A thief stole a bicycle on my porch and we have CCTV cameras installed. However, witnesses couldn’t recall the exact time, leaving us with three full days of footage to review. Watching it manually was impractical, especially since the mobile app couldn’t fast-forward remotely as it was not on the same LAN as the DVR.

We downloaded all 65 video files from the DVR, but even that was daunting. That’s when I turned to AI.

Using AI to Solve the Problem

I asked ChatGPT to write a Python script to detect bicycles in the footage.

The script worked immediately, but after some testing, I adjusted it to detect people instead—making it faster and more efficient.

It saved only frames with detected persons, reducing hours of video to just the important clips.

Tools and Setup

I ran the script on an Ubuntu machine with an NVIDIA RTX 4070 ti super GPU, which processed the footage quickly. What would have taken days was done in almost 3 to 4 hours.

The Moment of Truth

Reviewing the condensed clips, I finally found the thief on camera, riding away with the bicycle.

What do you think is the proper way to bring justice?