DistroAV - Network Audio/Video in OBS-Studio using NDI® technology 6.1.1

[shennyp]

In case this plugin is not updated for NDI 5 and fixing issues some people are having at the moment, I've managed to switch over my own multi-cam set-up to using NDI's own tools directly into OBS Studio, and just keeping this plugin active for "NDI Out".

OBS-NDI is/was a great plugin and thanks to Palakis for all the work done for it over the years but realistically no one can really do "free forever", especially for such a complicated plugin. I made sure I donated to the OBS project at least.

I would like to know how you achieved it using NDI 5 because my attempt with out updating the plugin to NDI 5 failed. Below post explains it

NDI 5 Update fail ?

We use OBS (27.0.1) with all camera sources as NDI. It worked smooth under NDI Tools version 4 but when I upgraded to NDI 5 last week all my sources in NDI freezes with in few seconds after the start. It was doing the same in NDI monitors too. On upgrading Installed NDI 5 tools with out...

obsproject.com

 

[darran wilson]

I'll have to check our system but I believe when I installed NDI 5, I made it a point to manually copy the .dlls from the NDI 5 Tools directory over to the OBS NDI folder and overwrote the 4 dlls. Seems to be working fine so far. I only realized this cause we also had Resolume installed on another system and I noticed even with NDI 4 Tools installed Resolume was still using V3 dlls from it's own program directory. Right click on your dlls and you can determine version. Backup your originals of course.

 

[Claudio Nunes]

I have been using this plugin for two years now. A problem that has diminished, but still exists, is when there is a change in data flow, there is an automatic change in the display in OBS. I use Skype for virtual room creation, and NDI to select participants through plugging. Are there any tips to reduce this problem?

 

[mediafp]

The ndi.palakis.fr server appears to be down. I am unable to download the second part (some installer for the Mac) in order to finish the install of NDI into OBS. Is there another place that the installer can be downloaded for Mac?

 

[GregPeatfield]

I have seen posts on Github of people not seeing instructions on how to install this plug-in. There are numerous YouTube videos to walk you through installation such as:

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.

www.youtube.com

 

[Acey05]

Thought of mentioning a few things in case anyone is still trying to fix the Desync Audio issues. I really wish the latest Timing Code fixes mentioned on Github where pushed through since this is clearly an OBS to NDI output issue related to how OBS captures the Audio from the Desktop itself.

I tried several recordings and several dozen hours of testing NDI Main Output Audio vs. having each Audio source their own NDI Filter and so far here are my results:

• Microphone by itself never Desyncs (Main or Filter).
• Microphone may start having problems (such as popping or skipping/dropping audio) if it doesn't have the same Khz Output as MAIN OBS after some time (if OBS is 48Khz, set your Microphone to 48Khz).
• If Microphone is not picked up correctly by MAIN OBS in the first few seconds (there is a delay of it getting picked up), NDI FILTERS can potentially glitch out the Audio (popping and dropping).
• If Microphone is not picked up correctly by MAIN OBS in the first few seconds (once again, the small delay), NDI MAIN will Desync the BOTH Desktop and Microphone audio by a small amount.

Solution: Restart your MAIN OBS (not the Second one receiving), UNTIL your Microphones output is fixed. Either way, Microphone audio has the lowest chance of having issues it seems like.

Desktop Audio is the main culprit and where most of the issues are coming from.

• CHANGING SCENES on the MAIN OBS has a high chance of causing desktop audio Desyncs on the SECOND OBS (I don't know why, I noticed during recordings where I changed Scenes a lot the Desync either happened sooner or instantly).
• Desktop Audio can randomly DROP Audio at random intervals on both NDI MAIN and NDI FILTERS (I don't know if it's the Audio Overflow buffer thing some people talk about or what, but I noticed sometimes for a couple of frames, very easy to miss. Audio levels can drop instantly to zero). This seems to happen sometimes a lot at the start before fixing itself.
• If Desktop Audio drops Audio on NDI MAIN, that will also drop the Audio from the Microphone if the Microphone was already transmitting (if you speak DURING the drop, the Microphone not drop, don't ask me why this is so specific).
• Desktop Audio can Desync if there are CPU overhead spikes related to the OBS which could affect the Audio filters, both for NDI Main and NDI Filters towards the SECOND OBS (if a game randomly spikes the CPU, like an old game that doesn't know what a Quad Core is, and that affects OBS Filters which are being used on the Audio, the Desync will permanently stay on the SECOND OBS and not affect the MAIN OBS).

