PDA

View Full Version : AirVenture 2012 Webcam Official Thread



Todd Ritzman
07-04-2012, 09:37 PM
Welcome to the official thread for AirVenture 2012 Streaming Media. This will be the only thread monitored by our group during the show. All updates and important info will be posted to this thread and in this "first post"

We changed the method of distributing and encoding all the camera feeds this year to allow greater compatability with different operating systems and types of browsers. A couple months ago we had a sample feed up using the new distribution method and had excellent results and response from the dozens of people that tested it on tons of devices, browsers and operating systems including iOS and Android. If you are having an issue feel free to post in this thread and we will do our best to help.

A quick note on the Airshow Camera....
Just as last year, the video feed we get for the airshow is a shared resource. The main purpose of the camera that is on the control tower is to record interesting events going on around AirVenture for future EAA publications. Just as last year we are fortunute to be able to take a feed off this camera to stream across the internet to EAA members that can not attend the show. Since we are taking a feed off a camera that is there to record more that just the airshow, you may see the other views than just the aircraft in the show.

Theater in the Woods...
We are still working out which programs we can stream from the theater. Due to copyright issues no concerts or movies will be streamed. A schedule will be posted in the next few days.

Camera link...
http://www.airventure.org/webcams/

Updated Information including known issues, answers to common questions, camera status ect....

7/18/2012 7:45 pm

Issues: People have been having troubles opening the camera links using Windows 7 with Internet Explorer and getting a message "IE can't display the webpage"

Fix: What you have to do to fix it is click on "Tools" go to "Pop-up Blocker" and either turn the pop-up blocker off or go to "Pop-up Blocker Setting" Under the "Exemptions" "Address of website to allow" take and add www.airventure.org (http://www.airventure.org/) and click "Add"

Update 7/24 - We killed the ultralight and Warbird cameras to free up some additional bandwidth for air show (and stuff) viewers.

Todd Ritzman
07-09-2012, 07:55 PM
The towers were raised this morning. The official EAA website for the streams should be coming soon. Till then, there is a sample stream running of the warbird camera for your enjoyment, please see the first post in this thread. http://eaaforums.org/showthread.php?1880-AirVenture-2012-Streaming-Media-Beta-Testing-Help-Needed Once EAA has their page up, we will be taking the beta stream down.

Todd Ritzman
07-17-2012, 05:46 PM
The official EAA Webcam link page has been posted at www.airventure.org/webcams

Sawdust
07-17-2012, 06:25 PM
Thanks for putting these up! Running these is keeping me sane while I wait to leave for OSH on Friday!

Todd Ritzman
07-17-2012, 06:50 PM
Not a problem, I have been doing the same thing as I travel a lot for work and am currently out on the east coast. I head for home Thursday and hope to head back to OSH Friday or Saturday.

Todd

Todd Ritzman
07-18-2012, 03:54 PM
We were just notified the official EAA webcam site is up and running. You can find the link to all the cameras at the following address. www.airventure.org/webcams

Please be aware the Theater and Airshow cams are only active during certain times.

wyoranch
07-18-2012, 04:41 PM
Now if you can tell me how to open all three streams on one pc that would be great. I am sure I am missing the obvious.
Thanks again to all of you working on this
Rick

wyoranch
07-18-2012, 04:53 PM
Never mind I found the direct links to the cams.
www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_north.html
www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_south.html
www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_central.html
Rick

Jim Rosenow
07-18-2012, 05:10 PM
wyoranch....your browser should have an option (probably right click on the link depending on OS and browser) to Open Link In A New Window. You can do that on all 3 links and get them up simultaneously (and at the same time, too :-) You'll have to size them to all fit as best you can, of course.

To clarify...each cam will open in its own copy of the browser.

wyoranch
07-18-2012, 05:13 PM
My open in a new window is grayed out. So for now I just open a new window and paste the links above into each window. Perhaps it is just a windows 7 thing. I will try my XP laptop after dinner.
Rick

spongebobiwan
07-18-2012, 05:15 PM
Wyoranch,

Another thing you can do, is use three different browsers. For example, I use Safari, Google Chrome, and Google Chrome Canary. There are several other browsers I could use as well. I realize you have a Windows PC and not a MAC, but the principle is the same. :)

Bill Berson
07-18-2012, 05:27 PM
I could not find any new webcam links at the Airventure home page.

Jim Rosenow
07-18-2012, 05:28 PM
Try this, Bill....

http://www.airventure.org/webcams/

Sirota
07-18-2012, 05:34 PM
Todd,

I was able to view the Beta feed the last week or so and can view each camera via the links wyoranch posted but when I go to the Webcam page and click on a cam link, I get an error message saying "IE can't display the Webpage". Using Windows 7. FYI.

Dave

MEdwards
07-18-2012, 05:57 PM
The links on the AirVenture webcam page are not opening properly in new tabs at this time. If I bookmark the link and open it separately, the camera video comes up fine. If I just click on the button on the page, I get a new blank page. I'm sure they'll figure out the problem and fix it soon.

Todd Ritzman
07-18-2012, 06:27 PM
Todd,

I was able to view the Beta feed the last week or so and can view each camera via the links wyoranch posted but when I go to the Webcam page and click on a cam link, I get an error message saying "IE can't display the Webpage". Using Windows 7. FYI.

Dave

Dave and MEwards

I just gave it a try on my Windows 7 machine too and had the same problem in IE.

What you have to do to fix it is click on "Tools" go to "Pop-up Blocker" and either turn the pop-up blocker off or go to "Pop-up Blocker Setting" Under the "Exemptions" "Address of website to allow" take and add www.airventure.org (http://www.airventure.org) and click "Add"

Hope this helps.

Todd

Sirota
07-19-2012, 11:22 AM
Thanks Todd

Jefflcarr
07-19-2012, 03:47 PM
Is there going to be a link on the main page anywhere? Right now the only way I can get to them is to come here and click the link. I can bookmark it, but it seems like you should be able to navigate to them from the main page.

Hal Bryan
07-19-2012, 04:47 PM
Yes - they'll be featured on the "AirVenture Live" page (airventure.org/live) once it's been fully updated for 2012. It may be done now, I haven't checked in a few hours.

orvie6
07-19-2012, 05:57 PM
Will the webcams be available on the Sporty's App?

Todd Ritzman
07-19-2012, 11:03 PM
Will the webcams be available on the Sporty's App?

No, the cameras are not on the Sporty's app.

Eric Page
07-19-2012, 11:19 PM
My open in a new window is grayed out. So for now I just open a new window and paste the links above into each window. Perhaps it is just a windows 7 thing.

Maximize your browser so it fills the screen.
While holding down Shift, click on each of these links:

www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_north.html (http://www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_north.html)
www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_south.html (http://www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_south.html)
www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_central.html (http://www.airventure.org/webcams/popup_central.html)

- This should give you three windows with a camera feed in each.

If not:

Hold down Ctrl while clicking each of the three links above.
- This will open each in a new tab.
Hover your pointer over each tab, click and hold, and drag the tab downward.
- This will turn it into a separate window.
Resize windows as desired.

Enjoy the show!

Jefflcarr
07-20-2012, 08:29 AM
Yes - they'll be featured on the "AirVenture Live" page (airventure.org/live) once it's been fully updated for 2012. It may be done now, I haven't checked in a few hours.

Great, I figured you folks had something in the works. Thanks for all the work you do, can't wait to get up there!

orvie6
07-20-2012, 02:12 PM
Is there a problem with the Ultralight Cam or is my timing just off?... I have tried to view it several times today and all I get is the view of the Beach 18 parked in the grass..does not seem to be panning as usual.. Also notice some 'holds' in the warbird cam.. Just wondering..seems the Beta version was always moving..

