Best products from r/VIDEOENGINEERING

Weller WESD51 has been my go-to soldering station, but if you have money, Hakko is awesome. I also like the Weller heat gun, it comes with a curved deflector for heat shrink. The TS-100 pocket soldering iron is awesome for a tool bag. (Someone also hacked the firmware so you can play Tetris on the 96x16 OLED.)

Paladin (now Greenlee) crimpers are great. I have the 8000 series crimper with the 2699 "HDTV" die. It has sizes for most of the BNC connectors I need to crimp. Also get a quality coax stripper, I have a CST Pro, but I actually prefer the LC CST. Normal wire strippers and a curved wire cutter (like this) are must-haves, too.

Small diagonal cutters are great to have, I have the Xcelite 1178M, but the Hakko CHP-170 are cheaper and just as good.

If you have any fiber, get some IBC cleaners. They have different tips for various ferrule sizes. I usually end up carrying one for LC and one for SMPTE. A fiber scope is nice, but a bit overkill if you ask me. A laser is good enough for most of what I do.

A drill with a long phillips bit is essential for racking equipment, as is some sort of flashlight. I like this one because it has a magnet on it, which is perfect for sticking to rack rails.

Speaking of screwdrivers, a set of precision screwdrivers is handy. A friend of mine has this very expensive set. I have this one from Wiha and it's really good. Plus you get free needle nose pliers.

I've never had a problem with the EZ RJ45 crimpers, at least when using EZ RJ45 plugs.

This sounds like one of those crazy ideas that some sales or marketing peep comes up with that seems stupid-easy to the non-tech, but winds up giving us nightmares.

Even if you solve all the streaming, bandwidth, and connectivity issues (and don't forget, wifi that's perfectly stable during testing can easily go to hell when an audience shows up with their phones and laptops trying to hit the network as well...), it would be unwatchable due to lag with playback or any 'live' source like a camera. The only thing you could use it for would be graphics, since even with the best streaming connections you'd still be seconds out of sync with reality.

Also, iPads demand to be played with. You establish a connection and a stream to each device, and then throw it out on a table. The first person that picks it up is going to hit home and start swiping around. How do they get back to the stream seamlessly and without assistance? Are these their personal devices or are they strictly for show and you lock them down completely, even to the point of putting them in enclosures to prevent physical button access?

Are using the actual iPads a necessity? I've done old-school wired set-ups where we distribute a signal to a monitor on every table. It's not as sexy as seeing it on your own iPad, but it scratches the itch for having the content 'in your face'.

For something wireless, what about a small-scale local broadcast DTV signal to a couple dozen of something like these?

Of course! Here is an example with a small switcher: AW-HS50 In the specifications on that page you will see a listing at the bottom in the section called TALLY/GPI. As you see, it has 5 inputs and 7 outputs. The inputs can be assigned to do specific things on the switcher but the outputs/tally are usually assigned for a purpose (turn on the tally light on a camera or a multi-viewer, here is a video that goes over the setup on a larger, slightly out of date swticher), to turn on/activate when the source assigned to it has been selected on the program bus (larger switchers that have multiple program feeds with have the option to assign a source and program feed to use so you know which program feed went live with that specific source). You will have to dig into the manual for the specific switcher you want in order to set that up as most manufacturers do it a different way. When a tally is activated, it switches from being either negative to positively charged, or positively to negatively charged. This wire is then connected to another system that can take in this boolean value (on or off) and then assigned to a specific function on that system. Here is an example of what I meant by a GPIO USB device. With all of this being said, feel free to jump to my TLDR if you don't care.

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TL;DR

As others have said, just get a PCI capture card and set the inputs into OBS. Should be a lot easier and if you really want a physical switcher, just get some device that you can assign the buttons to keyboard shortcuts and then assign those shortcuts in OBS to change sources.

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Hope this helps and feel free to reach out with more questions. I don't mind.

Having not seen your facility:

Since the run is only 50 feet, I would run Coax cable from the camera to the junction box. Coax is going to be more robust and it is less likely to be damaged, plus anytime you can hide/protect the fiber, the better. I love hiding Fidos in boxes where they are less likely to be messed with.

That being said, each location is unique. I've also had good luck running Coax to the base of a basketball basket, and then running Tac to a junction point. I was using the same Tac for cameras as well, so a Tac-6 was going to be run anyway, might as well use it. I'm currently lucky enough that I have fiber available right at the base of the basket, and we've built a cover that keeps the Fidos and Lunchboxes covered and protected.

As a side note, if you want to run Coax and Power together to a camera, I have had luck with these cables: NEW rg59 coaxial cable 20AWG 50ft All in One RG59 Siamese Coaxial Cable for 1080P /720P, TVI, CVI, AHD HD-SDI CCTV Camera Installation. They aren't technically rated for the video (they are RG59, I'm a 720p facility), but I've had success running these to locations when I needed to get power to the camera and video from the camera, and want to make a clean run.

Hello,
So I work Support for Teradek so obviously there is some bias. I can give some insight on the solutions as from my perspective as some of the pro's vs the LiveU.

1. I can tell you that Teradek boxes give the best quality for the bitrate. We've tuned that processor well.
   
2. Teradek devices don't require a service unless you are bonding or want to do simulcasting. The LiveU devices become bricks if you don't purchase their service.
   
