simpler for some, it depends on type of hardware you have or if you want to leave a computer running all the time. camera is a stand-alone setup but is definitely less secure.

 

[sram]

Can you click on the DDNS settings page?

You have the basics down, it really should work. If you're trying to go to the name with your phone on 3G it should work, but doesn't look like it does

On a computer in the network, do a "whatismyip.com" and it'll give you a number.

Your hostname is currently (2013/10/28 1543) 86.96.96.75

Same/similar/completely different?

I know about whatismyip.com and other websites like it. It is actually working now! I just rebooted the camera and it worked. So, the camera was just acting up. There was nothing wrong at all, which makes sense because it stopped working without me changing anything.

I would personally go for a vpn setup over forwarding ports. Would be a lot simpler setup plus your cameras wouldn't be open to the internet then.

Hmmmm. Okay sounds cool. Can you please expand a little? I'll do some reading and do it.

 

[firedrow]

Something to think about, is your camera DHCP or static internally? If your camera is using DHCP then your port forward won't always be sending to the right endpoint. Also, you said cameras, as in multiple. You might run into issues where the cameras are all sharing one port (8090) but you're only forwarding it inward to 1 device. So you will have to change ports on the other devices and forward those in as well.

 

[sram]

Something to think about, is your camera DHCP or static internally? If your camera is using DHCP then your port forward won't always be sending to the right endpoint. Also, you said cameras, as in multiple. You might run into issues where the cameras are all sharing one port (8090) but you're only forwarding it inward to 1 device. So you will have to change ports on the other devices and forward those in as well.

Okay I'll clear. The camera ip is static, it doesn't obtain it automatically from DHCP. And yes, it is actually more than one camera and I'm using more than one port forward of course.

It sounds like you missed my previous post, because I already said it is working after I rebooted the camera(s).

 

[sram]

I would personally go for a vpn setup over forwarding ports. Would be a lot simpler setup plus your cameras wouldn't be open to the internet then.

Again, can somebody expand on this please?

Thanks.

 

[ThirdLeft152]

Again, can somebody expand on this please?

Thanks.

Setting up a vpn would allow you to be connected directly to your lan at home. Once connected there would essentially be no firewall to block you from accessing anything on your network, therefore requiring no port forwarding. Because your were then connected to your network, it would not be let your cameras be accessible from the internet, like it is now with the DDNS address.

 

[sram]

Setting up a vpn would allow you to be connected directly to your lan at home. Once connected there would essentially be no firewall to block you from accessing anything on your network, therefore requiring no port forwarding. Because your were then connected to your network, it would not be let your cameras be accessible from the internet, like it is now with the DDNS address.

If somebody can walk me through doing this VPN thing, I'll be really grateful. I haven't done vpn's before, but giving me an idea here will surely help me.

 

[ThirdLeft152]

If somebody can walk me through doing this VPN thing, I'll be really grateful. I haven't done vpn's before, but giving me an idea here will surely help me.

There are several good tutorials out there, but first thing is you were need some sort of hardware to run the VPN service. A pc can run a server, a router flashed with DD-WRT/Tomato, or a router with vpn server capabilities.