March 14, 2020: moderator’s note: changed title to make topic easier to find for community input
I recently purchased the theta v. after having no luck w the insta360. I am trying to stream live in 360 without the need of a computer. The insta was supposed to connect to android via a cable - and stream… but it simply did not work… eventually (after 3 months) someone from Insta360 called me and told me that it doesn’t work at the moment… and they are trying to fix it.
So - I returned it - and got the Theta V yesterday… now it seems you can install a plugin - so that the camera can independently stream live. I am going to try that later today. It does seem a bit convoluted to set up. but perhaps once it’s set - it’s easier going forward.
That being said – I am wondering if there’s a way to stream from the android? I saw a dead thread w a guy who seemed to have create an app that allowed this wirelessly… but that tread is a year or so dead… I used to be able to do this w the theta S. years ago - w an app called camerafi. but I think they no longer allow this to be done… or don’t support it - and when I plugged in the theta V – my phone didn’t seem to recognize it was plugged in anyway.
Is there an easy solution to stream live to YT and or FB? I did a search - and most of the threads were a couple years old.
I was wondering if I could stream from theta v to my android - - to LIVE Youtube or FB. that way I could be somewhere without wifi and stream when I am outside. etc.
As I said - I used to be able to do that w camerafi and the theta S… but they no longer support theta - and the camera wasn’t recognized when I plugged in the cable for some reason.
USB cable technique likely will not work. Set your phone to function as Wi-Fi hotspot and then connect the plug-in to your phone using Wi-Fi. See the article below.
Practical Use - Live streaming in mobile environment
Basically, the tethering function of the Wi-Fi router, the mobile router, and the smartphone in the house, etc., have differences in the method connecting to the Internet, but all of these work equally well as seen from the THETA side.
Let’s try using the tethering function of the smartphone as a mobile router here.
Turn on the tethering function of the smartphone. For iPhone it is called Internet Sharing. Turn this on.
In the CL Mode setting, set the smartphone model ID (equivalent to SSID) to the name and set the password for tethering. Security is set to WPA / WPA2 PSK.
In this state, when launching in THETA’s CL Mode in the mobile environment, the smartphone is automatically selected as a router. If there are two routers in the same environment, routers are chosen in the order of the setting priority.
As a precaution, both the tethering of the smartphone and the mobile router often have capacity restrictions such as 2 GB per month, so be careful.
The earlier steps were a progression for you to gain experience. Before trying mobile data, I suggest you first try with your home router as it is a simpler setup. It does work with mobile data, but you need to connect your camera to your mobile phone with Wi-Fi, which can be tricky.
I am trying to just get the regular wifi streaming to work - before I go to the next step of using my mobile phone… maybe you can help tell me what I am doing wrong.
To start with - it seems a bit out of date the instructions - but I select 360 once I create the LIVE event although I don’t seem to have any options on the quality of the stream. (basic ingestion doesn’t seem to be an option - but I tick on 360).
I copy the stream info into my google keep note pad…
Now here’s what I don’t understand – it says to connect your camera to the wifi router – I have no idea how to do that… as I can only connect my phone to my camera when using the camera’s non-internet based wifi. to connect camera to my phone.
So that I don’t understand –
But I when connected to my camera via my phone- I was able to set plugin – and then click the plugin and put in all the stream information. like it shows in the picture…
But I imagine because the camera is on its own wireless connection - and not the network – it does not stream.
From your other note, I think you now understand that you need to connect the camera to the Wi-Fi router in your home or office using Client Mode.
The password below is the password of your camera. It’s confusion, but it’s the password of your camera, not the Wi-Fi router.
I think you had a questions about 5GHz.
5 GHz Access Point
If you have a 5GHz WiFi router, the THETA V may not connect to it reliably. You need to limit the channels to 36, 40, 44, or 48. The THETA V complies to the 5GHz standard W52（IEEE 802.11a/n/ac that works with channels 36/40/44/48.
Many 5 GHz routers comply to W58 standard, which allows dynamic channel allocation to include 149/153/157/161.
If your router is using those channels, the THETA V will not connect in client mode. Please refer to this Wikipedia article on WLAN channels.
IP Address
You may have asked a question about how to get the IP address.
Find IP Address
You will need the IP address of your camera to save the YouTube settings to your camera. The easiest way to get the IP address of your THETA V is to use the Ricoh mobile application.
For this step, you need to connect your mobile phone to the camera with Client Mode (green LED).
From the screen where you can see your camera images, go to the Settings gear in the upper right corner. Go to Camera Settings → Camera versions → IP Address .
So what’s happening is this… The theta seems to be connected… steady green light. which means it’s connected to my wifi – - but no matter what I try – It won’t show up on my phone.
1 - -they are both connected to the same SSID
2 – the theta has a steady green light - -
3 - they are both on the 2.4 g network
3 - I followed all the steps - and in theory it all should be working.
The app doesn’t want to see the camera. I have no idea why.
I called ricoh today - and the woman wasn’t sure about wifi - and said a level two tech would call me back within an hour - and no one ever did — I realize there’s other things going on right now.
I am just trying to see why this isn’t working - or any troubleshooting i can do.
I saw from your other post that you can the plug-in to work. Do you know what the problem was? It might help other people. The plug-in is difficult for most people to use, so sharing the community information is useful.
So… I am so close. I have pretty much everything working - except - the stream just won’t connect. I am not sure why yet. Once this is all figured out - I am going to create a simple guide - because every video/online instructions I see - are missing steps.
As of right now - the camera can connect to the phone over my router.
The plugin is enabled
All the stream information is entered.
BUT - when I click STREAM – I get a giant red “!” on the theta… and not sure why .
Fortunately - I have a lot of time on my hands today - as do most of us… so I will try and figure this out.
I will say - that someone at ricoh theta really needs to look at their docs and do a 2020 update on almost every page.
