Bug Report Screen Randomly Flashing Black

bardwooders

New Member
When I am streaming (either in-game on League of Legends or just on my desktop) everything is perfectly fine on my end. I'm streaming using TwitchTV, and Twitch records all of my broadcasts so I can watch them over.

Upon watching them over, you can see a random black "flash" that occurs once every ~15 seconds. Everything is fine with my quality, my sound, and my computer's performance, but the people watching the stream have to see a random black flash that pops up for a very small brief second. It's really annoying to watch.

Here's a link to one of my broadcasts so you can see what I'm talking about: the flashes occur at what seems to be a random frequency:

http://www.twitch.tv/bardwooders/c/1780030#

Does anyone have experience with this? I've done some digging around and I can't find any solutions online, sorry if it's something obvious!

Thanks

Edit: Here's a log if it helps:

Code:
Open Broadcaster Software v0.457a - 32bit (´・ω・`)
-------------------------------
CPU Name: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-2600K CPU @ 3.40GHz
CPU Speed: 3392MHz
Physical Memory:  4095MB Total, 4095MB Free
stepping id: 7, model 10, family 6, type 0, extmodel 1, extfamily 0, HTT 1, logical cores 8, total cores 4
Windows Version: 6.1 Build 7601 S
Aero is Disabled
------------------------------------------
Adapter 1
  Video Adapter: AMD Radeon HD 7800 Series
  Video Adapter Dedicated Video Memory: 2123567104
  Video Adapter Shared System Memory: 4006637568
=====Stream Start=====================================================================
  Multithreaded optimizations: On
  Base resolution: 1920x1080
  Output resolution: 1280x720
------------------------------------------
Loading up D3D10...
------------------------------------------
Using auxilary audio input: Microphone (USB Audio Device)
------------------------------------------
Audio Encoding: AAC
    bitrate: 128
Using Monitor Capture
------------------------------------------
    device: Venus USB2.0 Camera,
    device id \\?\usb#vid_0ac8&pid_3420&mi_00#6&2f2d1795&0&0000#{65e8773d-8f56-11d0-a3b9-00a0c9223196}\global,
    chosen type: YUY2, usingFourCC: false, res: 640x480 - 640x480, fps: 15-30, fourCC: 'YUY2'

Using directshow input
Using text output
------------------------------------------
Video Encoding: x264
    fps: 30
    width: 1280, height: 720
    preset: veryfast
    CBR: no
    max bitrate: 1500
    buffer size: 1500
    quality: 8
------------------------------------------
bufferTime: 2000, outputRateWindowTime: 1000, dropThreshold: 2500
Total frames rendered: 11745, number of frames that lagged: 113 (0.96%) (it's okay for some frames to lag)
RTMPPublisher::SocketLoop: Aborting due to bStopping
Number of b-frames dropped: 0 (0%), Number of p-frames dropped: 0 (0%), Total 0 (0%)
=====Stream End=======================================================================
=====Stream Start=====================================================================
  Multithreaded optimizations: On
  Base resolution: 1920x1080
  Output resolution: 1280x720
------------------------------------------
Loading up D3D10...
------------------------------------------
Using auxilary audio input: Microphone (USB Audio Device)
------------------------------------------
Audio Encoding: AAC
    bitrate: 128
Using Monitor Capture
------------------------------------------
    device: Venus USB2.0 Camera,
    device id \\?\usb#vid_0ac8&pid_3420&mi_00#6&2f2d1795&0&0000#{65e8773d-8f56-11d0-a3b9-00a0c9223196}\global,
    chosen type: YUY2, usingFourCC: false, res: 640x480 - 640x480, fps: 15-30, fourCC: 'YUY2'

Using directshow input
Using text output
------------------------------------------
Video Encoding: x264
    fps: 30
    width: 1280, height: 720
    preset: veryfast
    CBR: no
    max bitrate: 1500
    buffer size: 1500
    quality: 8
------------------------------------------
bufferTime: 2019, outputRateWindowTime: 1000, dropThreshold: 2519
Total frames rendered: 31729, number of frames that lagged: 236 (0.74%) (it's okay for some frames to lag)
RTMPPublisher::SocketLoop: Aborting due to bStopping
Number of b-frames dropped: 0 (0%), Number of p-frames dropped: 0 (0%), Total 0 (0%)
=====Stream End=======================================================================

Profiler results:

==============================================================
frame - [100%] [avg time: 11.493 ms] [avg calls per frame: 1] [children: 97.2%] [unaccounted: 2.78%]
| scene->Preprocess - [55.5%] [avg time: 6.374 ms] [avg calls per frame: 1]
| video encoding and uploading - [41.8%] [avg time: 4.8 ms] [avg calls per frame: 1] [children: 13.6%] [unaccounted: 28.2%]
| | CopyResource - [1.03%] [avg time: 0.118 ms] [avg calls per frame: 0]
| | conversion to 4:2:0 - [0.0348%] [avg time: 0.004 ms] [avg calls per frame: 0]
| | call to encoder - [12.4%] [avg time: 1.428 ms] [avg calls per frame: 0]
| | sending stuff out - [0.104%] [avg time: 0.012 ms] [avg calls per frame: 0]
==============================================================

Memory Leaks Were Detected.
 