Paul Hayden
07-20-2012, 02:21 PM
Heavy arrival and departure time we often park the cameras. If the little clock in the bottom left is changing, it's live video.

Jim Rosenow
07-20-2012, 02:33 PM
1 vote for 'parking' on the active runway end, Paul...thanks!

Jim

orvie6
07-20-2012, 02:38 PM
Thanks Paul for the info... my first year viewing the cams and was not familuar with your protocol...but understand and think it is a good idea.. Will continue to watch over the next few days until Wed...driving up then and will be there in person thru Saturday night... be nice to watch the airshow and other cams with the family before I leave so they will know what to look for while I am gone.. Again..nice work guys.

Todd Ritzman
07-20-2012, 05:02 PM
During the week, we do change the tours of the cameras from time to time. Some times we will park them in one spot, like today when we are more likely to see a fair amount of landing traffic, or we will modify the tour to allow more runway time, but still cover some of the grounds as well.

The warbird camera was configured to cover more of the runways today, but still move around the grounds.

While running the beta testing, we had the cameras on a almost continuious roam because of the low traffic and more activity around the grounds.

I personally like seeing how quickly things get set up as the show nears and explodes into a city.

Hope you enjoy them.

Todd

orvie6
07-20-2012, 05:10 PM
Todd, Yes..I like the layout of the cams and the coverage provided...Im sure that over the next two days the activity will increase even more.. I would think that the air show performers would be in on Sunday and look forward to seeing "Aeroshell Square" (Im a diehard!!) fill up more..

Todd Ritzman
07-20-2012, 08:47 PM
The first day of the airshow is Monday. I am sure the performers are enroute and some of them are probably there already.

The Vintage camera does have a good view of the Phillips 66 Plaza (main ramp area), but we cannot see the aerobatic parking area east of the Wittman Rd.

As some of the aircraft do get parked on the Phillips 66 Plaza, we will add some stops to the camera to highlight them.

Todd

Kiwi ZK-CKE
07-21-2012, 12:55 AM
Pity the only time I get to view the cams they just show lots of darkness - the joys of being in a timezone on the other side of the world.... Would be really good to have some form of recorded archive / timelaspe thingy.

Paul Hayden
07-21-2012, 06:55 PM
We are working on a few things. :)

FSMP
07-22-2012, 01:12 AM
Is there an EAA Radio "studio" Webcam this year ? If so, is the link available yet.

Listening to EAA Radio is great -- seeing who is talking makes it even better !!!

Geoff

Paul Hayden
07-22-2012, 07:19 AM
Yep. We are helping them out with that stream. It's located here http://www.airventure.org/radio/. There is an embedded player with a big radio logo near the bottom of the page. Click the little play button and it will fire up.

Paul Hayden
07-22-2012, 03:53 PM
we are currently streaming about 230 Mbits/s and everything seems to be holding stable. Thats a good thing, but the real test will be tomorrow's air show. We are going to attempt to run the stream at the hightest bitrate we can safely get out, if demand exceeds available bandwidth and server capacity, we may end up shutting down the other cameras to allow maximum number of viewers on the air show stream. We will keep you posted.

spongebobiwan
07-22-2012, 05:20 PM
WooHOOO!! I just noticed that liveatc.net has added the airshow frequencies to the live feeds this year, Air Boss, Air Show Control, Warbirds, etc., etc. I think I just wet my pants a little bit. :P

Paul Hayden
07-22-2012, 05:30 PM
yep, we have been working with Dave from LiveATC.net to get those up and running for your listening enjoyment.

Todd Ritzman
07-22-2012, 06:33 PM
Just to let everyone know, Theater in the Woods is streaming live tonight.

Todd

wyoranch
07-22-2012, 08:06 PM
What just happened at TITW?

Todd Ritzman
07-22-2012, 08:12 PM
I just got back to the theater and it sounds like the heat got to the camera operator and may have gotten a little dehydrated. I was told he is up and walking around.

wyoranch
07-22-2012, 08:15 PM
Glad he is up and about.
Thanks
Rick

Fodhopper
07-23-2012, 07:02 AM
Post a picture of the AirVenture Streaming Mascot!

FS-MP
07-23-2012, 08:05 AM
1 vote for 'parking' on the active runway end, Paul...thanks!

Jim

+1

To be able to watch the planes "land" and "take off", while listening to the ATC radio, would be really cool.

Paul Hayden
07-23-2012, 10:35 AM
Post a picture of the AirVenture Streaming Mascot!

lol, I will work on that. maybe even a small tribute to a former mentor..."Traveling Bob"

Fodhopper
07-23-2012, 12:23 PM
Cams look great...how are the coolers doing? Get all the mosquitos out of the fans?

iflyatiger
07-23-2012, 12:41 PM
Thank you again for your hard work..

I also would / have enjoyed the cameras a lot more when they show more of the landings and takeoffs. The panning is interesting every so often to see how the grounds are changing but watching the landing and takeoffs while listening to live atc really is the best.

Thank you.

orvie6
07-23-2012, 01:16 PM
how can we listen to what is happening during the showcase and airshow?? Is there sound available?

Paul Hayden
07-23-2012, 01:43 PM
The air show equipment just got installed about 15 min ago. It is up and live with audio provided by EAA Radio.

flightwriter
07-23-2012, 01:50 PM
I appreciate the effort the EAA has put in to covering the Showcase and air show via webcam... but could you please tell your camerapeople to focus on the aircraft? I'm not watching the Air Show cam to see the chalets, or a wide pan of the flight line.

flightwriter
07-23-2012, 02:02 PM
I appreciate the effort the EAA has put in to covering the Showcase and air show via webcam... but could you please tell your camerapeople to focus on the aircraft? I'm not watching the Air Show cam to see the chalets, or a wide pan of the flight line.

Much better job with the Ju-52 demo.

iflyatiger
07-23-2012, 02:08 PM
Hello everybody..

Does anyone know why I can get all webcams to work except for the airshow cam ? The airshow cam gives me a server not found error from in side the webcam popup box.
Thanks for any help..

Paul Hayden
07-23-2012, 02:16 PM
Some of these cameras run on pre-programmed direction
and show live feeds from the grounds, and some cameras (like the Air Show
camera) may display live video of the daily air show as viewed through the lens
of EAA's video production team. This is not a television-quality broadcast of
the event, just a chance to share their view. There will be times when the
videographer is moving the camera, reviewing existing footage, etc., where you
may not see the show itself. This is to be expected.

EAA put Tim up there to capture video for other EAA and non EAA purposes. They are kind enough to let us piggy back off that video. He will focus on the air show as much as he can but occasionally he has assignments that he must complete which takes his attention away from the show, sometimes he just has to take a break. Also we just got everything running moments before the start of the show, so you might have caught a bit of the last setup steps.

Paul Hayden
07-23-2012, 02:22 PM
strange. I'm watching the stream from the airshow just fine. can you tell us a little more about your system?

orvie6
07-23-2012, 02:31 PM
I know it may not by your fault..but the cameraman needs to keep focused on the FLYNG aircraft..not the ones on the ground...could not see ANY of the Heilo Courier!!!

wyoranch
07-23-2012, 02:41 PM
Is there an issue with the streams?

Fodhopper
07-23-2012, 03:05 PM
Orvie6...you need to calm down...this is a free webcam...the camera operator is not up there to cover every second of the air show...they are there to cover as much as they can, while getting their assignments...if you want to stand up there in 100 degrtee heat and follow all the action...perfectly in focus every second of the broadcast as you demand...then come on down and bring a $70,000 lens plus camera and stand next to the operator that is already there for three hours.

Give the volunteers a break and enjoy the fact that there are any live pictures at all.

iflyatiger
07-23-2012, 03:11 PM
Guys

I got on the airshow cam after trying a few different times. I dont know what the problem was.. I tried different browsers with the same results. I just tried to connect over and over and it finally started showing right about when the beechcrafts were doing their formation flyby's . Thanks for the replies.. Jon



Hello everybody..

