Live feed broadcast to tv screens possible?

D

Dakkar

Member
Hi guys and gals, here's my situation. I've been asked to broadcast the feed from my camcorder (HMC-150 obviously) to 2 screens which are locate in other rooms in the same building. Both within 100 feet, but one upstairs and one downstairs. What setup would you suggest?

I was thinking of feeding the video to a laptop who could then stream over network (through VLC?) to two laptops attached to the tv screens. Is this possible or is the bandwith involved too much? Also, what could be used to capture the HDMI onto a laptop?

Better ideas are welcome. However, I'd rather have a solution that doesn't involve too much $$ as this is pretty much a one time thing.

Thanks!
 
Simple. Composite cable. I would not fuzz and fitch with wireless video, or streaming VLC mpeg.. it's not worth it. The amount of time and gear involved.. no way. Get a video DA , take the yellow video from the 150, into the DA, split to the two TV sets.

If you are shooting under poor lighting, then there's absolutely no reason to send a HiDef signal to them.. no HDMI, not Component.. good old blue video down the hall, taped up over the doorways, to Video In.

Wireless anything will run at 2.4ghz, and a microwave oven, a router, a cordless phone will kill that signal.

If you get a DA, you need to look at cost per RCA output. A 1 in 2 out Component DA should cost the same as a 3 in 6 out composite, because they are exactly the same thing. You could even put the video into an RF modulator along with the audio, and then tune the sets to Ch. 3. A cheap splitter is all ya need to feed multiple rooms.

Make sure you turn off all the OSD items on the output, and set the aspect ratio according to the monitors.

If audio is needed at the TV sets, then it's even cheaper.

Video cable is stupid cheap, buy a few hundred feet of RG6, crimp on RF ends, then buy some adapters to BNC and RCA, you can connect to anything with that setup.
 
Last edited:
Less interferance if you take Wpg's sugesstion but use a rca to Svdieo adapter, run the svideo cables instead of RCA, Also most TV's will take Svideo.

Other option to reduce noise is RCA to coax and run coax to the rooms then another adpater from coax to RCA.

I have to run two feeds of my camera for a hocky webcast. One RCA and one Svideo. I have an RCA splitter, with one going to a DVD recorder and the other end going through an svido adpater ($15) though an svideo line to the encoding computer. I find the rca to Svideo looked cleaner over a 1 hundred foot run.

I used to run hundreds of feet of composite through BNC (same cables as coax) from the video out on an Arri film camera to the video play back booth. It's a good option. The nice soft coax cables were nice to use for long runs. Stiff coax is a pain.
 
Don't bother with S-video for long runs like this. Also, converting from Composite to S-video won't help you (it was already composite, it's not going to get any better).

Good quality coax cables (with appropriate connectors [try and keep adapters to a minimum]) is the simplest way to do this and get a good picture.

- Mikko
 
Well technically yes, but if it's a matter of running over an svideo cable vs a RCA cable then the svideo cable will have less loss. At least in my experience.

For a hundred feet svideo would be good. But I would say Coax is best.

For my situation above I have no choice. Those are the feeds handed to me. Otherwise I'd be doing a coax run.
 
RCA is just a connector.

All video cable are "Coax" coaxial cables, regardless of the end connector (BNC, RCA, or F).

Even S-video cables are simply 2 little thin Coax Cables within one larger outer jacket.


Use the highest quality cable with good connectors and as fed adapters as necessary. - Don't convert between formats unless you need to!

- Mikko
 
we just finish working on a concert where we had 4 cameras connected to a switcher, and from the switcher to a projector and also capturing the signal to our NLE... the cheap way was using coax cable with RF to RCA adaptors at the end, we ran two cables (for two cameras) maybe 250 to 300 feet (about 100 yards) to the switcher. And we had no problems with signal quality drop!

We used coax cable because we have access to boxes of them (we know someone at comcast =) ) so we pretty much made our own cables... But if you don't want to go thru all that trouble then get something like this
http://www.frys.com/product/4458636?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG

I know someone mention this, but make sure you change your OSD settings to get rid of the things on the display... the projector we used was 4x3 so we had the cameras do a sidecrop to output a 4x3 signal on the RCA

Good luck!!!
 
mikkowilson said:
RCA is just a connector.

All video cable are "Coax" coaxial cables, regardless of the end connector (BNC, RCA, or F).
Click to expand...

Of course it is. What we are really talking here is a composite signal; generally sent via cheap cables with RCA ends.

And I do believe RG6 is better than an cheap RCA. I also contend through personal experience that a Composite signal converted to Svideo will look better over a hundred feet of Svideo cable than a hundred feet of cheap composite cable.

