BeeCam

This is an earlier version of my BeeCam.  It's an Axis PTZ security camera you might find on the side of a commercial building watching the parking lot.   My hives are between 10 and 30 feet from the camera.

The camera livestreams to YouTube 24x7, although there's not much to see at night on or  on cold winter days.  It does have night vision.  The stream is 1920x1080p, 60fps, 10Mbs which gives a pretty good image.   

This is a work in progress,. I'm just starting to look for the right mix of camera angles and zoom levels.  Those change based on the time of day and the strength of different colonies. 

live.karlsbees.com should always get you to the stream.  The YouTube channel is @karlsbees, but the livestream is all you'll currently find there.

Video "Programming"

Different hives and zoom levels look better at different times of the day.  Sometimes the camera rotates through all hives for about 2 minutes each.   Other times it rotates through a few of the more interesting views for a couple minutes each and then at the start of each hour will loop between all the hives for 10 seconds each.  Mornings generally have more closeups.  In the afternoon some of the hives may have a wide angle to capture orientation flights.  

Audio

The microphone doesn't pick up many bee sounds, it's mostly random nature sounds from my backyard (and mowers, and airplanes...). 

YouTube Tips

HD

Youtube usually picks the right quality for your device, but if you're using a big screen make sure it is set to 1080p60.

Slow Motion

Setting the playback speed to .25 gives a nice slow motion view.  This is good for watching the bees in flight or their small movements in closeup views.  Unfortunately some YouTube players don't support playback speed.

Instant Replay

Youtube can scroll back up to 12 hours.  This can be used for a quick instant replay, or to go back earlier in the day.  I like watching them in the morning.  The time of day is on the top left of the image.

Minimal YouTube link (testing)

This link can be bookmarked/used to open a BeeCam YouTube player in a new browser tab/window.   You'll have to click another link on this page and then click play on the YouTube player which is annoying.   The YouTube player can then be resized so that it just has video, similar to YouTube theater mode but with no header and footer so it takes up less space on your screen.  Still playing with this,  it may or may not work for you.