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IP control over internet remote location

I have successfully managed to control the camera through Wirecast on a LAN and can see from your video help that this is technically feasible through Livestream Studio software, too.


However, I am keen to know if this will work over WAN (all your help materials only discuss LAN setup)? For instance, if I can give the PTZOptics camera an IP address that can be accessed from anywhere (perhaps through a DDNS service) will everything work as if it's on the local network or is there something else that I will need to know?


In fact, I can't seem to find any articles that address using these camera in remote studios in the field, as it were, so I am wondering if there's some big gotcha (barring bandwidth limitations) that I don't know about, since this strikes me as a natural use-case scenario? I was hoping that these camera could be taken to events, configured to be accessible over the Internet, and then piped into the studio for live-streaming. For example, in a three-way interview scenario I might have two cameras in the field (in two separate locations) and one in the studio with all the cameras coming into the studio's switcher. At least that would be the plan.

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Hi David,


Thank you for taking the time to detail your end goals and some of the concerns associated.


I'll do my best to explain where the "gotchas" in the chain can occur as there are some areas with a "gotcha" nature to them...


I do currently run cameras using Static IPs, Port Forwarding and DynDNS... it is possible :-)

So the largest warning here is that you are at the mercy of the Public Internet which, unlike a LAN, you are not in control of and can result in unexpected and seemingly illogical behavior.

There are services that exist that will attempt to mitigate the impact of the Public Internet from companies such as SIENNA, MediaLooks, and even in hardware HAIVISION to name a few.

But it all depends on what level or reliability you are looking for.


Using Static IPs is definitely an option, though it can get costly depending on your location, and does open your camera up to more attempted attacks from the bots on the public internet.

If utilizing Static IPs it is highly recommend to change the default login credentials. You will also need to use HTTP (CGI-BIN) or TCP Commands for control of the camera is using something other than the WebUI.

The most common issue I see when using this method is that the camera, due to data traversing the public internet, will fail to receive a stop command and thus pan or tilt to its limit.


Using DynamicDNS is also an option but I find comes with the above mentioned caveat plus the fact that some DynamicDNS services will only pass along some of the traffic...

So you may have control with no video, or possibly vice versa and to make matters worse on any given day I can randomly discover that the service is temporarily failing to pass along data it had the day prior.

Given the caveats mentioned above the DynamicDNS service I have found to be the "most" reliable, though still exhibiting these issues, for this usage has been http://dyn.com/


My next option is a little different than anything suggested above in that it is a full fledged live video production solution that lives in the cloud.

EasyLive is an amazing platform that allows you to leverage the RTMP capabilities of the cameras to stream content to their platform, and handle all production from the cloud.

Depending on the budget and needs this may be a worthwhile solution to investigate.


The final option I can offer, for now, would be looking into using GRE Tunnels and if encryption was desired GRE Tunnels wrapped in a VPN-IPSEC.

This option would allow you to have "network boxes" that allow a remote user to plug the box into their network and the camera into that box, to enable the remote camera as part of your LAN.

Here is a nice little article Ubiquti has provided on using their affordable EdgeRouters to accomplish the GRE Tunnel with IPSEC... 

just of note that while the EdgeRouters provide this functionality they are the affordable option in the market with some solutions costing thousands of dollars.


Just a note that when pulling in these sources locally and remotely you may have issues with synchronization of content... if handling this more for remote interviews using vMix with the vMix call feature may be able to accomplish what you're looking for... it may even be a mix of the above :-)


I hope I have been able to provide some useful information, some topics to research a bit more and maybe even introducing some options you may not have originally been aware of.


If you have any follow up questions, or about other topics, please do not hesitate to come back.





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