Does anyone know why I can get all webcams to work except for the airshow cam ? The airshow cam gives me a server not found error from in side the webcam popup box.
Thanks for any help..

flightwriter
07-23-2012, 03:35 PM
Orvie6...you need to calm down...this is a free webcam...the camera operator is not up there to cover every second of the air show...they are there to cover as much as they can, while getting their assignments...if you want to stand up there in 100 degrtee heat and follow all the action...perfectly in focus every second of the broadcast as you demand...then come on down and bring a $70,000 lens plus camera and stand next to the operator that is already there for three hours.

Give the volunteers a break and enjoy the fact that there are any live pictures at all.

Like I said in my earlier post, I do appreciate what EAA is doing. Criticism shouldn't be interpreted as lack of appreciation. However, if the cam isn't going to focus on the air show, perhaps it shouldn't be called the "Air Show" webcam?

spongebobiwan
07-23-2012, 04:07 PM
Very nice and much appreciated camera work by the airshow cam crew. Thanks a million!

FS-MP
07-23-2012, 04:44 PM
I also appreciate that EAA provides some Video Feeds from Oshkosh, and that this year, they are open to all.
(One wonders how many are now starting to watch).

Yes, its not like Watching "The History Channel", but something is better than nothing, and the price is right !!

Unfortunately, we have all become spoilt with highly post-processed video, and many may not appreciate what it would take to cover the Airshow in real time, as NBC or the BBC would. For a video feed, provided by volunteers, with limited budget and equipment, the results are really quite acceptable.

Maybe, in the future, some aviation company will realize the potential of sponsoring the video feeds, and by throwing enough money at it, bring is a full professional team, with multi-camera setup, director, video mixers etc etc.

Till then, thanks for providing a glimpse of what is happening at Oshkosh, for those who can not make it there in person.

( Thankfully, the Camera work is not as SHAKY as the TV cop show "NYPD Blue" !!!)

Geoff

spongebobiwan
07-23-2012, 04:58 PM
If opening day's afternoon showcase and airshow are any indication of the week to come, it's gonna be a heckova week!

orvie6
07-23-2012, 05:09 PM
Ok..Airshow is over...and I do want to appologize for what seemed to be overcritisism.... I did enjoy the video very much..and like it has been said..perhaps in todays technolical era..we do expect more. Sorry to sound so negative, It really was not inteded to be that way.. Perhaps in the future, some of our many EAAers that work in the video field (news cameraman, movie industry) may want to volunteer.. Not so much as the actual cameraperson, but maybe offer advice and guidence to make the video seem to flow better.. I do have to admit, it seems as though the camera was 'parked' for peroids and made it difficult to follow the EAA Radio commentary.. Again..I think the actual quality of the cameras used is excellent.. and thank you gentlemen, and perhaps some ladies also, for making this happen.. Sorry for the seeminly negative post earlier..

Fodhopper
07-23-2012, 05:39 PM
Its important to manage expectations of the technology....and resources available...If I had an hour of your time, I could explain to you exactly all the steps it took to have webcams for the runways and now an actual "manned" camera to follow the airshow (it took twice that time for it to be explained to me by someone who works in this area). The first runway cam was a camcorder sitting on a shelf in EAA Radio...EAA has come so far...from what I have been told...getting connectivity between all these far-flung buildings that are dormant for 11 months out of the year is half the battle. As for sponsorship, I understand that capability has always been there but there has been a lack of imagination in some decision-making areas.

wyoranch
07-23-2012, 06:28 PM
Those of you folks that are complaining about the coverage, just stop it. If you want a guaranteed view of the air show, then go. If you can not make it, then accept everything this guys and girls do as a gift. Accept it graciously, say thank you and enjoy. It appears as though these feeds are free to all(I could be wrong,but I have not had to log in as an EAA member). This is not a multi feed broadcast designed specifically to replace being at Airventure, these are feeds that have a primary purpose of gathering images/video of the event for future use. The guys and gals have been kind enough to let us piggy back on them to give those of us who cannot be there something to feel as though we are. Even if it is not perfect, I for one am thoroughly gratefully for their efforts.

Machspeed
07-24-2012, 06:13 AM
To those of you having problems accessing the cams, here's what I have found. Please note, I am not an IT guru, just doing reseach to solve my access problems. The video is sent using real time messaging protocal, tunneled (rtmpt), on port 80. You may see this info if you are seeing a "Server Not Found" error statement. Because rtmpt is frequently used to bypass firewalls, many network administrators will block rtmpt. Possible options include: adjusting your firewall settings, asking your network administrator to allow rtmpt, politely asking those providing the service if they could please use a different protocol and/or port for sending the streaming video, or as a last resort, hopping in you plane or car and head to Oshkosh!

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 07:45 AM
I'm going to assume your comments were not meant as a slight on my professionalism and just keep plugging away. Suggestions are always welcome, we are constantly trying to improve as illustrated by completely redoing the entire system to support iOS and android devices this year. However every year people are asked to assist, asked to donate equipment, yet this entire operation is 2 people, and only EAA, Discovery World, the two of us and one other company have purchased, donate or loaned equipment. Actually the air show stream, which is now titled airshowandstuff on my server, is running off my personal PC taken off my desk at home. The theater presentations are brought to you by Todd's personal PC. I guess I'm saying no matter how "professional" you want to be, there are site, organizational and budget limitations that no matter how good you are there is only so much you can do within the limitations with borrowed equipment a few DSL lines installed in the middle of nowhere, and a roll of duct tape.

So, I'm done with the rant if anybody wants to discuss it further PM me and I will provide you with my personal cell number and we can talk. I'd really like to keep the thread on topic.

Speaking of "On Topic"
we are going to knock down at least 2 of the roaming cameras during the air show to see if that lessens the connection issues with the air show stream. Yesterday we were pushing out a little over 600Mbps on all 5 streams, that may have been asking a little much from our server.

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 07:56 AM
politely asking those providing the service if they could please use a different protocol and/or port for sending the streaming video, or as a last resort, hopping in you plane or car and head to Oshkosh!

I recommend the second suggestion :) there is no way wecan change protocols mid week. We did extensive beta testing over the span ofabout 3 months and were unaware of a single person that had issues. The reasonwe use rtmp over http, is that most firewalls don't block it. If your adminsare blocking it, for one, there is probably a good reason, and two I doubt anyother live stream would make it through either.

FS-MP
07-24-2012, 08:08 AM
I'm going to assume your comments were not meant as a slight on my professionalism and just keep plugging away.


Speaking of "On Topic"
we are going to knock down at least 2 of the roaming cameras during the air show to see if that lessens the connection issues with the air show stream. Yesterday we were pushing out a little over 600Mbps on all 5 streams, that may have been asking a little much from our server.

Paul.
I hope that was not a response to my suggestion of a sponsor, sponsoring a Professional Broadcast Crew, to provide the streaming content. IN NO WAY, was it meant to imply that you, and your team are not "Professional".
I fully appreciate all the volunteer time & efforts you, and your team put into providing these feeds.

---------------

As far as the 600Mbps bandwidth on "your server" -- not sure what you mean by "your server", but I assume it must be a Data center Server somewhere ? Video stream services like BITGRAVITY or USTREAM, or even JUSTIN.TV can provide streams in excess of 1Mbps. Maybe there is some opportunity to get sponsorship from one of these services during EAA Venture.

