Requirements
The following is a list of requirements that must be met for live streaming in Quicktime format when using the V2_ streaming platform:
- Minimum bandwith is 600 kbit/s upstream. This is the absolute minumum that must be available to the streaming setup. Don't forget there may be other users on the same network that will use additional bandwith. It is of course possible to use less, but it may lower quality considerably.
- Connectivity should be provided wired. There should be at least one UTP connection available, preferably two or more.
- The firewall allows the following traffic:
- All traffic to and from 195.169.98.0/24 ((195.169.98.0/24 are all IP addresses between 195.169.98.0 and 195.169.98.255.)) with destination or source at port 554/tcp.
- All traffic to and from 195.169.98.0/24 ((195.169.98.0/24 are all IP addresses between 195.169.98.0 and 195.169.98.255.)) with destination port in the range 6970-6999/udp.
Quality improvements
The following is a list of things that help improve the quality of the live stream, especially on locations low on bandwith.
- Try to limit noise in the image and shoot in high resolution. Noise appears when using cheap-ass camera's like the ones that are used for Skype. This noise will make it harder to compress the video stream. The better the image of the camera, the better the quality of the video stream.
- Use a tripod to reduce movement. It's important to use a camera tripod when shooting a live event and avoid unnecessary changes to theimage. If the camera moves just one degree, every pixel in the frame changes, multiplying the difficulty of encoding the stream adequately. What was a simple scene to encode suddenly becomes much more difficult. Irregular camera motions are hard to compress.
- If you need to move around the camera, use a tripod with wheels.
- For similar reasons, make sure you there is enough light.
- If it is possible to influence the surroundings, try to get a plain background. Moving or high detail will lower the quality of the stream.
Output
The actual stream will have the following characteristics:
- The stream is 320 x 240 pixels in size (or smaller).
- The stream has a single bit rate only: 512 kbit/sec.