Looking for a camera to stream a church service

[spanakop]

Hi all, given the current climate, I've been looking around a lot for IP cameras to be able to live stream a church service. I've seen the Mevo camera which would work a treat, but is portable and I wanted something more permanent.

There are many cameras on this site, but honestly, I'm getting myself in a bit of a tiz. I have some questions i'm unsure about

• Do I need to use external software to control the camera or is it controllable via it's own internal web page accessed via a phone app or PC?
• Can I stream directly to Facebook via RTSP or RTMP or do I need something like OBS on a PC?
• Do I just connect into router via Ethernet/WIFI or does it need to go through a PC?
• Not sure what megapixel I need. I guess higher the better
• I think H.264 is what I need to stream to FB

The camera will be positioned approx 30m distance from the subject and at a height of approx 2-3m looking down

• Ideally looking for a camera with a built in mic, if not, then one can be added
• Not sure if PTZ is needed or a fixed position is what they want
• No need for IP ratings as it will be indoors
• IR I don't think is needed, but I wouldn't complain if it was in there
• 4K is overkill and not needed
• No requirement to record anything (just stream), but maybe have that as an option in the future if they decide to want that

Any help is gratefully appreciated
spanakop

 

[Phil]

I was hoping to get an article put together on this for you today, but we have been very busy.

It's a topic that we planned to cover anyway, as due to coronavirus we have seen a big uptick in enquiries and orders for this application.

The short answer - use an Axis network camera and camstreamer.
Here is their page that shows the list of Axis cameras supported by Camstreamer.

We will shortly publish a link to a demo Axis M1135 livestream.

The Axis P1367 camera has been the most popular model purchased by churches.

Where the advanced capabilities of an indoor PTZ for live streaming are required, then the Axis V5915.

 

[Phil]

This demo live stream on YouTube is of a relatively basic Axis 2MP network camera (the Axis M1135) - plus Camstreamer - that's all i.e. no PC, software, streaming device, relay station (just the camera, on our existing office network, pointed out through the window).

Undoubtedly there are cheaper ways of achieving this, but if you include time and technical complexity then we commend this solution to you for its simplicity and quality.

The view is out of our office window of the main A20 dual carriageway, about 1 mile prior to the Port of Dover (normally a road packed continuously with traffic headed to and from the UK's gateway to Europe).

That is the white cliffs of Dover in the background, and Dover's famously painted-over Banksy of the European flag to the left.
The large building is the Gateway Flats, a large block of mostly private residential flats overlooking the English Channel.

 

[spanakop]

Sorry for the late reply.

Thanks for this info, it's been really useful. This setup is probably what we're after. A test stream via laptop illustrated a problem with the internet speed of where this church is. Upload is very slow even when the ISP has maxed it out. The church is in the middle of Birmingham city centre and there's not a great upload speed at all, not enough to stream a good quality video and audio feed. Bizarrely, there is great 4G connection there, so they are having to use their phone to stream it instead for now.

I have bookmarked this so if/when ISP's get their act together to offer a faster speed in the city centre, I will come back to this.

 

[redtogreybeard]

Hi all, given the current climate, I've been looking around a lot for IP cameras to be able to live stream a church service. I've seen the Mevo camera which would work a treat, but is portable and I wanted something more permanent.

There are many cameras on this site, but honestly, I'm getting myself in a bit of a tiz. I have some questions i'm unsure about

• Do I need to use external software to control the camera or is it controllable via it's own internal web page accessed via a phone app or PC?
• Can I stream directly to Facebook via RTSP or RTMP or do I need something like OBS on a PC?
• Do I just connect into router via Ethernet/WIFI or does it need to go through a PC?
• Not sure what megapixel I need. I guess higher the better
• I think H.264 is what I need to stream to FB

The camera will be positioned approx 30m distance from the subject and at a height of approx 2-3m looking down

• Ideally looking for a camera with a built in mic, if not, then one can be added
• Not sure if PTZ is needed or a fixed position is what they want
• No need for IP ratings as it will be indoors
• IR I don't think is needed, but I wouldn't complain if it was in there
• 4K is overkill and not needed
• No requirement to record anything (just stream), but maybe have that as an option in the future if they decide to want that

