Laptop has a webcam, PC streaming through doesn't - can I connect them somehow?

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UKMSc

New Member
Laptop has a webcam, PC streaming through doesn't - can I connect them somehow?

I don't want to use my phone if I can avoid it whilst streaming.

I have streamed using OBS and my iphone as a camera, I'm just struggling to get the laptop camera to show on my OBS,

I don't want to stream through my laptop either.

The laptop and PC are connected via Bluetooth OK.

Thanks.
 
A

AaronD

Active Member
Bluetooth is nowhere near enough for live video.

There are two options that I see:
  1. Run OBS on both machines, and use one of several plugins to send the video from one copy of OBS to the other across the network. Preferably wired, because WiFi has its own issues.
  2. Make the camera full-screen on the laptop, and run an HDMI cord from it to an HDMI capture device on the OBS machine. OBS thinks the capture device is itself a camera.
    • Don't cheap out on the capture device! The ~$20 USB things are unpredictable garbage. Deceptively made and deceptively marketed. Can't really support those beyond, "get something better." Expect to spend about $100 per channel for name-brand USB, or use an internal PCIe card.
 
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UKMSc

New Member
AaronD said:
Bluetooth is nowhere near enough for live video.

There are two options that I see:
  1. Run OBS on both machines, and use one of several plugins to send the video from one copy of OBS to the other across the network. Preferably wired, because WiFi has its own issues.
  2. Make the camera full-screen on the laptop, and run an HDMI cord from it to an HDMI capture device on the OBS machine. OBS thinks the capture device is itself a camera.
    • Don't cheap out on the capture device! The ~$20 USB things are unpredictable garbage. Deceptively made and deceptively marketed. Can't really support those beyond, "get something better." Expect to spend about $100 per channel for name-brand USB, or use an internal PCIe card.
Click to expand...
Can you give me a clue what to look out for the OBS plugins in your option 1? I really appreciate your guidance.
 
koala

koala

Active Member
Instead of trying all kind of workarounds, capture hardware and OBS plugins, and spending much much time with questionable results, I recommend to just buy a separate webcam for your PC. Webcams with laptop-like quality are not that expensive.
 
A

AaronD

Active Member
UKMSc said:
Can you give me a clue what to look out for the OBS plugins in your option 1? I really appreciate your guidance.
Click to expand...
koala has a very good point. But if you insist on this exercise anyway, you can look for Teleport, Beam, and probably a few others in the Plugins section of this site.

But again, you probably *will* be better off buying a camera. In addition to the IT setup, laptops are harder to aim, and their built-in cameras generally aren't all that good anyway.
 
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UKMSc

New Member
Can OBS talk to my PC from my laptop via bluetooth? If so, how? It has no network port unfortunately.
 
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