Part of my ongoing ‘Directing your own online classes’ series. All articles can be found on this page.

Introduction

Several people contacted me to ask what they should do if they don’t own a web-camera but still want to for example film a hardware setup or themselves while teaching using OBS project to direct their stream. Well your smartphone is a very good camera and can be used as a substitute for this problem.

Props to this post that show how to solve this.

Steps to follow:

Install an IP Camera app on your phone. I have an Android device , so I used this one. I think iPhone users can use this one
Start the IP Cam server in the app and note the address. (it should be something like https://192.168.0.2/8080)
In the Android IP Camera app, scroll down to the end to find ‘Start Server’. Bingo! You should now see video , with the IP addresses printed at the bottom. I recommended you use the httpS one!
Open OBS Project and add a new Media Source.
- Uncheck “Local file”
- Insert the address in the “input” textbox BUT DON’T FORGET TO ADD /video .Otherwise this won’t work. So for example for me this becomes: https://192.168.0.2/8080/video
- Only when pushing OK will you see the stream in action (the screen here was taken after going back to the properties of this scene)
Done! You can now use this source (or scene) in your other OBS scenes.