Solution: Don't change scenes during stream/recording OR restart MAIN OBS after each scene change. Random Audio drops aren't bad, they are a couple of frames at worst and can be literally cut out with a Video Editor without noticing it. If a spike happens that affects filters, simply restart your MAIN OBS again.

 

[wilderf353]

I'm a newbie. Is there a way for this plugin to make IP addresses of NDI cameras available to a LUA script so I do not have to manually enter IP addresses for PTZ control of my NDi cameras. It seems they sometimes change IP addresses (DHCP) and then I have to go into the PTZ scripts and enter the new IPs.

If you have access to your router, you should try to reserve IP addresses for your NDI cameras (ie: tell the DHCP server to always assign the same IP address based on the camera's MAC address) .

I am running dd-wrt on my router, here is a good article on Static DHCP (I doubt your router will work the same way, but this article may help you get an understanding of what you should do on your router).

 

[Bert Kortbree]

I am new here. I have an datavideo camera with NDI en I work with OBS. The video has compared with the Microfoon audio a delay of 350 ms. There fore we have delayed the audio. So far so good. Mostly it works correct but sometimes the video has a extra delay. Recently I discovered that when we running OBS and then press on source NDI source and we close the popup the video has an extra delay.
Who can tell me more about it.

 

[Randle]

I tried raising a timing sync issue introduced in 27.1.1 with OBS and they say it isn't their problem. Can we fix this as it is causing significant fluctuating delays

https://github.com/obsproject/obs-studio/issues/54MM
In 27.1.1 the NDI sources are out of sync by approximately 1000-1300 milliseconds. This number isn't consistent and can fluctuate by about 300 milliseconds. I had to put three video delay buffers to get this total and to get the lip-sync reasonable for my livestream on the weekend.
I have NDI tools installed and so I checked whether the video feeds were in sync with this on the same computer. They were perfect (within 30 milliseconds). In OBS one video feed is always ~1000 milliseconds behind the other with filters on or with no filters. This is the same with both source timing and network timing.
To fix the all I did was install OBS 27.0.1 with no other changes and the video feeds were both back in sync.

The video has compared with the Microfoon audio a delay of 350 ms. There fore we have delayed the audio. So far so good. Mostly it works correct but sometimes the video has a extra delay.

I believe you may have a related problem. What version of OBS?

 

[Acey05]

To fix the all I did was install OBS 27.0.1 with no other changes and the video feeds were both back in sync.

Are you using version 4.9 or 4.8 of NDI by any chance?

 

[Malic]

I have been noticing that after about 2+ hours of streaming, my game PC NDI OBS source is lagging behind between a half to a full second. Is very visible when playing in VR and the image is delayed when I turn my head.

I tend to stop and restart the copy on the game PC and it syncs back up and then slowly loses sync again over the next few hours.

 

[Acey05]

Does using the NDI Filter for the Video and Audio work in not Desyncing? I don't know if the VR captures allows it, but it could be worth a try.

 

[AGP]

Hi everyone!

@Palakis,
The NDI Output and the NDI Plugin filter, both use NDI-HX or NDI Full?

 

[rockbottom]

^ Nope, regular NDI only. But, that can be sent to the NDI Bridge & transcoded to NDI-HX (H264 or HEVC) if needed.

Also, have had good results with OBS 27.0.1, with NDI Plugin 4.9.0 & NDI Tools 5.0.10.0.

Also using it with vMix 24.0.0.72 with no issues.

 

[Malic]

Does using the NDI Filter for the Video and Audio work in not Desyncing? I don't know if the VR captures allows it, but it could be worth a try.