Geoff

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 01:56 PM
We have a donated server in Discovery World's maintelecom room. From there its a 1 gig fiber to the University of WI - Milwaukeeand 10 gig to the internet. All the bandwidth is donated by DW as well. Ourguidelines from EAA were, it had to be affordable, it had to be 3rd partycommercial free, and it had to be embedded into an EAA hosted web page withanalytics. Any major fundraising and sponsorship for the streams has to behandled directly by EAA. When we were looking at a way to provide iOS android supportI did look at some of those services and Livestream as well. Last year westreamed 14 TB total, for the 7 show days, for $0. A rough equivalent on Livestream usinghardware encoders would have been $7,000 minimum.

Earlier I was talking about location issues as well. We had to do all sorts ofcrazy things to get the largest data connection available out to these remotelocations. Yep, our only option is a whopping 750k up DSL which due to thelocations are really between 600K and 670K. A 500K stream is about all that isgoing to come out with any reliability or loosing frames.

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 02:03 PM
we are going to kill the Ultralight and Warbird cameras until the end of the airshow to provide more available bandwidth to air show (and stuff) viewers.

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 02:22 PM
also here is Theater in the Woods schedule for tonight 7/24. Since I have no idea where you are from, all times are central
7:00 PM - 7:30 PM Bill Barber Award
7:30 PM - 8:00 PM President's Awards
8:00 PM - 9:00 PM Piper Cub Program
9:00 PM - 10:00 PM Winnebagoland Barbershop

av8rBlake
07-24-2012, 03:58 PM
This complaining about the quality of the webcams makes me think of this video clip:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk&feature=youtube_gdata_playerEverything is amazing. Nobody's happy.Blake

av8rBlake
07-24-2012, 03:59 PM
Clean link:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Fodhopper
07-24-2012, 04:19 PM
AV8r...well played sir...

Jim Rosenow
07-24-2012, 04:28 PM
+1 avr8r

wyoranch
07-24-2012, 04:40 PM
+1!!!!!! No one has EVER summed up this whole topic better .

Paul Hayden
07-24-2012, 05:48 PM
lol..thanks guys. Both Todd and I really needed that laugh.

the ultralight and warbird cameras are back online. Not sure if taking them down helped any, but unless somebody wants to overnight me a big fancy multiprocessor server, there is little we can do at this point. It also amuses me when people that belong to the "Experimental" Aircraft Association insist everything be perfect right off the bat. This system is as experimental and homebuilt as many of the aircraft around here this week.

Anyway....theater in the woods is live tonight and should be starting up in about 15 min.

wyoranch
07-24-2012, 05:57 PM
Paul today's broadcast of the show was quite good, I didn't se a single hiccup. Keep up the awesome work.
Rick

dklord
07-25-2012, 10:29 AM
Again this year I am enjoying AirVenture from my wheelchair at home. This is do to a lot of great work from a couple of guys that we all owe a great deal. Thank you so much. Thanks for the passion.

dmbleess
07-25-2012, 11:25 AM
You guys definitely have done a great job this year turning a baling wire and duct tape budget into a great setup. Every year it seems to get a little better as you find new ways to improve the system.

Thanks again for all of your efforts.

Todd Ritzman
07-25-2012, 11:37 AM
You guys definitely have done a great job this year turning a baling wire and duct tape budget into a great setup. Every year it seems to get a little better as you find new ways to improve the system.

Thanks again for all of your efforts.

Thanks for all the support out there. We have tried very hard to make this years webcams a better and have a much easier innerface for the end user. Planning and testing started about a month after the end of AirVenture 2011.

We have taken many notes along the way this year of some of the technical issues that have presented them selves and will see what can be done to improve on them with the budget we do have.

We also have been working on other ideas that we hope to implement as well in future years, there just was not time to get all the ideas approved and implemented in time.

Todd

Paul Hayden
07-25-2012, 11:58 AM
We are planning on knocking down the extra cameras to reserve as much processing power for the Air Show and Stuff Stream.

Theater in the Woods schedule for tonight..

7:30-8pm General Aviation Awards
8-9pm Greatest Generation in the Air

For obvious copyright and legal reasons the 9 pm concert will not be streamed, there might be something to watch if we finish our other volunteer tram duty. With the loopy heat induced sillyness in here today it might involve a vat of pudding and a strange pink flightless bird. Hal, you are invited, bring a spoon and a golfcart.

and yes, I did just use the camera to check out the customer line at the GoPro tent before I walked over there.. :)

Todd Ritzman
07-25-2012, 12:31 PM
I have modified the tours on the Warbird, Vintage cameras to allow more time on the runways and currently the Ultralight camera is fixed on the approach for Rwy 18.

Paul Hayden
07-25-2012, 12:34 PM
ok, just to let everybody know we have been told we should expect severe weather this afternoon and evening with winds gusting up to 60mph.

We like camerman Tim, if there is weather as expected we will unchain him from the tower and let him go inside, as a result the stream may drop off unexpectedly. We will get things back online after we have finished clinging to our tents and small children.

Paul Hayden
07-25-2012, 05:45 PM
man, we could use that storm they were freaking out about...its super hot around here still.

anyway, airshow is over and the rest of the cams are back in operation. Theater in the Woods starts at 7:30pm tonight and remember we are not streaming the Little Texas concert however we might let a cam run so you can watch Deeraf's head bobble with his pudding.

BetsyE
07-25-2012, 06:40 PM
Hi, I'm watching from afar and the south, ultralight webcam is off line. It had frozen, staring north but you could at least see the planes come and go, now the feed is down. I can still get webcam central and the warbird webcam north. Thank you SO much for having these! I spent Sunday at my computer watching the arrivals with ATC.net playing. I miss you guys!!!

Jim Rosenow
07-25-2012, 06:51 PM
Hey, Paul, as if you're not warm enough...TITW feed audio sounds like the audio pickup is in the back of the house, not thru the mic up front.

There's a post on another thread that the south feed is dark, also.

Good thing there are TWO of you!....sorry, man, had to :-)

Jim

Paul Hayden
07-25-2012, 08:10 PM
sorry was off attending to my other Tram duties. We have somehow lost connection to the Ultralight h.264 encoder. We will have to make the treck out there in the daylight and see whats happening.

I will talk to the theater techs and see whats up.

Jim Rosenow
07-25-2012, 08:15 PM
Thanks, Paul...you two ROCK!

Todd Ritzman
07-25-2012, 10:00 PM
We are looking into why the Theater in the Woods audio is poor tonight. We think it has something to do with when Little Texas setup their equipment this afternoon. Tomorrow we will be working with the theater sound crew to figure it out. The audio problem is not just from our end, it is also on the house tv monitor lines that run backstage, their main sound system was not affected.

We also are looking into why the Ultralight feed is down, we currently cannot contact any of the equipment installed at that location. We were all ready to head out there to check on the installation at the tower when a thunderstorm moved into the area. We will be heading out there tomorrow morning to start troubleshooting that location.

Todd

Todd Ritzman
07-25-2012, 11:11 PM
Well the rain quit, and since it was still hot out and now with super swampy air that will keep us from sleeping, we decided to take a midnight walk down to troubleshoot the problem with the Ultralight tower cam. Well the good news is it is back up and online for everyones enjoyment. We can thank this outage to someone that decided to unplug the equipment at the base of the tower. Our guess is that person decided they needed to charge their cell phone or laptop.

And even after a hours walk, it is still to warm and swampy to sleep.

Todd

Paul Hayden
07-25-2012, 11:15 PM
See Hal. Walked. :)

Hal Bryan
07-26-2012, 04:39 AM
I see indeed, Paul... All of us, and I in particular, already owe you guys infinitely more than we can repay... So just double that and put it on our tab. :)

In all seriousness, though, you and Todd are the unsung and heroic backbone of this whole project, which is the very definition of EAA volunteers.

We simply can't thank you enough.

(and we'll start looking at the transportation question for next year in, say, August...)

