Streaming Pinball

[George Polansky]

I have a somewhat unusual application in mind. I'd like to stream some pinball machine play over twitch/youtube. I'd need to connect three cameras to capture the playfield, scores on the backbox and the player. Typically people use cameras connected to transmitters and receivers to connect the video to a desktop computer that then goes into OBS and then to the internet.
I was wondering if it was possible to use IP cameras instead, just connecting via Cat6 POE. This would eliminate the need for batteries and transmitters/receivers, but would add the hassle of dealing with three Cat6 cables. The rig would need to be mobile, being able to roll to one pinball machine to another, so the cable management might be tough. My main question, though, is whether IP cameras would have the quality needed for this application. I know picture quality, latency and the ability to capture fast movement (in terms of the playfield camera at least) is important and not sure whether IP cameras have the right capability in this regard.

I'm attaching what a typical wireless rig looks like. Any advice is appreciated!

 

[wittaj]

Interesting situation!

In all likelihood surveillance cameras are not designed for that type of capture that you are looking for. And the sensor tech used are generally years behind what you can find in gopro and iphones, etc.

They would make okay cameras for general overview type things, but this isn't their intended purpose.

We have had recently people come here after purchasing cameras in two instances where they were wanting to use in sports complexes - one was a tennis club and another was a youth soccer club.

Even with the higher FPS, In both cases they found that these types of cameras were not capable of what they were wanting to do. Sure the cameras could run faster FPS, but it still didn't provide them with the level of detail they were looking for.

I recall the soccer club had a decent quality PTZ ($800) that is fine for a residential or retail/commercial installation to capture a thief, but to cover the action of the soccer field it wasn't capable of meeting their needs. And because of the extremely fast motion, it was creating a halo type effect around the action (which can be seen in certain lighting conditions). These cameras are good, but not good enough to catch the rotation of a ball for example.

Here is another example from one of these types of cameras.

Another came here trying to use this cameras for a race track in the pit stalls to monitor lug nuts and violations and it just couldn't do it.

 

[bp2008]

People really set up something like that and then can't be bothered to use cables for video transmission?

I see the appeal of doing it with PoE IP cameras. Keeping the complexity and number of parts to a minimum. You'd want to add your own studio lighting, but otherwise your rig might just have cameras and a PoE switch on it. Then one network cable leading away.


Once upon a time I would have recommended box cameras for this job. Box cameras forego weatherproof enclosures that are found on most IP cameras, but give you the power to bring your own C or CS mount lens (or get an adapter to use another style of lens). But that type of camera is really unpopular anymore. Dahua used to sell a 12 MP box camera but I think it might be discontinued. Maybe you could try something similar like this, if you want to try supplying your own lens: Honeywell 12MP 4K Ultra HD Box Camera HCD8G | eBay

If not box cameras, then I'd recommend cameras with varifocal lenses since those should allow you to fine-tune the field of view and focus. With fixed lenses it would be hard to get the size you want, and they typically come focused at infinity so you'd have to open up the camera, break the glue holding the lens in place, and focus it yourself. Even with a "varifocal" IP camera, it won't be super convenient to focus since you can't just rotate a lens with your fingers. Instead you need to use the camera's web interface and hope you don't need to do it again every single time you power on the camera.

Some other things to be aware of:

• You'll want to add good lighting. Tune the shutter speed, gain, iris (iris is non-functional on some camera models) appropriately to suit your lighting. Lower gain should produce a cleaner picture, generally speaking.
• Most IP cameras also let you adjust brightness, contrast, sharpness, white balance, and other settings to suit your tastes. Sharpness is often too high by default.
• Most IP cameras max out at 25 or 30 FPS (25 in PAL mode, 30 in NTSC mode). Some cameras are limited to a frame rate below 30 FPS -- check their specs before purchasing. You will really want 30 FPS as a minimum I think. 60 FPS is a lot harder to find but they do exist, especially at lower resolutions like 1080p or 720p. This one for example claims to do 60 FPS at 1080p. It is a native 4MP camera so assuming they did pixel binning well, I'd expect its 1080p output to be better than a native 1080p camera.
• In the camera, use "CBR" (constant bit rate) encoding and set a high bit rate. It will probably max out around 8 to 16 Mbps, not nearly as high of bit rate as a gopro or something, just so you're aware. But since the camera shouldn't be moving that should hopefully be enough.
• The camera's built-in audio (if it has any) is probably going to suck, unless you get one with a line-in connector and provide your own compatible microphone. But even then it will probably still suck compared to professional audio equipment or even a high-end USB microphone.
• Getting the audio and video in sync may be more difficult with an IP camera than an SDI / HDMI capture system. Good luck.