Any help is gratefully appreciated
spanakop

Hi We livestream in our church. I am on forums: Churches that live stream, Modern Media Ministry Made Easy, Official Propresenter forum, Official Jamulus, Choral Jamulus, Worldjam Jamulus (Jamulus lets musicians play live together over the internet with reduced lag, which you can't do with Skype or Zoom successfully. Jamulus is Open source and runs on Linux, Mac, PC in order of preference.
I found, unlike the older camcorders that newer ones are no longer controllable with ir remote, so looked around what there would be with PTZ. My eyes watered at cost, so having used the CCTV idea before for recording and streaming, I looked at CCTV camreas. So I found new on Ebay: Floureon CCTV IP IR PTZ 30x for £180 and it works great. We had to adjust sound from sound desk to OBS to lipsync (the camera had no sound input). This is what we do, we haven't for various reasons upgraded to propresenter 7 yet. iMAC prop6 is being used to project most things for the congregation (FOH) OBS on a i7 16GB GTX 1060 6g desktop PC does livestreaming. (I found out toolate how good and cheaper Ryzen based machines are.
iMac: installed also Syphon NDI and NDI Tools as well as Manycam Studio.
PC has OBS, Manycam Studio, Zoom and IPC_AX installed
Sound comes from a Yamaha LS9 32 with a dedicated mix for the livestream vi DI box into line in on OBS PC. The stream sound is monitored as client on mobile with headphones and adjusted using AirfaderLS9 Pro (Android based, either from phone or we use an android minipc with mouse, monitor and keyboard and LAN connection)
On the Mac we run stagedisplay as a fake monitor: displayadapter to HDMI into that a HDMI to VGA adapter. That's it.
Stageadapter has all windows off, except lyrics and that is full screen (cropping down didn't work, to allow transparency in OBS it neede to be full size)
1) Start propresenter, go to preferences and set display adapter to on, then arrange screens. 2) Syphon should be enabled AND INSTALLED. NDI TOOLS scanconverter also installed. 3)optional Manycam Studio
All lyrics are set to two or the most three lines. On the FOH using about 70 to 100pt you do a textbox sidesqueeze which causes the two lines to reflow into several lines. Backgrounds can be run as usual. (in case an operator forgets to put a background up, rather than a green background I made it dark RGB blue as it's easier on the eyes than green.
Stagedisplay type size is set different to FOH and also different colour.
FOH gets NDIed with Syphon (doesn't allow choice) for OBS
Stagedisplay gets NDIed with NDI Tools Scanconverter (File and select)
Stream on OBS PC
NDI source for FOH (e.g. we run a welcome video 5minutes before service that shows live and livestream to serve as synchroniser), NDI source for L3rds (you crop, size and place and apply chromakey to make it transparent over camera feed)
We also run Zoom, so that landline people can listen to the service. OBS streaming content goes either direct via virtual Camera to Zoom as webcam, or OBS NDI output as input to Manycam Studio and that as webcam for Zoom. sound is via virtual VB cables. everybody is muted, can't unmute themself and the settings are done with passcode so you don't have to be manually let in. Joining signal is off, but OBS NDI/Manycam is selected as video in. Also, should YT have a problem, you can watch the stream in Zoom.
If anything is run on OBS PC but wanted on the Imac for projection as well, OBS NDI out goes to Manycam Studio on iMac and the NDI input there, used as webcam in prop6 on iMac and projected.

If the pastor runs powerpoint from his laptop, we have connections on the platform. The output travels to the back (currently still) into a manual switch, set platform to projector. This feed is also captured into Manycam (OBS has a Manycam source set up, so whatever is selected in Manycam is available in OBS. Seems more jumps but is easier to use). For streaming you'd have a full output with a PiP of the speaker, small in a corner, till the slide is turned off
any extra cameras/camcorders if HDMI are captured with capture cards. MCS numbers them as USB1, USB2 etc making it easier to run. BTW if you happen to have Hauppauge WinTV capture card (it does the rendering), you can utilise older DV cameras and camcorders, still, for crowd shots.
if you run a camcorder or camera as an image capture device for OBS etc, take the recording media out and it won't go to sleep (seen that in superstore showrooms to allow people to look at features like zoom etc. they would stay on all day.)
This was long, but i hope somebody gets some benefit from it