Jim Rosenow
07-26-2012, 06:33 AM
Hal...thanks for stopping by the thread. I'll address my comment to Hal, Paul, and Todd...

There are those of us out here who are willing to donate...pay to play...specifically to support Paul and Todds' efforts. Can you suggest a donation functionality that will 1) Get the funds to directly to the webcam gurus (they are the masters of making something out of nothing), 2) Let us know what equipment needed, as some of us old IT hacks have equpt that might be useful. 3) Tax write-off would be nice for $$ donations. :-)

Paul estimated between 950 and 1000 users viewing the airshow yesterday, and with the links open to the public this year, there will only be more demand in the future. I know this is a busy week for you three, but it's time critical...people tend to forget how much they enjoy the 'cams once the week is over, and apathy reigns.

Let me know if I can help in any way with coordinating this. Thanks!

Jim Rosenow
EAA 64315

Todd Ritzman
07-26-2012, 10:07 AM
The tour for the Ultralight camera has been revised to view runway 36 and the Ultralight runway with some view of the general area while moving from different tour points.

Todd

Todd Ritzman
07-26-2012, 01:37 PM
Again we will be shutting down the streams on the 3 tower cams during todays airshow and stuff camera feed.

rcmodelr
07-26-2012, 01:53 PM
Does anybody know whether I'll be able to see the Saturday Night Air Show and Fireworks on the Webcam?

Paul Hayden
07-26-2012, 03:38 PM
unfortunately no, We just got notification from Discovery World's ISP about a major network cutover taking place saturday night from 6pm-2am. It seems "somebody" is sucking a ton of bandwidth. ok, thats probably not the reason but unfortunately we will be dark. Its a ton of donated bandwidth we are using, probably exceeding 45TB for the run of the show, so we can't really complain too much.

We hope it takes less than the scheduled time, if so, we will post here and be back up asap. If not we expect to be operational sunday morning with cams pointed to the departure runways.

FS-MP
07-26-2012, 04:07 PM
Again we will be shutting down the streams on the 3 tower cams during todays airshow and stuff camera feed.

Cutting off the Airshow Audio as well ???

Tuned in at 5pm (local Oshkosh time) on Thursday. Camerman was doing a good job, but no audio.
No audio on EAA Radio either.

Someone hit the wrong switch on the audio mixer ???

Geoff

Paul Hayden
07-26-2012, 04:18 PM
Strange. It was working the last time I was in the office. I forwarded the issue to the radio station staff

codetalker
07-26-2012, 04:34 PM
We are working the issue

Paul Hayden
07-26-2012, 05:09 PM
Ok. Well, Just a reminder, the theater in the woods has no scheduled programs tonight.

FS-MP
07-26-2012, 05:12 PM
Strange. It was working the last time I was in the office. I forwarded the issue to the radio station staff

Thanks Paul.

When I tried again @ 7pm , there was audio, just enough to hear the announcement that that was the end of the show !! ( You probably got it corrected a lot earlier)

Never mind, there is always tomorrow for me :)

Geoff

rcmodelr
07-27-2012, 04:48 AM
I noticed the Ultralight Webcam quit streaming video around 1 AM. As of 5:45 AM, the other 2 Webcams are working fine, but the Ultralight Webcam is once again not streaming.

Jim Rosenow
07-27-2012, 05:29 AM
Paul....you've gotta see the humor in this. Maybe a sign that says, "This area monitored by video surveillance" ??? .... or point the webcam at the plug-in after dark and cache the stream?? :eek: Thanks again for all you do!

Jim

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 06:49 AM
ugh...you have got to be kidding me. Ok, todd and I will walk out there....again....and see whats going on, probably the same issue.

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 07:43 AM
tripped GFCI for some reason. To hopefully prevent issues went all ninja spidermonkey with the giant roll of duct tape. Ultralight cam is back in operation.

Tonights Theater schedule

6:45pm-7 Raspet Awards
7pm-7:15 - Rotorcraft Awards
7:15-8 - Mort Crim movie

after 8 we will probably be dark due to the Phil Vassar concert, unless we find something amusing to throw up there.

wyoranch
07-27-2012, 08:42 AM
Is it too soon to talk about next year? :-)
Paul and Todd,
With a couple year almost under your belt I wanted to ask if you (when you get a chance) to compile a "wish list" of equipment and expertise needed to do what you think is needed to perfect your streaming system. I have learned a couple of things in working in corporate IT.
1) Ask for everything + 1
2) Sometimes It is easier to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission .
I am suggesting that all of us here look at the list and see what we could provide. I work for a couple of Fortune 50 companies that I could probably persuade to "donate" to the cause.
Just a thought
Rick

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 11:14 AM
yeah. the first order of business might be a more powerful server. The dual processor dual core 2.8ghz xeon system we are running it off of can't keep up. All 4 cores are maxed out the entire airshow serving about 900-1000 streams. also I'm planning on taking a look at load balancing servers, then we would need another wowza license @ $1500.

Other misc stuff, a PTZ camera, housing and h.264 encoder for possible install at Seaplane Base, Mt Dew, new camera domes to eliminate those annoying scratches, a golf cart, GoPro cameras and accessories, pudding, spare h.264 encoders, and there is probably a ton of stuff I am forgetting.

These are just a few possibilities, but of course we have to run this past EAA and figure out what they want next year and how they wish to handle it.

and wow is it getting loud here, the crew is setting up for the concert tonight...ha, that way I won't accidentally give away the location of the bat cave..

we may have some cool video for you guys this evening, but until then business as usual other cameras offline during the show, back up after theater schedule I poseted earlier...too much Mt. Dew..blah blah..yeah

FS-MP
07-27-2012, 01:04 PM
yeah. the first order of business might be a more powerful server. The dual processor dual core 2.8ghz xeon system we are running it off of can't keep up. All 4 cores are maxed out the entire airshow serving about 900-1000 streams. also I'm planning on taking a look at load balancing servers, then we would need another wowza license @ $1500.


Are you really trying to stream all those 900-1000 streams from a "PC" on the Oshkosh Site ?
What Upload bandwidth do you guys have ?

Maybe, if you have time, after Oshkosh, you might be able to post what equipment you currently have, and how it is configured.

Geoff

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 01:10 PM
no of course not..there is no chance in hell that we could get that much data off the grounds and served to the world. its one DSL per camera out of the airport, the server that everybody hits is in milwaukee. Currently we are averaging 3 times the amount of traffic compared to last year when the cams were members only.

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 01:34 PM
Airshow cam is going live at 2:45. At that point the other cams will be offline as per the usual this week. Might take a bit longer to get the cams back up after the airshow today as we have a limited window to get our cameras back from the very awesome FiFi crew.

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 02:39 PM
we have a pretty stiff NE wind today and as a result cameraman Tim has had to take refuge on the south side of the tower. As a result his view to the north will be limited.

Fodhopper
07-27-2012, 04:00 PM
Passing along a text sent to EAA Radio: "Who can we email to give some praise to the great EAA camera coverage during the show" Since we don't read texts on the air during the air show...I am posting it here so that Paul and Todd can pass this along to our "Eye" in the sky.

Paul Hayden
07-27-2012, 05:34 PM
cool...thanks for that.

anyway, the airshow is over and the rest of the cams are back up and operational.

Theater in the Woods will be up from 6:45 to 8pm with the programs I listed this morning.

We also got some super cool footage of the CAF's B29 FiFi as it did a flight around oshkosh, and no, its not shot from the outside of the plane. :) stay tuned, we will let you know how to view it...

Todd Ritzman
07-27-2012, 10:02 PM
Since the theater feed will be dark again due to another concert, Paul and I are working on putting some video footage together to play late Saturday afternoon before our ISP shuts down the network for the evening. We will post updates on when to expect a video if we can get it together in time.