Krazy

Town drunk
Hm, not entirely sure then. Video drivers up to date? Does it happen with webcam disabled as well?
 

bardwooders

New Member
Aye - all video drivers are up to date. Webcam doesn't appear to be affecting it.

I've also come across another problem - After about ~2 hours (on average) of streaming, the stream "lags out". By this I mean that I will get messages from people that are watching saying that the video + audio quality drop significantly. If I open up my stream, the video is extremely choppy and the audio appears to be fast-forwarding as if it's trying to catch up with itself.

All I have to do is click "Stop Streaming" and then click "Start Streaming" and it works perfectly again for another two hours. Any ideas on this one or the black flickering?

Here's a link to the distortion I'm talking about:

http://www.twitch.tv/bardwooders/c/1780016#
 

Lain

Forum Admin
Lain
Forum Moderator
Developer
Hey. That distortion is due to a bug that was fixed in 0.458a. 0.457a had a fairly critical bug there.

As for the black frame flashing.. that's really weird. First, upgrade to 0.459a. Then if it still happens, could you send me an FLV generated from my app if at all possible? In broadcast settings, use "save to file" or something, try to see if it happens, and then some how send that file to me? Could tell me what's going on, but I know it's a lot to ask.
 

bardwooders

New Member
Oh wow, was unaware that there was an update already - I just started using OBS a day or two ago!

I just downloaded the new file and updated - and the program seems to have saved my scene (which is super convenient, by the way)

I'll stream some more tomorrow and the next day and report back if the black flashes + distortion continues to occur. Thanks so much for the helpful response, is there any way to automatically check for updates when launching the program?

I'll report back soon, thanks again
 

Lain

Forum Admin
Lain
Forum Moderator
Developer
We're implementing an auto-updater, it's just taking a it of time. We didn't expect this much publicity this soon so we're kind of behind where we'd like to be on that sort of stuff.
 

Lain

Forum Admin
Lain
Forum Moderator
Developer
I actually don't know what could be causing this. I didn't change any code in that area.

I can't watch the videos again due to my horrible ISP having connection issues with twitch.. Did this only happen with the desktop, or did it happen with everything (including webcam)? If it happened with the desktop, then you may want to try another capture method to see if it happens again. See if you can use game capture, or window capture with aero on, see if anything changes. Unfortunately it's the best I have to go on right now, as I don't have a lead yet.

I also haven't heard of others having this problem, so I'm somewhat baffled. Could be some driver issue (latest drivers or not), as the capture method is basically a hardware-based method.
 

Krazy

Town drunk
The flash did NOT happen with just the webcam. Try one of the other capture methods as Jim suggested. Note, these methods will require you to set up two scenes, one for the menus and one for the game itself.
 

bardwooders

New Member
Update:

I'm getting reports from people watching the stream that are saying it is fixed.

I had scrolling text that was going along the top of the stream. One of my viewers pointed out that every time the scrolling text "looped" or repeated, the black flash occurred. I removed the text from the stream and they're saying all is good now.

I'll post again if the problem persists
 

Lain

Forum Admin
Lain
Forum Moderator
Developer
Text you say? Hm, interesting. If you can find a way to replicate let me know, and I'll fix it
 

OnlyLogic

New Member
It seems I'm having similar problems. Your newer videos don't seem to have the flicker, though. If you found a way to fix it, care to post it so maybe I can try what you tried? Thanks!
 

Celize

New Member
This happens when I play Star Wars: Knight of the old republic, tried everything but still occurs. Was one time when it didn't flicker but then there was this weird resonance/disturbance in the sound. It doesn't happen when I play without the stream.
 

MCVictorious

New Member
The same issue has recently started to happen to me, except much worse. I play a game called Geometry Dash (Full Screen) and before it didn't happen, but recently my power went out, and my OBS resolution reset (It's set to be stretched all the way across to fit a width that I don't have selected) and it flashes a black screen over top randomly (it depends) but usually 5 times per second, which can cause epilepsy, and me who uploads videos onto youtube, would rather avoid this
 
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