Streaming
Menu → Streaming
SubC Streaming Service is a cloud-based software that is accessible from any system connected to the Internet.
The SubC Blackbox has the ability to interact with SubC Streaming Service, allowing you to live stream a variety of input video sources from offshore (i.e. ROVs and/or Vessels) to SubC Presentations where viewers onshore can watch from anywhere in the world.
With SubC Streaming Service, you can Stream the Channel videos to the Internet and securely control who can view by creating Presentations in SubC Streaming Services Web application.
Your Presentation invitations include a link and Access Code and are sent to your viewers via email from within each Presentation.
To use this Streaming feature in SubC Blackbox requires a SubC Streaming Service account.
When you select Menu → Streaming, if you get this activation prompt, and your company has subscribed to SubC Streaming Services, login to SubC Streaming Services Web application to generate an Activation Code and enter it in this Activate prompt on your SubC Blackbox desktop application.
This “Activate” step registers your SubC desktop application host PC with your Group in the SubC Streaming Service. You’ll only have to do this activation once per PC when your first install the SubC desktop application.
With Blackbox Channel configured with video Inputs,, Select Menu → Streaming
Sign In to your Streaming Service account
Ideally,
Latency shouldn't exceed 150ms.
Jitter should be below 30ms.
Packet loss % should be no more than 1%
Server - This field will populate automatically with the domain name of the Stream Server based on your selection (below in the Server → Location field).
Status - Indicates the status of the connection with the selected Stream Server: Success or Failed (Failed if the server is unavailable or unreachable due to Internet accessibility issue).
Latency (ms) - Latency refers to the delay in network traffic between your PC and the streaming server.
Jitter (ms) - Jitter is when packets arrive at the destination in a different order than they were sent. (Typically caused by network congestion, route changes, etc.) The longer it takes for packets to arrive, the more jitter can negatively impact the video and audio quality.
Packet Loss % - Packet Loss happens when packets travelling across the network fail to reach the destination (usually caused by network instability and/or congestion).
Location - Click the dropdown field and select from the list of available SubC Stream servers.
Login Timeout - Is set to default of 15 seconds. You can adjust this to a longer wait time if your network takes more than 15 seconds to respond to the transmissions between your system and the Stream server.
Auto Reconnect (On/Off) - set to default On. If you lose your Internet connection, or connection to the Stream server is interrupted, as soon as the service is re-established any streams that were started before the interruption will resume.
RealTime streaming is useful when you need very low latency video (such as for piloting a craft). Typically, this type of stream has sub-second latency but minimizing latency means no buffering. Frames are delivered and displayed as soon as they become available. The lack of buffering may result in the video being jumpy on slower networks
Transmission Type: RealTime
Encoder: vp9 | gpu_h264 | h264
vp9 - Default; vp9 is a higher compression codecs, allowing for better quality images at a lower bitrate/bandwidth requirement; Stream at 1bit/sec; requires higher CPU resources
gpu_h264 - Is a lower compression codecs; Streams at higher bitrate/bandwidth requirement; Stream at 4bit/sec; requires less CPU resources as the performance is video-card based.
h264 - Is similar to gpu_h264 in all aspects, except it utilizes the CPU resources; Select h264 if your system video card does not support gpu_h264 but you wish to use lower compression/stream at a high bitrate/bandwidth.
BitRate (Kbps) - Default = 256;
Selection Range: 16-5120.
Resolution - Default = Auto;
Selection Range: 1920x1080, 1280x720, 720x480, 320x240.
Framerate (fps) - Default = Auto;
Selection Range: 5, 15, 20, 29.97, 30.
Embedded Audio - If you have a microphone connected to your system through which you would like to communicate/add narration during your video streaming transmission, select Enable checkbox.
Audio Bitrate (Kbps) - Default is set to 64Kbps depending on your Network performance. You can adjust the audio bitrate to improve the audio quality.
You need to be logged into the SubC Streaming Service (See Menu → Settings → Sign In/Out) to activate the Presentation Name field to become a drop-down / selection field.
Create your Presentations from within the SubC Streaming Service Web Application to make them available in this selection field.
Presentation Name - Displays the Name of the Presentation that this Channel will stream to.
Data Enabled - Displays as red “X” if not enabled / green checkmark if enabled on the Presentation
See Data Input section for more details.Audio Chat - Displays as red “X” if not enabled / green checkmark if enabled on the Presentation
One-Time - One-Time Stream is optimized for quickly sharing a single channel of video, (without the need for an access code as is an option in regular Presentations). The link to a One-Time Stream will expire as soon as the Channel stops streaming, and a new link will be generated each time the input is started streaming. See Presentation → One-Time Stream
Blackbox with SubC Streaming Service & Presentations
Open both the Blackbox Desktop application and the SubC Streaming Service web application.
