blinkbridge

Note: there is an issue related to local storage systems; please see issue #1 for a temporary fix until it's resolved.

blinkbridge is a tool for creating an RTSP stream from a Blink camera using FFmpeg and MediaMTX. Blink cameras are battery operated and don't have native RTSP support, so this tool uses the BlinkPy Python library to download clips every time motion is detected and then creates an RTSP stream from them.

Due to the slow polling rate of BlinkPy, there will be a delay of up to ~30 seconds between when a motion is detected and when the RTSP stream updates (can be changed at risk of the Blink server banning you). The RTSP stream will persist the last recorded frame (i.e. a static video) until the next motion is detected.

Once the RTSP streams are available, you can use them in applications such as Frigate NVR (e.g. for better person detection) or Scrypted (e.g. for Homekit Secure Video support).

How it works

1. blinkbridge downloads the latest clip for each enabled camera from the Blink server
2. FFmpeg extracts the last frame from each clip and creates a short still video (~0.5s) from it
3. The still video is published on a loop to MediaMTX (using FFMpeg's concat demuxer)
4. When motion is detected, the new clip is downloaded and published
5. A still video from the last frame of the new clip is then published on a loop

Usage

1. Download compose.yaml from this repo and modify accordingly
2. Download config/config.json, save to ./config/ and modify accordingly (be sure to enter your Blink login creditials)
3. Run docker compose run blinkbridge and enter your Blink verification code when prompted (this only has to be done once and will be saved in config/.cred.json). Exit with CTRL+c
4. Run docker compose up to start the service. The RTSP URLs will be printed to the console.

Real-time Motion Events

The default mechanism for detecting motion is to poll the Blink servers, which can have a delay of up to 30 seconds. To get real-time motion events, blinkbridge includes a built-in web server that exposes an HTTP endpoint. You can send a POST request to this endpoint to immediately trigger a snapshot and update the RTSP stream.

The endpoint is available at http://<host>:8000/motion_detected_event/{camera_name}.

Home Assistant and Alexa Integration Example

You can use this endpoint to integrate with services like Home Assistant and Alexa for real-time motion notifications. Here is an example workflow:

1. Create a helper toggle in Home Assistant. This toggle will be used to signal that a motion event has occurred. For example, you can create an input_boolean called input_boolean.blink_motion_detected.
2. Create an Alexa routine. In the Alexa app, create a routine that is triggered when your Blink camera detects motion. The action for this routine should be to turn on the helper toggle you created in Home Assistant.
3. Create a Home Assistant automation. This automation will be triggered when the helper toggle is turned on. The action for this automation should be to send a POST request to the blinkbridge endpoint.

Here is an example of a Home Assistant automation:

automation:
  - alias: "Blink Motion Detection"
    trigger:
      - platform: state
        entity_id: input_boolean.blink_motion_detected
        to: "on"
    action:
      - service: rest_command.blink_motion_event
        data:
          camera_name: "Your Camera Name" # Replace with your camera name
      - service: input_boolean.turn_off
        entity_id: input_boolean.blink_motion_detected

You will also need to configure the rest_command in your configuration.yaml:

rest_command:
  blink_motion_event:
    url: "http://<blinkbridge_host>:8000/motion_detected_event/{{ camera_name }}"
    method: post

This setup allows you to get near real-time motion events from your Blink cameras in your RTSP stream.

TODO

• Better error handling
• Cleanup code
• Support FFmpeg hardware acceleration (e.g. QSV)
• Process cameras in parallel and reduce latency
• Add ONVIF server with motion events

Related projects

• https://github.com/kaffetorsk/arlo-streamer