Dragonfly

Smartphone/tablet camera

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Your smartphone or tablet can be used as a wireless remote camera for Dragonfly streaming a video over WiFi or LTE using one of the many third-party application available on Google Play or App Store.

About the accuracy when using smartphones and tablets cameras
Before using a smartphone and a tablet as a video streaming device with Dragonfly please be aware that the FOV (field of view) of the standard smartphone cameras is typically narrow. This means that Dragonfly won’t see a large amount of features and could get lost very frequently if the smartphone/tablet moves too fast or if the smartphone/tablet is pointed forward and makes pure rotations.

1 – Setup the streaming App

First of all you need to ensure that your smartphone is accessible from the machine running the Dragonfly Java App (they need to be both on the same local network).

1.1 – IP webcam – on Android

  1. Download the IP Webcam App from the Google Play store at this link.
  2. Open the App and click on VIDEO PREFERENCES and select a VIDEO RESOLUTION of 640 x 480. Set the QUALITY parameter to 70 (or a closer value)!
  3. Go back to the main settings screen and under AUDIO MODE select DISABLE.
  4. Scroll down and click ENABLE THE SERVER.
  5. The app should display the camera preview and provide you with an URL of the video feed. Take note of the IP and port assigned to your device and go to section 2.

1.2 – Live-Reporter – on iOS

  1. Download the Live-Reporter Security Camera App on the App Store at this link at this link.
  2. Open the App and Allow the permissions required.
  3. Change the default settings of the app to these settings:
    1. Camera Setup 640 x 480;
    2. Framerate 30fps;
    3. Encode Quality Medium;
    4. Key Frame 1sec.
  4. Take note of the IP (and default port – usually 554) assigned to your device starting with rtsp and go to section 2.

2 – Make the video stream available to Dragonfly

  1. Launch Dragonfly.
  2. Click on the Configuration tab:
    • set the CAM_SOURCE parameter to the following string (where ip_of_your_device is the local IP address assigned to your smartphone provided by the 2 Apps described above):
      • on Android:

        gstreamer:souphttpsrc is-live=true location=http://ip_of_your_device:8080/video ! decodebin ! videoconvert ! appsink sync=false
      • on iOS:

        gstreamer:rtspsrc location=rtsp://ip_of_your_device:554 latency=0 buffer-mode=auto ! rtph264depay ! avdec_h264 ! videoconvert ! appsink sync=false
  3. Click on Save and Restart.

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