There’s nothing like a little paranoia to start the day. If you worry about who’s wandering around your home while you’re away, or who is checking out your cubicle while you’re at lunch, here’s a way to capture the perps (TV lingo for ‘perpetrator’). It’s a Mac app with the clever name Security Cam and it records both photos and video clips of whatever walks by your Mac’s built-in camera.
You can buy security cameras that work in standalone mode but they’ll cost $100 or more (Dropcam is a favorite), but this is a security camera in app form and it comes with a whole laundry list of features so you can customize to meet your security needs.
The Motion Trigger option turns your Mac into a motion detector. Set the trigger to capture a photo or video clip as soon as motion is detected by the camera and app.
There’s also a built-in Audio Detector which will snap the camera when a pre-defined level of sound is detected by your Mac.
No security camera is worthwhile unless there’s a stealth mode and Security Cam has that, too. It turns off the Mac’s display but keeps the app active. Security Cam is accessible from the Mac’s Menubar and displays settings, current camera view, and other options.
Security Cam can be customized with frequency settings, too. That means the audio trigger and frequency capture combine. There’s a similar setting for both frequency and motion detection.
As you would expect, the app exports videos and photos with a simple click, and if you prefer, each can have a time and date stamp so you can see exactly what took place and when.
Security Cam is nicely done, affordable, very Mac-like in usage, and a boon to any Mac user who is paranoid about home or office security. After all, if everyone is out to get you, a little paranoia is the right attitude to have.