Fixed/Networked Devices

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"Devices" is a setting under your administration account that allows you to interact with hardware cameras that you may not (want to) be able to directly plug into a laptop/Chromebook.

For example, this may be an "Action Camera" (like a GoPro), IP/PTZ/CCTV camera, or any other device that allows you to RTMP directly to MAS instead of using our default streaming system.

If you are a legacy My Action Replay customer - this is how we migrate your fixed installation cameras and so this relates to you in particular. Please get in touch if you need help with this.

If you have a camera that is capable of natively livestreaming (using "custom" outputs like RTMP) then you can, and should, create it as a Fixed Device here. When you/your scorers go to create a match, these cameras will be available for them to select as a "networked" camera.

Creating a device

There is no restriction on the number of devices you can create, and you can safely delete or rename at any time.

To create a device:

Sign into the Platform and navigate to devices
Click New Device
Give your device a recognisable name
Click Save

Your device should now appear as "networked" camera when you/your scorers go to create a match - all they need to do is select it and MAS will start reading video from your device.

If you need to re-mint the RTMP URL, you will need to delete, then recreate the device following the above steps (giving it the same name again is fine).

Applying the RTMP details

When you create your device - and at any time after by click on it again - you can see your unique RTMP URL and Stream Key.

The full URL will contain the unique key, depending on your device you may need to remove it and put it into the "Stream Key/ID" in your device's settings.

The RTMP URL will always start with rtmp://ingest.myactionsport.com/live/ and the final part is unique to your device.

Copy and paste these values into your device settings - anytime your device turns on, it will stream at this and our server will receive a video feed.

How this looks is going to be specific for your hardware, please reach out to us if you need a hand.

Using the device

When you (or your scorers) go to create a new match on the scoring platform, the camera selector will now display these devices as a possible input.

Selecting one of these will tell the MAS video server to look at your device for video, instead of waiting on the scorer's device to send it video as it normally would. You can read more about this setup flow here.

Renaming a device

You can rename these devices at anytime, these updates will immediately flow through to your scorers on the Scoring Platform so just bear in mind when changing it that this is communicated to your scorers.

Renaming a device does not change the RTML URL so it is generally safe to do.

To rename a device:

Sign into the Platform and navigate to devices
Click the name/row of the device you wish to rename
In the Actions section click Rename Device
In the device's title section, set a new name
Click Change device name to apply changes

Deleting a device

You can safely delete devices at anytime, these updates will immediately flow through to your scorers on the Scoring Platform.

However, if your device is still streaming at this endpoint, and the camera is currently being used in a match then it will continue to work. Go into the match on the Scoring Platform and end the stream or select a different camera (or turn the camera off on the device itself).

To delete a device:

Sign into the Platform and navigate to devices
Click the name/row of the device you wish to delete
In the Actions section click Delete Device
Click Delete it to confirm changes

In your device's hardware settings you can safely clear the existing RTMP URL and stream key.

Advanced use cases

While we normally talk about fixed hardware/cameras as cameras that have no "easy" way of getting online (i.e. anything that can't be plugged into a laptop, iPhone/iPad, or Android device) - you may actually want to make a phone camera a "dumb" fixed device.

For example, there are many apps for iOS and Android, such as:

Larix Broadcaster for iOS, and;
Larix Broadcaster for Android

There are mnay that have more "professional" controls, and sometimes filters and overlays that MAS does not provide beyond its point-and-shoot features.

Multi-camera on a budget

In addition to different types of controls, this type of setup allows you to create a "multi-camera" setup where you add multiple iOS/Android devices and set them to stream as fixed devices. You can then feed these into a product like OBS, vMix, or XSplit (as well as just using the native camera selector in a game inside MAS) to swap between each of them.

OBS VLC source — In this example, a "VLC Input Source" has been added to OBS and a new playlist with the RTMP URL as a source. The camera's feed is relayed into OBS (via the MAS server) - and you can feed in as many as your internet/device can handle.

For these third-party video production solutions, you can set the above RTMP URL as an input (the video coming off your phone/device will relay through MAS and into your software), meaning you can nominate a producer - who doesn't even need to be at the venue(!) - to manage your broadcast and switch between all your fixed cameras.

There are better ways of doing this, most (semi-)professional broadcasts will have the producer at the ground and feed all the camera inputs into a hardware switcher - but this is a nice hack in a pinch!