Paul Hayden
07-28-2012, 09:15 AM
ok, for your viewing enjoyment we have footage shot from inside FiFi as it did a few laps around Oshkosh yesterday afternoon. Its located on the Theater in the Woods stream and we will leave it loop all day. enjoy.

wyoranch
07-28-2012, 09:37 AM
Thanks for the loop of Fifi. I am unfortunately going to have to ruin your entire AV. I found a combination of pc,software and hardware that does not work. I drug an old laptop( Pentium 3, 512 of ram, running Win2000) out of a closet to send for recycling. Just for giggles I decided to try it out. It did not work. Can you PLEASE, take some of your precious time, drop everything you are doing and fix my issues? ;-)
Thanks
Rick

Paul Hayden
07-28-2012, 11:50 AM
lol! just for you, Boat Anchor support for 2013

Paul Hayden
07-28-2012, 12:18 PM
quick reminder if anybody is still watching (seems like 50% fewer people are on the streams than previous days) that we will be offline from 6pm until 2am due to a network cutover being done on our host server location in milwaukee. That means all cameras and video streams will be non functional.

Jim Rosenow
07-28-2012, 02:25 PM
Enjoyed the Fifi footage, guys...thanks!

I don't 'get' the music playing during the airshow....we 'come' to hear Packard Merlins and R-985's...not music. I know you guys have no input on that, but maybe you know someone who does :-)

admiralinwi
07-28-2012, 05:11 PM
Much better job with the airshow this afternoon. You got a good mix of the planes in the sky & the action on the ground.

Marla

Todd Ritzman
07-28-2012, 07:19 PM
Unfortunutly we will not be streaming any of tonights airshow live due to system maintenance of the ISP system. And currently all cameras are offline as well.

However, we are trying to get it recorded for playback sometime tomorrow if all goes as we hope. We will post here again if we are able to get a working copy of the show.

Todd

spongebobiwan
07-28-2012, 08:11 PM
I don't 'get' the music playing during the airshow....we 'come' to hear Packard Merlins and R-985's...not music.

Man-oh-man Jim,

You just hit one of my nerves. I've been saying the same thing for years now. Slowly but surely it seems all the airshows and airshow acts have all been choreographed to coincide with some very loud music, sometimes so loud I can't even hear the airplane. I wouldn't mind it if once in a while some act decided to include music, but it seems to me they've all done it now. And I'm with you. The REAL music and the only music I wanna hear, is that Packard engine, etc. I think I was born too late and I've lived too long. :-)

EDIT: Ugh. My apologies. Thread hi-jacking violation on my part. My emotions got the best of me on this one and I wrote before I remembered what this thread topic was all about. Pardon my interruption.

Jim Hann
07-28-2012, 08:34 PM
Unfortunutly we will not be streaming any of tonights airshow live due to system maintenance of the ISP system. And currently all cameras are offline as well.

However, we are trying to get it recorded for playback sometime tomorrow if all goes as we hope. We will post here again if we are able to get a working copy of the show.

Todd

I've been going nuts trying to get the stream, I hope we can see the entire airshow online and not just "highlights"!

Jim

rcmodelr
07-28-2012, 10:27 PM
Thursday it had been posted here that the Webcam streams would be down from 6 PM - 1 AM tonight (Saturday), and you were hoping to be able to get back online fairly early Sunday morning.

Just thought I'd let you know... The Webcam streams are ALL back online as of 11:25 PM Saturday night.

Todd Ritzman
07-29-2012, 08:58 AM
I've been going nuts trying to get the stream, I hope we can see the entire airshow online and not just "highlights"!

Jim

We were able to record the stream and got it transfered from one location to the one we can work on getting the correct format to play. The video we play will be unedited, so not just the highlights. There was not to many aircraft flying the night airshow this year, but the fireworks were good.

Watch for the stream to start playing around noon central time.

Todd

Wrongway Feldman
07-29-2012, 10:45 AM
We were able to record the stream and got it transfered from one location to the one we can work on getting the correct format to play. The video we play will be unedited, so not just the highlights. There was not to many aircraft flying the night airshow this year, but the fireworks were good.

Watch for the stream to start playing around noon central time.

Todd

Where will the stream of the unbroadcasted Saturday night air show be broadcasted.
Will it be in the "Airshow" jwplayer popup.

Thanks

rcmodelr
07-29-2012, 11:59 AM
More info needed!!!

Todd said to watch for it to start playing around NOON (nearly 1 hour ago.) I did...

Titw and Air Show pages have BOTH said whole time "Stream not found."

Other 3 streams have been showing LIVE coverage...

Where can we see the Night Air Show from last night???

We were told to watch for it to start around 1 hour ago Central Time, but nobody said WHERE to watch for the stream!!!

Info on which stream or a link to click on would have been helpful.

I still want to see the night Air Show... It's 1 PM Central... Did I miss it since you didn't say what stream it would show on???

If nothing else, please provide it as a downloadable file link so we can download the file & watch it when we get a chance instead of having to try searching for some MYSTERY STREAM hoping to find it before it quits streaming.

Paul Hayden
07-29-2012, 12:22 PM
You haven't missed it. We have been having some transcoding issues. Todd will post when it is up, the an is also to loop it on the theater in the woods stream. Also there will be no afternoon air show stream. The camera guy has finished his assignments and is on his way.

Paul Hayden
07-29-2012, 12:40 PM
Correction. The night air show will be played on the air show strea

Todd Ritzman
07-29-2012, 12:56 PM
More info needed!!!

Todd said to watch for it to start playing around NOON (nearly 1 hour ago.) I did...

Titw and Air Show pages have BOTH said whole time "Stream not found."

Other 3 streams have been showing LIVE coverage...

Where can we see the Night Air Show from last night???

We were told to watch for it to start around 1 hour ago Central Time, but nobody said WHERE to watch for the stream!!!

Info on which stream or a link to click on would have been helpful.

I still want to see the night Air Show... It's 1 PM Central... Did I miss it since you didn't say what stream it would show on???

If nothing else, please provide it as a downloadable file link so we can download the file & watch it when we get a chance instead of having to try searching for some MYSTERY STREAM hoping to find it before it quits streaming.

Sorry for the delay, we are having some issues transcoding the video into a usable format to be able to stream. I think we are getting close. Hope by 3:30 at this point and hope I can meet that schedule.

Look for the stream to come up on the Airshow Camera latter this afternoon. Also, todays airshow will not be streamed as EAA is not having a camera man up on the tower today to record the show, so we don't have a feed to grab.

Todd

Todd Ritzman
07-29-2012, 02:37 PM
Sorry we have not gotten the night airshow online yet. Can't get it to burn to a dvd that is playable. Will keep on working on it for all of you.

rcmodelr
07-29-2012, 03:29 PM
Sorry we have not gotten the night airshow online yet. Can't get it to burn to a dvd that is playable. Will keep on working on it for all of you.

Any idea how long you'll be able to keep the stream going, assuming you manage to get it on?

Why burn to DVD first? Can't you copy to Hard Drive folder and play it from there? OR... Post it on YouTube or similar site so we can see it when we have time available instead of spending all afternoon/evening/night waiting & hoping it eventually starts streaming.

Todd Ritzman
07-29-2012, 03:42 PM
Any idea how long you'll be able to keep the stream going, assuming you manage to get it on?

Why burn to DVD first? Can't you copy to Hard Drive folder and play it from there? OR... Post it on YouTube or similar site so we can see it when we have time available instead of spending all afternoon/evening/night waiting & hoping it eventually starts streaming.

The problem comes in playing it from a file, we were hoping to do that, but the encoding software we are using in Oshkosh does not allow a play from file to stream. And the format that we were able to record in has to be converted before it can be converted to DVD.

We are looking at other possibilities for getting it online as well.

The server software license we have expires Aug 2, so that is the latest any of the cameras will be online.

