Happy to be here

@will Yeh, the smarter half will not appreciate extra bits sticking out of the door / walls / porch, etc. Still in the sketchbook phase.

@binaryrhyme 

Wouldn't the only thing on the outside be the PIR sensor ? It's about 32mm*24mm, smaller than your door knocker 🙂

@will Not if I'm putting bits of wood around it to focus its detection area, lol. I'll poke at the options.

@binaryrhyme 

I was thinking that if it sat back against the wall right on top of the door frame, then the frame would block the lower scanned area, so it doesn't need a full enclosure, just enough at the bottom to reduce any IR signals from the floor in front of the sensor.

Don't know, I don't know how thick your door frame is 🙂

@will Mail slot it is going into is smack in the middle of the door. 😉

@binaryrhyme 

Back to the drawing board 🙂

@binaryrhyme The actual camera lens is tiny, 10mm and it appears that a 5mm opening would still work as long as it is nearly flush. The PIR if that is what you end up using can be behind a frosted glass 'feature' in the brickwork, or if wood structure, make a hole and cover with some sort of IR transparent material that blends in. I would also consider making a sign with the house number on it and both the camera and sensor built into it. Good luck.

@zander Yeh, that is another option I'm considering. The advantage of the door insert is it can be engineered to only be removable from the inside, and it is more likely to withstand the worst days of a Canadian winter, but nod on that.

@elvendecker ... and now, back to our regularly scheduled program after that intrusion ... welcome again. 😉

@will The lens aperture is less than 0.200" diameter, and would fit behind a peephole.  The issue in our hose is that I usually get to make all the functional decisions and my wife usually makes all the aesthetic decisions.  This has created an impasse.  The technical constraint is that the mount is the size of a postage stamp.  There is a short ribbon cable that connects back to the Pi.  It's likely this summer that the Pi will be inside a mounting behind a porch light, with a small slot open for the camera.

Thanks all... My imagination is exploding. 🙂

@elvendecker 

Sounds like you have a workable plan that will satisfy everybody 🙂

@elvendecker That is a huge! I assumed you were using either a Pi 0 or ESP32-CAM. I am posting a picture of a much smaller camera with a longer lead but you can get even longer leads on Ali. I aloso posted a picture of the lens. The lens entire width is 1cm but the actual camera is only about half that. 

I just got an email from AliExpress, here is a link to an 8" long camera.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002260523682.html?ug_edm_item_id=1005002260523682&edm_click_module=item_detail&tracelog=rowan&rowan_id1=aeug_edm_24677_1_en_US_2022-03-08&rowan_msg_id=5473biz_pay_after_purchase:0:0_571352720$d51451c3fdb64bfb92b09fd5e795a6c6&ck=in_edm_other

@zander, my previous reply didn't take, no doubt user error.  That camera looks great!  I've started thinking through how I'd put it together.  Thank you!