Question / Help Webcam with multiple setups

Jarod997

Member
I have two different scenes, each scene uses a different video source, but each source uses the same webcam "item". The first source uses the webcam with a 1.333 ratio, the second source uses the webcam with a widescreen ratio. Problem is, even if I have "Deactivate when not showing" checked on both sources (using the same webcam), when I transition from one scene to another OBS doesn't deactivate the first source before showing the second and I don't get a webcam image (because it's still active).

Further, as I'm using Studio Mode the second scene won't show the image (because the active scene is showing the other). I don't care that the preview isn't showing the webcam in the alternate format - but when I transition, I would like the active scene to show the new ratio image.

The question is - is there any way to disable the webcam in the preview panel on the left side in Studio Mode? I'm hoping this will fix my "locked preview webcam" problem.
 

Narcogen

Active Member
No, there isn't. You only have one camera. When that's added to a scene as a source, the driver is initialized with the specified settings. The only way to do what you want would be to have a transitionary scene with no webcam in it, go into studio mode, delete the camera input and then add it again with the new settings.

"deactivate when not showing" turns the camera off so there's no video decoding being done, and so reduces load on the system when you're in a scene that doesn't need the camera, but it doesn't uninitialize the driver.

You also cannot, as far as I know, selectively disable the display of certain sources in the Preview pane. By design the preview pane shows the scene that goes active next as it will appear when it goes live-- that is the purpose of it.
 

Jarod997

Member
I like the preview pane, I use it, I just don't want my webcam to be active in the preview pane, just the "output" pane.

I don't know if I buy the whole "driver is only initialized with specific settings" idea. The driver controls the camera and should be able to change the settings that control the camera. Now I could see that if I create two sources which both use the same camera that OBS creates two instances of the "driver object" and they'll compete with each other.

Alternately, how can I go about having two different scenes where one uses a 4/3 ratio webcam image and a second uses a 16/9 ratio webcam image?
 

Narcogen

Active Member
The preview pane mirrors the way hardware video switchers work. It has to show exactly what goes live when you hit the CUT button. It can't be just some of it; you can't have a video switcher where you hit CUT and then you see anything different on the Program window than you did in the Preview window. This is absolutely by design.

The only workaround I am aware of is the one I suggested.

Another one that might work would be to use a third party software to view your webcam, presumably one that can change the aspect ratio on the fly, and capture that window as a source in OBS. However I haven't ever done that, so I can't say for sure. It might work. I'm not sure if OBS would change the window source size dynamically though, so even if your image changed to the proper aspect ratio, you'd just be getting your image letter or pillarboxed, depending on which aspect you are changing to or from.
 

carlmmii

Active Member
For the question of how to change aspect ratio between scenes, just enter manual numbers for the transform menu (ctrl-E). The transform settings are independent per scene, so anything you do in there shouldn't affect anything else. Just set your camera's resolution to whatever can be transformed into the other (i.e. use a larger resolution so you can shrink it with the transform, or crop it), and you should be fine.
 

Jarod997

Member
For the question of how to change aspect ratio between scenes, just enter manual numbers for the transform menu (ctrl-E). The transform settings are independent per scene, so anything you do in there shouldn't affect anything else. Just set your camera's resolution to whatever can be transformed into the other (i.e. use a larger resolution so you can shrink it with the transform, or crop it), and you should be fine.

Thanks Carl, I think I can live with that. :)
 
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