Brown dwarfs, with masses < 0.08 Msun, fill in the gap in mass between low-mass stars and giant planets. Brown dwarfs and planet-mass objects, having no sustainable nuclear fusion reactions, are relatively bright and warm at birth, thereby readily detectable in star-forming regions or young clusters. These substellar objects are also vital tracers of star formation versus planet formation and serve as key analogues to exoplanets around stars. We have applied the technique of on-off imaging of the 1.45 µm H2O absorption band seen in typical spectra from late M to L, T, and Y-type objects to identify the substellar population in IC348 and B5 (LDN-1471), both located at the eastern edge of the Perseus cloud complex at a distance of 300 pc and 350 pc, respectively. IC348 (~3 Myr old) comprises 478 cluster members with the most massive star being a B5 star. Barnard 5 is also known to have ongoing star formation, harboring a group of protostars, fragmenting cloud filaments, and Herbig-Haro objects; however, its low-mass membership is much unexploited. The 1.45 µm imaging together with J and H photometry renders a reliable way to select water-bearing objects relatively free of reddening. We report the first discovery of brown dwarf members in Barnard 5 and use complementary data from WISE, 2MASS, and Pan-STARRS to look for possible young stellar members. Analyzed by Gaia DR3 parallaxes and kinematics of the cloud members across the Perseus region, we propose the star formation scenario of the complex under influence of the nearby OB association.