Human presence detection?



  • I want to be able to use some "simple" but accurate form of human precence detection for shuting down lamps, heat etc. in rooms where no human is occupied.

    I first thought of the standard pir sensors but I then realised how many times I had to wave my hands in my garage, toilet and other places when using standard pir products.

    I then was about to order some omron d6t mems thermal sensors witch looked like the ultimate product . I then realised that my current skill level was not anywhere near the required skill to make them work as I wanted.

    I have now reverted to a "simple" solution again. I want to use two or three ir,ultrasonic or similar sensors in my doorways. So that when someone enters a room the first sensor will trigger and after a couple of ms (?) the second sensor will trigger and I would hopefulle be able to be able to construct a sketch that uses the trigger-order to determine if a person has left or entered a room.
    Well it sounds easy in my head anyway. I would then have variables in domoticz with with a number for every room that specifies if room has less than 1 person it will turn of the lights.

    But for the first step is ir the best technique to use when the range needs to be ~1m and pretty narrow so that both sensors does not trigger at the same time. I would also want the sensor type to draw relatively low power as I would need ~20 of them in all doorways and they have to be powered 24/7

    Sound-Detection

    Infrared-Range

    Laser-Sensor

    Infrared-Thermometer

    Ultrasonic

    And I guess you could use the same principle using a load cell/weight sensor/foil-contact sensor on/under the floor on both sides of every doorway. But it feels a bit unpractical to rip up the floor or to place som kind of mats in every doorway.

    Edit: I am brainstorming now 🙂 but maybe you could use pir-sensors for example in the roof directly above and on both sides of the doorways and "shield" them so that only detect motion in a very narrow angle covering only a "slice" just before after the doorways,


  • Admin

    You might also use "indirect" rules like I do for our TV room.

    I wanted to cut the power to all AV equipment when no-one was present in the room.

    So I use the alarm motion sensor (turns on AV equipment for 10 min).
    If window light is on I never turn off the equipment.
    If TV is on (ping TV over ethernet), equipment stays on.

    This works pretty well with our usage-pattern. We usually watch tv in the evening (when window light has been turned on). Haven't had much complains from the wife with the current setup.



  • That might work when working with logic people like adults. I on the other hand am dealing with chaos (kids) witch seams to have struck some sort of deal with my power company. Normal procedure is to start up every tv in the house with different shows, move on to the laptops and to simultaniously fiddle with their tablets before moving on to tearing apart some newley cleaned room while all apparatus is turned on and are usally set to full volume.

    I also want to be able to not have to turn any lights on or of as I usally forget to turn of the lighting in half of the rooms.


  • Hardware Contributor

    (OT) Hahaha! ☝ Amen to that... let me know how to solve this. If possible some sort of automatic food dispenser for the children as well since they seem to want to half-eat every 5 minutes... 🙂


  • Mod

    How come you abandoned the Omron D6T?



  • Simply because I am not good at all in "coding" or writing sketches. I would have to hope someone else creates the exact sketch that I need. I saw some video where someone showed of the sensor and some "simple" code. There where alot of arrays involved and you had to write some half complicated "algoritms" to translate the different arrays of temperatures into "persons" to detect.


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