Some Tesla owners are in the early release program and what is supposed to be under NDA, often leaks online. One of Tesla’s upcoming software releases is being tested right now.
According to this Tesla software tracking site, version 2020.12.5 of the software includes the following features:
Release Notes
Dashcam Viewer
- Watch Saved Dashcam clips or Sentry Mode events directly from the touchscreen with the Dashcam Viewer. To launch, tap the Dashcam icon in the status bar and select “Launch Viewer” while the car is in PARK. If the car is in DRIVE, you will continue to save a clip by tapping the icon.
- To view saved clips and events stored on your USB drive, tap the Menu icon in the upper left corner of the viewer. Each video is organized by location, date and thumbnail for easy access. For additional filtering options, tap the “Dashcam” or “Sentry” tabs.
- Select a clip or event to play the corresponding video. To select video from a particular camera, tap the associated thumbnail marked Front, Rear, Left or Right. Play pause or scroll by using the video controls at the bottom of the player. To delete a video, tap the trash icon in the bottom right corner of the video player.
The update will also provide details on Out of Order Supercharger Stalls, as well as a change to the Sentry mode icon.
While we’d seen a photo of the release notes, there’s now a video of the Dashcam in action. Twitter user @greentheonly promotes how well the UI for this in-vehicle dashcam/sentry viewer is.
When a sentry event or a dashcam recording occurs, 4 cameras are captured simultaneously to your storage device. Playback is as easy as selecting the date/time of the recording and you can then simply tap on the camera you’d like to see.
At the bottom of the screen, you’ll see a timeline, which allows you to skip through the video (to the interesting bit). This certainly looks like a great step forward, compared to the current process of removing the drive from your car, transferring the footage to your phone or PC.
After having a Model 3 for some time, I’ve accumulated many hundreds of GBs of footage and something I’d love is analysis software that’s regularly available in the CCTV world that identifies significant events in the footage.
While this software smarts initially began by simply detecting changes in pixels, like a person or car entering the field of view of the camera, they’re now able to leverage advanced algorithms to determine objects. With Tesla’s significant experience in content analysis for their Autopilot and FSD systems, it seems plausible they could start to auto-label footage with things like ‘collision’ or ‘break in attempt’ to help get straight to the footage you’re after in a sea of recordings.
This smashes the functionality available by 3rd party dashcams. While the Tesla cameras certainly aren’t the highest quality cameras on the market, they contain more than enough pixels to determine critical aspects like people and number plates.
This upcoming software update is expected to roll out to all Model S, Model 3, Model X and Model Y owners in the next few weeks.
Awesome, thanks for reporting on this. Long overdue but still excited.