And both will be beat by RG 6 or even RG 56. And if you really want low signal noise you can get fiber optic (with necessary equipment that is).

OP, if you make your own cables, do yourself a favor and go with BNC ends. Much easier to attach and remove than standard cablevison type ends. Especially if you end up using them on alot of gigs. You can get BNC to RCA ends and couplers for them as well.

PLGBNC.GIF
pwd_ba90.jpg
 
Last edited:
I have boxes of RG6 in the basement (perk of working at a cable company), and I have threaded BNC ends, not crimped. In the field, the end of a cable can get damaged, or the end pulled off. If all you have is crimped ends, then you could be hooped.

I've often had to 'spin' the BNC end on a newly stripped cable. A stripper (cable kind :grin: ) is just a light, small plastic tool, easy to keep in your kit bag. A crimper is not. Without one, you could use your Buck Tool (Gerber, Leatherman... _never_ go out without one) to cut the cable up, and the pliers to spin the BNC end.

Yes, S-Video is a cleaner signal, but on an HMC-150, doesn't exist, and those cables cost quite a fair amount for long runs...

If you want primo signal quality on long runs, use 3 cables and push the analog component signal over them. They need to be the same length, otherwise there could be some shifting of colour signals on the monitor.

Any passive composite to YC (S-video) adapter will make things look like garbage. And an active adapter will induce just as much noise as a straight composite run.
 
Thanks a lot for your expertise and taking the time to answer. I see your point about wireless interferences. Would it be possible to use some network cables and change the connectors at the end? Would that still be considered "coax" cables?

Please excuse my ignorance. :-)
 
Dakkar said:
Thanks a lot for your expertise and taking the time to answer. I see your point about wireless interferences. Would it be possible to use some network cables and change the connectors at the end? Would that still be considered "coax" cables?

Please excuse my ignorance. :-)
Click to expand...

No worries :) Network cables (assuming Cat5 in all its various flavors) consists of 8 wires, forming 4 twisted pairs, 24AWG diameter copper. 24AWG is really quite thin.

RG6 is nominally 1 solid core of 18AWG copper, with a metallic shield running around the cable. The shield improves resistance to noise.

I probably wouldn't recommend running adapted Cat5 due to the potential for noise. It would theoretically be possible to do it, by stripping off the inner insulation on all 8 wires, soldering them together into one big bundle and then connecting it to the BNC connector, but you'd then be left without a shield and ground. How it would perform is really anybody's guess :) For very short runs it might actually work.
 
Pushing video directly over Cat5 won't work. Not only is there no shield (as mentioned above, the shield in Coax is part of what makes it work so well), but the impedance almost certainly won't be 75-ohms either.

There are various passive (bauluns) and active (such as Kramer's twisted pair interfaces or even Camplex) devices that allow you to send various video signals over Cat5 cable - but those normally cost much more than just getting the correct coax cable for most basic applications.

- Mikko
 
This was asked... what is a DA ?

DA Distribution Amplifier. If you only have one composite video connector and need to feed multiple devices, you'll need a DA in most cases. Common boxes have 1 input and 4 outputs.

If you loop video into more than one device, the signal might get terminated, and then look low on all the monitors. Most consumer devices auto-terminate the video signals, there's no getting around that.

Some TV sets have an output section, where if you have 3 inputs to choose from, it will output the signal you are watching. This is handy if the sets are all in one direction and you can just loop from set to set.

But if the sets are in all different directions, you'll probably have to home-run the cables to your DA.

DA's can be found at Best Buy and places like that, but make sure you get the kind that need to be plugged in for power.
 
Well, following your advice, more or less, I scrapped the idea of the wireless streaming. I now have my camcorder connected to a converter box. The output is a coaxial cable that I split into 2(2 way splitter I think it amplify the signal as well, not sure) . One goes on a 100 feet coax cable and the other to a 50 feet coax cable. From what I could test, there didn't seem to be too much difference. 40$ worth of hardware will probably eliminate a lot of problems.

Anything I should worry about?
 
Anything I should worry about?
Click to expand...

people + cable = problems
make sure you tape or hide your cables, corners work good for running cables! If possible put rubber mats or carpet on top of high traffic areas... some banquet halls have them available for people to use!
 
Just wanted to say thanks everyone. I followed your advice, used coaxial (running through suspended ceilings) and the result was, no problem whatsoever! Everything went smoothly and the image on 42 inch HDTV looked quite nice even with SD from the RCA of the HMC-150.

Thanks again!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top