Todd

Paul Hayden
07-29-2012, 03:45 PM
ok, I just got home and I think we have this figured out at least for the time being. give this a try and let me know how it works. http://www.haydenworld.com/jwplayer/AV_cam_airshow.htm

it is video on demand, and it is the whole evening airshow which starts with parachutes at dusk and goes from there all the way to the end with a large fireball. It might take the stream awhile to start, but it will.

rcmodelr
07-29-2012, 04:04 PM
OK!!! Thanks MUCH!!! I tried it... It took over 5 minutes before it started playing, but so far, it's playing at least as well, if not better than the daily Air Show LIVE streams did.

Todd Ritzman
07-29-2012, 04:08 PM
OK!!! Thanks MUCH!!! I tried it... It took over 5 minutes before it started playing, but so far, it's playing at least as well, if not better than the daily Air Show LIVE streams did.

This video is recorded at the same settings as it would have been if it was live. The only quality difference you may see if less hesitations as our server load is much lower now. typically we had around a 1000+ viewers at a time watching the streams and that was maxing out the server.

iflyatiger
07-29-2012, 06:31 PM
To Everyone involved in creating these webcams and streams I would like to say a sincere congratulations and a big thank you ! You have all done a great job !! If you can't make it to the show this is a really great alternative.
Have a great year..
Jon

wyoranch
07-29-2012, 08:44 PM
Paul and Todd,
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for your work!!!! Truly awesome! I won't mention how you let me down by not picking a format that worked with my state of the art P3 laptop. Perhaps I could donate it to be used as next years server. What do you think?
Thanks again
Rick
P.S. When you get a breather might I suggest a kind of round table of needs and wants for next year. I am sure there are a lot of people who can,will or would contribute to the cause.
P.P.S Not that I will be watching next year as I AM going to be there!!!!

Wrongway Feldman
07-29-2012, 09:50 PM
let me know how it works. http://www.haydenworld.com/jwplayer/AV_cam_airshow.htm

It took about 74 seconds to load player. @ 12 Mbps Downstream Speed
Works great !!

Now, if only the camera man could stay with the with the action we'd be fine.
Feed a little crowd/airplane/pyro audio in with the mix and it would be ready for ESPN.
2314
Thanks, Great Job

Jim Hann
07-30-2012, 12:13 AM
Now, if only the camera man could stay with the with the action we'd be fine.
Feed a little crowd/airplane/pyro audio in with mix and it would be ready for ESPN.

+1 on both of these! Thank you Paul and Todd!

rcmodelr
07-30-2012, 07:25 AM
[QUOTE=Wrongway Feldman;20344
Now, if only the camera man could stay with the action we'd be fine.
Feed a little crowd/airplane/pyro audio in with mix and it would be ready for ESPN.

Thanks, Great Job[/QUOTE]

+ many more on this... I recorded the stream, then edited out all the ground shots and times of Night Air Show when camera was pointed away from the action. That cut run-time down from nearly 2 hours to barely 1 hour. :)

Jim Hann
07-30-2012, 12:35 PM
How did you record it?

MEdwards
07-30-2012, 01:03 PM
Paul and Todd, thank you. You guys worked incredibly hard to keep up and ahead of everything last week. I didn't see much of it, because I was in Oshkosh and couldn't get any wifi, but from the forum traffic it sounds like you had a full time job and more. Thank you.

One opinion for next year. More like my vote, since I'm sure others will have other ideas. I would have liked it better if the three tower cams just followed a simple pan, back and forth, all the time like they did last year. I tried to talk to the folks back home and tell them what they were seeing, and tell them where to see me or our airplane, but it was pretty much impossible due to the irregular and (to me) unpredictable schedule for moving the cameras.

Again, you guys did a great job and I'm sure many thousands of people watched and appreciated it.

Mike E

Todd Ritzman
07-30-2012, 05:31 PM
Paul and Todd, thank you. You guys worked incredibly hard to keep up and ahead of everything last week. I didn't see much of it, because I was in Oshkosh and couldn't get any wifi, but from the forum traffic it sounds like you had a full time job and more. Thank you.

One opinion for next year. More like my vote, since I'm sure others will have other ideas. I would have liked it better if the three tower cams just followed a simple pan, back and forth, all the time like they did last year. I tried to talk to the folks back home and tell them what they were seeing, and tell them where to see me or our airplane, but it was pretty much impossible due to the irregular and (to me) unpredictable schedule for moving the cameras.

Again, you guys did a great job and I'm sure many thousands of people watched and appreciated it.

Mike E

Mike,

Thank you and I am assuming you did see some of the webcams this year. We did try very hard to provide a service that was enjoyable for most users. And yes, we did have a full time job with the cameras, additionally both Paul and I also volunteer in other areas as well during the week as well.

Far as the tours go. Most of the days the cameras were on a tour panning around the grounds, and days with heavier landing or departing traffic, we would allow the cameras to focus on the runways a little more, but still have them pan around the grounds as well. Yesterday, we did park the Warbird camera and the Ultralight camera to look at the runways for departing traffic. The Vintage camera should have been panning the whole show.

I am assuming you were trying to be in the view of the camera when talking to friends or family. All the tower cameras are mounted about 60' up in the air so it would be difficult to define a person through the webstream. Currently the best camera to use to be in the view would be the one at Vintage tower as we have always had that one stop to look at the enterance to the Antique Red Barn. At the end of AirVenture 2011, we did discuss the possibility of adding another camera on the grounds that was mounted lower where people could stand and wave to friends and family. This was put on the back burner for this year due to us totally changing the way the video was being encoded and distributed and costs related to that. We will still consider that idea for furture years and the many other ideas we would like to implement to further expand our coverage of AirVenture.

Todd

rcmodelr
07-30-2012, 05:34 PM
How did you record it?

With Stream Recording software called JAKSTA. With Jaksta, if I know a specific stream will be showing something I want to watch, I can schedule Jaksta to record the stream starting at a specific time either for a set number of minutes or until I tell it to stop. If a stream I find has something I want to record, I can start Jaksta, tell it to start monitoring my web access, reload the page with the stream I want to record, and Jaksta will detect when my system starts receiving a "new" stream and start recording the "new" stream until I tell it to stop (or cancel) the stream recording.

I recorded all the AirVenture 2012 Air Shows since I was busy doing other things most days when the show was starting. The only day's Air Show I didn't record was Monday's.

Todd Ritzman
07-30-2012, 05:48 PM
It took about 74 seconds to load player. @ 12 Mbps Downstream Speed
Works great !!

Now, if only the camera man could stay with the with the action we'd be fine.
Feed a little crowd/airplane/pyro audio in with the mix and it would be ready for ESPN.
2314
Thanks, Great Job

This was a long week for Tim the camera man (not to be confused with Tim the tool man) that we get our airshow feed from durng the week. He gets daily assignments from the video department of things they have to shoot both for during that day and during that week. I know there were many days he was shooting footage for more that 14 hrs. Additionally it is difficult to find and or follow some of the aircraft during the night. Also, you may have noticed him focusing in on tents during the show, he does this to adjust and calibrate the camera for the changing conditions of ambiant lighting. Additionally he does have some general footage he as to capture for his assignments as well.

Hope this helps explain a little bit why he is not always following the aircraft.

dklord
07-30-2012, 08:19 PM
Thanks for the hard work. I thoroughly enjoyed watching the arrivals, the fly-in, and the departures. Along with the audio from LiveATC, I felt like I was almost there. You are indispensible to those of us unable to attend.:thumbsup:

God bless you.

Wrongway Feldman
07-31-2012, 10:17 AM
This was a long week for Tim the camera man .

I think a lot of things were stressed/stretched to the limit at Airventure 2012.
Electronics & Humans don't function very well in high heat and very cold temperatures.
Case in point: Record 100° in Oshkosh, WI. Breaking a 72 year-old mark of 97°.