In a typical operation scenario, the Blackbox application is running on one system (i.e. on an ROV or Vessel) and the SubC Streaming Service web application is running on another system (i.e. on a Vessel or Onshore)
On the Blackbox desktop application, configure a Channel with video Input (see Starting an Input section).
On the Streaming Service web application → Groups screen, you’ll see the Blackbox Channels.
In this example, Desktop Channel 1 → Input displays the video Type and Address you’ve configured on the Blackbox system.
Desktop Channel 1 → Quality displays configurable parameters. In this example, we will remain with the default parameter values.
Desktop Channel 1 → Presentations allows you to select the Presentation you wish to make this Channel video output available, displays the selected Presentation’s additional configured features (Audio Chat and Data are included in this Presentation) and select a Streaming Server Location.
Click Start button to start Streaming this Channel and in a second or two, you’ll see the “Streaming in progress” message.
You can also Start | Stop the Channel Streaming from within the Blackbox Desktop application, however typically it often more convenient to remotely Start | Stop the Channel Streaming via the SubC Streaming Service web application.
Back on the Blackbox Desktop application, Stream Start | Stop button icon (bottom, center, right) changes to indicate if Streaming is active.
Streaming Stopped
Streaming Started
Next, we take a look at the Presentations within SubC Streaming Service Web Application.
Presentations that you create will display in your Stream Group here.
In the “Stream Presentation” example, the Invites field shows the email addresses of people we want to invite to view the Presentation.
Click the EMAIL INVITATIONS button to send individual emails containing the URL to access this specific Presentation and the Access Code to each email listed in the Invites field.
Click the EDIT button to add or change email addresses in the Invites field.
If you Edit to add more invites or edit email addresses, if you click EMAIL INVITATIONS again will send emails to all listed in Invites again.
Alternatively, if you rather not email everyone again, simply send a separate email via your email application to the additional invites and include the Access Code for the Presentation and this link to the SubC Presentations login URL.
Regular & One-Time Stream Presentation Examples:
Click the green + circle to open the Create Presentation UI.
Title - Give your Presentation a meaningful name.
Email Addresses - enter the email addresses of people you would like to invite to view your Presentation (separate each email with a comma)
Internal Presentation - Do not select for customer facing presentations.
Select only for internal testing of Presentations and One-Time Presentations as this option will place a SubC Watermark overlay the videos. Also, you will not be billed for these internal test presentations.
Data Streaming - Select if you wish to stream data out along with your Presentation video.
When you create a Presentation and include the Data Streaming option, if the Channel that is assigned to this Presentation is streaming Data (Channel is connected to a Rayfin camera w data &/or taking in other data source, such as NMEA or telemetry data, via Data Input), when you then take that Presentation in as Channel Input on another DVR+O / SCI system, it will receive the video & data streaming from the Source (“Sending”) Channel through the Presentation to the (“Receiving”) Channel. You can see this incoming data in Menu → Data Input → Existing Data Inputs → Presentation Data. You can also display this data on the Receiving Channel with Menu → Overlay → Data
Audio Chat - Select if you wish to include the ability to chat with other viewers during your Presentation. An “Audio Chat” button will appear on the Presentation that the viewers can click to open an Audio Chat session in another web browser.
One-Time Presentation
Note, Data Streaming and Audio Chat are not applicable to One-Time PresentationSee One-Time Stream for more details.
In the “Stream Presentation” example, the Invites field shows the email addresses of people we want to invite to view the Presentation.
Click the EMAIL INVITATIONS button to send individual emails containing the URL to access this specific Presentation and the Access Code to each email listed in the Invites field.
Click the EDIT button to add or change email addresses in the Invites field.
If you Edit to add more invites or edit email addresses, if you click EMAIL INVITATIONS again will send emails to all listed in Invites again. Alternatively, you rather not email everyone again, simply send a separate email via your email application to the additional invites and include the Access Code for the Presentation and this link https://presentationsnext.subcservices.com/ to the Presentation URL.
Those invited to view the Presentation can now open the Presentation web application, enter their email address and the Presentation specific Access Code to view the Presentation with the Channel videos Streaming to SubC Streaming Service.
Once logged in, the Presentation shows the streaming video in real-time.
Note: You can have multiple (up to a maximum of 6) Blackbox Channels displayed in a Presentation.
If you would alternatively like to have a SubC Presentation viewer UI customized with your Company logo / branding, contact sales@subcimaging.com