TV monitors on rostrum

[stephendoud]

You should be able to split the video feed you are using for the rest of the building to also feed the two small monitors near the podium. For my GA is in Africa but I am in the U.S. stake conference, I had an extra computer next to the pulpit connected to the Zoom call, muted, and took the video out of it to feed the two monitors.

I will do my best to accommodate all requests. This query is the result of a middle-of-the-night worry on how to set up rostrum monitors. The Spirit pointed me to this forum. I also met with the previous STS to get his ideas.

I'll keep the camera/rostrum TVs system separate from the Zoom setup. I am still unsettled how to get the USB webcam output to the TVs -some software on a laptop?

[russellhltn]

I am still unsettled how to get the USB webcam output to the TVs -some software on a laptop?

About the only way that's going to happen is to take the laptop's video output and get it into the monitors. But that's assuming you can set the software to show the camera full-screen.

You can split a composite video signal, an RF signal, or a HDMI signal. You can't split a USB. It will have to become something else first.

[stephendoud]

I am still unsettled how to get the USB webcam output to the TVs -some software on a laptop?

About the only way that's going to happen is to take the laptop's video output and get it into the monitors. But that's assuming you can set the software to show the camera full-screen.

You can split a composite video signal, an RF signal, or a HDMI signal. You can't split a USB. It will have to become something else first.

Thank you Russell. I will see if the software that comes with the Microsoft Live Cam that displays the camera image will go full screen.

[drepouille]

I cast my desktop image to a ChromeCast device using Chrome. However, I can only cast to one device, and I must register the ChromeCast in TM as a No Splash device. And this all relies upon Wi-Fi, of course. So my solution is not appropriate for your use case.

[stephendoud]

I cast my desktop image to a ChromeCast device using Chrome. However, I can only cast to one device, and I must register the ChromeCast in TM as a No Splash device. And this all relies upon Wi-Fi, of course. So my solution is not appropriate for your use case.

Thank you Dana. I use Chromecast at home, but I'm not sure it works on the Church/chapel network (tested a few years ago).

[drepouille]

My stake bought ChromeCast devices for each meetinghouse five years ago. However, since we had a DSL modem back then, the ChromeCast was useless. When we replaced the DSL modem with a cable modem, the new Liahona wireless blocked the ChromeCast until I got the STS to add it to the No Splash policy in TM. Now it works fine.

[swigginton]

I am a relatively new STS - only two stake conferences under my belt.
I Zoomed our previous stake conference meeting, and linked my laptop to an Epson projector to project Tabernacle Choir prelude music and linked it's audio to chapel sound via the crab box. So I have some experience.

The presiding area authority seventy at our upcoming stake conference requested two TV monitors on the rostrum floor, flanking the pulpit, for leaders and speakers to view the current speaker.
I have two webcams, laptop and an HDMI splitter.
I will also need to Zoom the Sunday morning meeting.
I need to know ...
1) What technology can I use to link webcams to these TVs on the rostrum?
2) How can I Zoom the meeting on Sunday, while simultaneously sending the video feed to the rostrum monitors?

Here's how we did this at our stake conference:

• Webcam at podium connected to a laptop. Laptop configured as a Zoom Panelist.
• HDMI splitter from that laptop to 2 monitors on the rostrum
• Set Zoom to full screen on that podium laptop.
• The Zoom host was on another PC and shared their screen to play recorded tabernacle choir videos. The host would then stop sharing and spotlight the podium laptop when ready. The host could also spotlight a remote speaker, if applicable.

You should avoid using a separate Zoom participant device for the monitors, since the video will be slightly out of sync due to the delay through Zoom servers.
Using the same HDMI splitter, another feed could also be routed through the building's HDMI system, if you have that option available and need it.

[dave.swartz]

Prior to our technology uplift here is how we got a video feed to the rostrum.

Master feed is from OBS Studio. We installed the NDI Tools package and add on for OBS Studio. Now OBS studio can send an NDI feed. All our buildings have been uplifted to Gbit networking. We placed a computer on the stand that is wired to the network and running NDI Tools Studio Monitor https://ndi.tv/tools/ The monitor output goes through a HDMI splitter to a projector (optional) and two other monitors on rostrum.

This eliminates all the composite video feeds which do not support HD graphical elements such as videos / ppt presentations in any kind of reasonable resolution.

Post technology uplift. We have an HDMI input and output as well as audio injector on podium. The current plan is to take the video HDMI output from the building distribution system and feed a HDMI splitter to then send program video to the two rostrum monitors.

The SP wants to show a video. We will have a dedicated computer running OBS Studio in the video closet that is attached to the network. The videos are pre-setup as scenes in OBS Studio. Again this computer will output NDI video via the installation of NDI tools. On the stand we will have an Apple TV4K that has TV Stream Monitor for NDI software. The HDMI output from the Apple TV is sent to an HDMI splitter. One branch goes to the projector. The other branch goes to the HDMI input on the podium. Because of how the church AV system is programmed in order to get audio via HDMI to the audio processor we would need the rostrum HDMI channel selected on the Extron presentation switcher. (We are extracting the video from the CP video output to send to an external production switcher.) We cannot do this since we need the switcher set to DP input and consequently we would be blocking the HDMI based audio input. The solution is to run an audio cable from the projector audio output to the podium mounted audio input. (The projector is acting as an HDMI audio de-embedder) The audio then appears to the audio processor as one of the inputs for the main mix. (This probably will make more sense to those with the new Extron/QSC based systems)

The short version is that the church provided a dedicated HDMI feed from and to the podium. Using NDI and the building network we have a third HDMI feed to the podium.