I should mention that the VR example only made it more noticeable ... it does it in every game, VR or not. Just gets to a few second delay of what I have on my Game PC and what is on the Streaming computer. VR is not a factor in it

 

[FrogSpawns]

Wanted to post my problem with NDI and frame issues here, any advice?

Using a dual PC setup with NDI Scan Convertor and the plugin for OBS on the stream computer. On the gaming output end, I'm outputting 60FPS, but there's no other way to describe it other than the stream just does NOT look 60FPS smooth. Maybe I'm just being too anal about this, but it just looks off to me.

Here's a clip recently (using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...h35VEt0qs5YTm?filter=clips&range=7d&sort=time
And here's one before when I had one PC (not using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...lOqHnqlns9iz?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

Second clip just looks smooth and 60 FPS to me. Am I losin' it?

 

[IvYWing]

Linux Mint 64bit 20.2 Xfce
OBS-NDI is giving me choppy/underwater sounding audio from my network friend over the LAN.
I have tried killing pulseaudio and restarting it, applying various fixes across the web of editing config files, uninstalling speech-dispatcher, etc.
Have rebuilt OBS 27.1.3 from the ground up and NDI 4.5.1-1 always has choppy sound. Have restarted billions of times my computer and have been uising NDI with choppy sound and trying to fix it for a week.
Could it be that my friend is on Windows 10 running Win 10 OBS? What is going on? Please help.

 

[IvYWing]

Wanted to post my problem with NDI and frame issues here, any advice?

Using a dual PC setup with NDI Scan Convertor and the plugin for OBS on the stream computer. On the gaming output end, I'm outputting 60FPS, but there's no other way to describe it other than the stream just does NOT look 60FPS smooth. Maybe I'm just being too anal about this, but it just looks off to me.

Here's a clip recently (using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...h35VEt0qs5YTm?filter=clips&range=7d&sort=time
And here's one before when I had one PC (not using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...lOqHnqlns9iz?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

Second clip just looks smooth and 60 FPS to me. Am I losin' it?

If you are on Linux, run a tool to see if it is your monitor or video card. It won't tell you which one but helps. Some monitors run near 60 but not perfectly.
glxgears -info
Wait a bit for it to start printing out monitor frames. It will begin printing it out every 5 seconds. You can press Ctrl+C in Linux Mint to cancel out, it doesn't end on its own.
If you are on Windows you can maybe run a similar tool. With a better and faster monitor and videocard and faster internet/network you could run above 60.

 

[Acey05]

Wanted to post my problem with NDI and frame issues here, any advice?

Using a dual PC setup with NDI Scan Convertor and the plugin for OBS on the stream computer. On the gaming output end, I'm outputting 60FPS, but there's no other way to describe it other than the stream just does NOT look 60FPS smooth. Maybe I'm just being too anal about this, but it just looks off to me.

Here's a clip recently (using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...h35VEt0qs5YTm?filter=clips&range=7d&sort=time
And here's one before when I had one PC (not using NDI): https://www.twitch.tv/fathersongami...lOqHnqlns9iz?filter=clips&range=all&sort=time

Second clip just looks smooth and 60 FPS to me. Am I losin' it?

The NID clip seems to be running at either 48 or 30 frames. It could be many issues, ranging from your Router not being 100MB Local or your OBS was configured to send out the Resolution and Frame as Output instead of Video.

Also remember that NDI can end up using about 5-10% if your Graphics Card, so if you're already hitting the 100% load it's going to make the issue worse.

 

[FrogSpawns]

If you are on Linux, run a tool to see if it is your monitor or video card. It won't tell you which one but helps. Some monitors run near 60 but not perfectly.
glxgears -info
Wait a bit for it to start printing out monitor frames. It will begin printing it out every 5 seconds. You can press Ctrl+C in Linux Mint to cancel out, it doesn't end on its own.
If you are on Windows you can maybe run a similar tool. With a better and faster monitor and videocard and faster internet/network you could run above 60.

I'm on Windows. I have a 2080S on the gaming PC and gig internet (wired) to both the gaming and streaming computer. I'm not sure that either of those are the bottlenecks, no?