3. Teradek has better API support. I believe the bottom level LiveU devices support RTMP only.
   
   Battery requirements would need to be 6-12 volts and I would suggest having a battery that has barrel connection outputs similar to this: https://www.amazon.com/XTPower-MP-10000-External-10000mAh-included/dp/B00935L44E/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1521828393&sr=1-4&keywords=power+bank+with+12v+output
   
   As another note, if you are going to do switching between cameras, you need to have a seamless switcher, maybe something like this: https://www.amazon.com/HUIERAV-Multi-Viewer-Seamless-Function-Support/dp/B01M8I6SKL

Thanks for the resources! I love Timescapes, it's great to throw on a loop while I'm testing things.

I've found the Spears & Munsil UHD HDR Calibration Blu-Ray has some good test content as well as some good patterns. I have a few of their demo clips ripped to a jump drive.

Sorry for the late reply friend. afaik the only ways to make use of live feed function in PP6 is to use one of Renewed Vision's recommended adapters for video capture.(link). What I ended up doing, however, was making use of the chroma key function on my video switcher that I didn't even know was there at first lol. I just made sure I had my default background in PP6 was set to black and poof everything worked seamlessly. Best part was there was no added lag to account for. My switcher does pretty well with latency and there is no noticeable delay for live video at the front of house. Now I know you said your switcher is in another room, but is it controlled physically by someone else, or is it software operated? In any case, I'd say it'd be worthwhile to see if your switcher has a chroma key feature, it would make your life alot easier, considering your already rather involved setup. imo it's really worth it to consider buying a switcher with at least the chroma key feature. It means less clutter and an overall more professional look, just my two cents. Here is my current video switcher if you're interested.

Get this model: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01DVP3GJW/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Do not buy another model unless you want to literally set your money on fire. Its what I have, its held up great, and is rock solid. Crane makes another model with a slightly narrower base, but this model is superior. There are lots of completely garbage laptop stands out there, that will break within a year, or be super rickety, or both. But remember you're setting your (potentially) multi-thousand dollar laptop on top of it.

One of the production companies I work with uses the Hercules laptop stands, and they're ok too, very well made. Just slightly more of a pain to set up than the one I have.

Depends what you're doing with it and what you really mean when you say "IP". Does something that only works in its own custom software work for you? If so, you have a myriad of options.

If not ... there's a bunch of ~$100 (depending on lens and options) security cameras out there that are IP and PoE. this style. Takes some digging but you can find a wide variety. You'll have to dig into each one and what software it has. The one I got to test with ^([link is what Amazon says I bought, not necessarily still the same due to options adding and removing from these listings]) a while ago has some standard stream support but only streams out when its software is running so you have to do some fun little tricks to get it going but once it's going you can throw it in VLC or into something like vMix or OBS.

The Sony PXW-x70 has everything you need, new it's about $2000 but there are used available on Amazon for $1,500 or so:

https://smile.amazon.com/Sony-PXWX70-HD422-Camcorder-3-5-Inch/dp/B00NPAJH8I

Also, a used Panasonic HPX-170 would be perfect for your setup:

https://smile.amazon.com/Panasonic-AG-HPX170-High-Definition-Camcorder-Optical/dp/B001E96LGI

It looks like those are going for about $1,600 used on Amazon. (No HDMI out on this one, but a $50 converter would get you by until you can get your switcher.)

Very cheap option: If you already have a BMDVA then you could use a consumer HDMI home transmitter depending on your room distance.

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So your signal flow would go: Source->Cheap (maybe monoprice) SDI to HDMI converter -> HDMI Wireless transmitter -> HDMI Wireless Receiver -> HDMI cable from receiver into BMDVA.

Example: https://www.amazon.com/J-Tech-Digital-Wireless-Supporting-Transmission/dp/B071VCK1FG/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=hdmi+wireless+transmitter+and+receiver&qid=1549747552&s=gateway&sr=8-3

To power the receiver in a wireless way you'll need power on the go. This provides 5v with the standard 5.5mm plug. Never put more than the rated amount of voltage into a device, or else white smoke magic will happen.https://www.amazon.com/Generic-Battery-Holder-Connector-Arduino/dp/B00O5AZI12/ref=sr_1_11?keywords=5v+5.5+battery&qid=1549747721&s=gateway&sr=8-11

Laggy option on the cheap: If you have a macbook get a BMD SDI Recorder : https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/ultrastudio, shove it into the macbook and OBS, and private stream over platform of your choice (Youtube/Twitch etc) and monitor with the Ipad wirelessy (as long as you have a house wifi network, or your own of course).Windows option: Elgato H60 is a piece of trash but does work.. most of the time. This option total would be around or less than $200. Hope that helps!

If you want to really learn video I would recommend Charles Poynton's book. I found it very accessible. That said, I'm a design engineer so my perspective might be skewed.

That won't directly help you with the projectors but it will help you identify issues with the image and help narrow down the potential cause.

This is a good overview in general: https://www.amazon.com/Broadcast-Engineering-Tutorial-Non-Engineers-ebook/dp/B00JZKP254

It sounds like you want to learn about RF and COFDM, look into this: http://www.ik4hdq.net/doc/testi/Modelli_RF_Wireless.pdf

This is a fairly decent book about the basics of video. It dose not cover everything you mentioned, but it did help me to get a deeper understanding of how video works.

https://www.amazon.com/Digital-Video-Second-Algorithms-Interfaces/dp/0123919266/ref=pd_sim_14_5?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0123919266&pd_rd_r=BHQ6TJBRWH3CN8CJTB24&pd_rd_w=dJr0z&pd_rd_wg=lPQ1F&psc=1&refRID=BHQ6TJBRWH3CN8CJTB24