2323

Farmers started giving crushed ice to the Chickens so they would stop laying hard boiled eggs. Thats HOT!!
I would like to personally Thank the guy who invented air conditioning.

Thanks for the reply,

Ken Smith
07-31-2012, 10:19 AM
Thank you for the great job with the webcams!! As 30+ year attendee (who couldn't make it this year) AirVenture represents a being at home feeling for me. I was glued to those views many times during EAA week. They certainly reenforced the feeling that I must get back to Oshkosh for AirVenture 2013. I also managed, by cell phone, to maneuver a good friend of mine in front of the vintage area cam and we enjoyed a short, one-way video chat.
It's also interesting to get a glimpse of the ramp up and wind down. What plans might you have for keeping them active during the off season?

Many Thanks

Todd Ritzman
07-31-2012, 01:46 PM
Thank you for the great job with the webcams!! As 30+ year attendee (who couldn't make it this year) AirVenture represents a being at home feeling for me. I was glued to those views many times during EAA week. They certainly reenforced the feeling that I must get back to Oshkosh for AirVenture 2013. I also managed, by cell phone, to maneuver a good friend of mine in front of the vintage area cam and we enjoyed a short, one-way video chat.
It's also interesting to get a glimpse of the ramp up and wind down. What plans might you have for keeping them active during the off season?

Many Thanks

Ken,

I am glad you were able to enjoy the views we were able to provide.

Unfortunutly we are not able to keep the camera live all year. The wayfinding towers that the camera are mounted on will be laid back down in about a week, leaving no place to have a camera to see anything. The towers have to be raised and laid down every year because they interfer with the instrument approaches and while the towers are raised the ILS is out of service. Also all our internet connection at those locations will be taken down as well and the server software lisence will be expiring on August 2nd, so after that, the remaining cameras will be offline.

For the most part the EAA grounds are very quite about 9 months out of the year with most of the setup activity starting about 3 months before the show with exhibit tents starting to be erected. The highest activity around here is the 2 weeks before and then planes starting to arrive late in the week before the show starts. With this in mind, we alway try to have the cameras online as soon as possible after the towers are raised so people can view some of the setup of the grounds, watch the aircraft arrive, and see the city of AirVenture spring to life. It is amazing how much gets done here in the last 2 weeks before the show.

Todd

Todd Ritzman
07-31-2012, 01:49 PM
I think a lot of things were stressed/stretched to the limit at Airventure 2012.
Electronics & Humans don't function very well in high heat and very cold temperatures.
Case in point: Record 100° in Oshkosh, WI. Breaking a 72 year-old mark of 97°.

2323

Farmers started giving crushed ice to the Chickens so they would stop laying hard boiled eggs. Thats HOT!!
I would like to personally Thank the guy who invented air conditioning.

Thanks for the reply,

You are correct, some of those days were cooking more than eggs.

WtrSkr
07-31-2012, 02:54 PM
Webcams were great. We went home on Friday and were able to watch the warbird show on Friday and Saturday from home. Also, I had to serve at church Sunday morning, to ease my Oshkosh withdraw I had the cams up watching departures while I was helping out.

Ken Smith
08-01-2012, 07:08 AM
Thanks for the information Todd!
If you need a volunteer for next year let me know how I can sign up.

Ken

Paul Hayden
08-01-2012, 08:22 AM
You are correct, some of those days were cooking more than eggs.

yeah, we need to add a 50 gallon drum of this stuff to the list for next year http://shop.antimonkeybutt.com/products/Anti%252dMonkey-Butt-Powder.html

Jim Rosenow
08-01-2012, 11:41 AM
yeah, we need to add a 50 gallon drum of this stuff to the list for next year http://shop.antimonkeybutt.com/products/Anti%252dMonkey-Butt-Powder.html

...and don't forget the IT 'breakfast of Champions'....can you buy Mountain Dew by the drum? ;)

Paul Hayden
08-01-2012, 12:38 PM
actually I volunteer for a handful of places and I must say EAA treats us well. We love the ninja like volunteer we have never seen, nor meet, that keeps a good supply or soda and magical sandwhiches in the fridge. This "Mt. Dew fairy" has a special place in our hearts.

Todd Ritzman
08-04-2012, 07:35 PM
Drove back to Oshkosh this afternoon to recover the webcams from on the wayfinding towers since they were laid back down on Thursday.

Right away there was not good news , first one I went to I found that it was broke off and in pieces. Not sure if it occured when the tower was laid down or if it got hit after the tower was laying down. This was the Vintage tower, which is the busiest location on the field. Needless to say, it is not fixable.

234023412342

The other two were recovered without any damage.

Jim Rosenow
08-04-2012, 07:44 PM
Looks like we're starting our streamer support fund about $2K in the hole. :(

If the thousand or so of us who watched every day chipped in........just sayin'.

Jim Hann
08-05-2012, 12:44 PM
Bummer about the camera but that is unusual for OSH, things are normally cared for very well. Who owns the cameras? Discovery World, EAA, you, or ???


actually I volunteer for a handful of places and I must say EAA treats us well. We love the ninja like volunteer we have never seen, nor meet, that keeps a good supply or soda and magical sandwhiches in the fridge. This "Mt. Dew fairy" has a special place in our hearts.

That fairy gets around because they also keep our fridge up at Flight Line Ops full. We are treated well for volunteers!!!

Jim

Wrongway Feldman
08-05-2012, 08:25 PM
Drove back to Oshkosh this afternoon to recover the webcams from on the wayfinding towers since they were laid back down on Thursday.

Right away there was not good news , first one I went to I found that it was broke off and in pieces. Not sure if it occured when the tower was laid down or if it got hit after the tower was laying down. This was the Vintage tower, which is the busiest location on the field. Needless to say, it is not fixable.

234023412342

The other two were recovered without any damage.

What a waste of a great tough as nuts camera.
Considering how well they held up in the heat.
Especially the camera zoom control and the electric motor for remote motorized left, right, up, down camera movement control.
You might want to check to see if EAA insurance will cover the damage!
Ether way make sure to keep it for back-up parts.

In case of camera troubles you also might want to secure at bucket truck (cherry picker) during the Airventure week so
you can reach the cameras on the way towers. Unless you already have one.

Thanks

Wrong

Todd Ritzman
08-05-2012, 08:26 PM
Bummer about the camera but that is unusual for OSH, things are normally cared for very well. Who owns the cameras? Discovery World, EAA, you, or ???
Jim

Jim,

This camera was owned by EAA. I will be talking to EAA tomorrow to see if they were informed of this happening and see where we go from there.

Todd

pathollywood
10-26-2012, 11:18 PM
Is there any archived video from the air shows this year? Someone said they had seen me, because I was helping out Kyle Franklin shortly before his performance on the Saturday and said, "We saw you on the webcam!" and I was a little taken back. But, it is an odd request. My experience at my first AirVenture this year was nothing short of magical, exciting, and thrilling and I would like to document that somehow. If it can't be done, no big deal. :)

Todd Ritzman
10-27-2012, 06:39 AM
Is there any archived video from the air shows this year? Someone said they had seen me, because I was helping out Kyle Franklin shortly before his performance on the Saturday and said, "We saw you on the webcam!" and I was a little taken back. But, it is an odd request. My experience at my first AirVenture this year was nothing short of magical, exciting, and thrilling and I would like to document that somehow. If it can't be done, no big deal. :)

Pat,

Sorry, normally none of the webcam footage is recorded or archived by the streaming media group. However there is a very small chance that it was captured by the video crew that does record parts of the airshows. Some of these clips have links on the Airventure website. I think the tab you want to look for is Multimedia and then Video.

Hope this helps.

Todd