Video Search

Summary

Video Search is GC Surge’s primary interface for discovering and reviewing alarm events. It provides a structured, filterable view of all events that have been processed and stored by the platform. Operators use Video Search for real-time triage, post-incident investigation, evidence review, and quality audits. Covers: What Video Search Does, Why It Matters, Understanding the Interface, How It Works, Filter Strategy, Best Practices.

What Video Search Does

Video Search replaces unstructured video playback. Instead of rewinding through recordings to find a relevant moment, operators search by event attributes — site, detection type, time window — and see filtered, tagged event cards ready for review.

Why It Matters

Speed and accuracy in event review directly affect operational quality. Video Search gives operators precise control over which events they see, reducing the time from alarm notification to triage decision. For post-incident investigations, it provides a unified interface to find and share specific events without navigating multiple systems.

Understanding the Interface

Site and Device Selector

Video Search opens on the events from every site you have access to, so you can start reviewing straight away. The Select Site dropdown — with its own search box — narrows the list to one site when you want to focus.

Once a site is selected, a Select Device selector appears beside it so you can narrow further to a single device. For a specific investigation, scope to one site and one device first, then broaden only if you don’t find the event.

Toolbar

The toolbar sits at the top right and controls everything you see below it. Three buttons switch the view — ZenMode, List View and Grid View — and beside them are Open Filters, Reset Filters and Refresh alarms, which reloads the event list by hand.

ZenMode inside Video Search lays the results out as one continuously playing tile per device, each labelled with its event count. Its own controls are Pause, Reset, a Speed selector (1x by default) and a ZenMode Limit that caps how many events are loaded into the view (100 by default). Exit ZenMode returns you to the list or grid.

Filter Panel

Open Filters opens the Additional filters panel, which works whether or not you have picked a site. Four filters are visible straight away, and Show more filters reveals two more. Nothing takes effect until you click Apply; Reset filters clears the lot.

• Search tags — filter by closure tags that have been applied to events.
• Alarm Type — filters by NOVA99x classification: All, Real Alarms, False Alarms, or None (events the platform has not classified). Default is All so you don’t miss anything. Start investigations at All to catch any misclassified event, then switch to Real Alarms once you have narrowed by time and camera. False Alarms is mainly useful for QA and noisy-camera tuning.
• Time Window — sets the investigation period, and opens on Last 24 hours. Pick a preset from Quick Ranges (Last 5 minutes, Last 15 minutes, Last 30 minutes, Last 1 hour, Last 2 hours, Last 3 hours, Last 6 hours, Last 12 hours, Last 24 hours, Last 2 days, Last 3 days, Last week, Last month, Current Shift, Last Shift), search that list by name, or set a custom Absolute Range with From / To fields (DD-MM-YYYY hh:mm). The picker reaches the full history of stored events in your account.
• Overlay — shows only alarms carrying a particular visual analysis overlay. Tick one or more of Heatmap, Mask and History Mask — see Masks.

Show more filters adds two further controls:

• User feedback — filter by how operators have rated events: Any, Up, or Down. Narrow further by verification tag (Vehicle, Unknown, Person, Tree, Insect, Reflection, Animal, Rain/Snow), search the operator comments with Search feedback comments, or switch on Verified only to keep just the events someone has actually rated.
• Acknowledge status — All, Open, or Closed, which separates the events still waiting on someone from the ones an operator has already closed.

Event Card List

A Total Alarms counter shows the number of events matching the current filters — check it first to gauge the volume before opening individual cards. Events appear in reverse chronological order (most recent first). In Grid View each card shows the clip thumbnail, the timestamp and a coloured status dot, with the device name appearing as you hover. List View puts the detail in one row: thumbnail, site, device and camera name on the left, timestamp and the detection-type chip (for example Person) on the right. The full REAL ALARM / FALSE ALARM badge appears when you open the event.

Event Detail Panel

Clicking an event card opens the event detail panel:

• Breadcrumb — shows the path Site > Device at the top of the panel, with the event timestamp and a classification badge (REAL ALARM or FALSE ALARM).
• Video panels — four clips: Pre Alarm, Alarm, Post Alarm, and a fourth panel showing additional camera footage.
• Marking — use the thumbs up or thumbs down buttons to classify the event. Each shows its keyboard shortcut underneath: W for thumbs up and S for thumbs down.
• Mask — the button below the clips shows or hides the camera’s mask overlay, and opens the Mask Editor where you can draw or change it.
• Export — hovering a clip reveals Copy Salvo URL, which copies a link to the clip, and Download Clip, which saves it locally.
• Close — use the X button to return to the event list.

How It Works

Use this workflow for both real-time triage and post-incident investigation:

1. Navigate to Video Search from the sidebar.
2. Optionally select a site, then a device, to narrow the results.
3. Optionally apply filters from the Additional filters panel: Time Window, Alarm Type, Overlay, Search tags, or User feedback.
4. Review the event card list — most recent events appear first.
5. Click a card to open the full event detail view.
6. Review the event, mark it using thumbs up or thumbs down. Close the panel with X to return to the event list.

Filter Strategy

Filters are powerful but require the right approach to get useful results:

• Start wide. Video Search opens on the last 24 hours across all your sites — review what is there before narrowing by site, device or tag. Jumping straight to a specific filter can cause you to miss events that don’t match the filter but are still relevant.
• Don’t narrow by verification tag during an investigation. If you are looking into an incident you need the full sequence, and an early event may carry a different tag — or none at all — from the one you are chasing. Filtering too early hides that context.
• Agree on a time window before reviewing as a team. If one operator searches the last hour and another searches the last two hours, they’ll see different events and may reach different conclusions about the same incident.

Best Practices

• Review events in structured windows, not continuously. Define shift review periods — for example, review the last 4 hours every 2 hours — and stick to them. Continuous monitoring without structure reduces focus and consistency over time.
• Use Video Search and ZenMode together. Video Search is your investigation tool. ZenMode is your active triage tool. During high-volume periods use ZenMode to reduce cognitive load. During post-incident review or investigation, switch to Video Search for full filter control.
• Record what you find in shift handoff notes. If you spot a pattern — repeated events from the same camera at unusual hours — document it before your shift ends so the next team knows what to watch for.