LIVE-to-VOD is a server-side recording service of the LightcastOVP. Our servers record exactly what they receive and make the recordings available to you in their original form - unaltered. This means that any malfunctions, interruptions, deficiencies in production quality are recorded just as the servers receive them in the stream coming from your live-encoder.
One common issue are brief disconnection and re-connections of live-encoders during live stream. Some disconnections can be discovered by your operator of the live-encoder at your broadcast location, if paid attention to during the stream. Other disconnections cannot be discovered as they are so brief that the live-encoder reconnects before it can be discovered on monitors in the control room, or on your live-encoder. Such undetected, very brief, disconnects are quite common due to numerous influences from local LAN networks, routers, firewalls, modems, other users on the same network, WiFi hotspots, your local ISP, the route of the signal over public internet and its hubs, networks, proxy servers, all the way to the CDN’s access points.
Please note that short disconnects of a live-encoder may not register on monitors in your control room or directly on your live-encoder software or hardware, but can still result in a brief “buffering” on the players, noticeable by viewers. However, in many cases viewers may assume that it is just a brief internet issue on their end, as there is no way for them to know the difference.
Lightcast.com recommends several precautions which can be taken in order to reduce the risks for “undetected” encoder disconnects. Please refer to our Article on how to secure your live-encoder setup on location.
Concerning the LIVE-to-VOD recordings of your live-streams such brief, “undetected”disconnects do matter indeed as they can cause the CDN to start a new recording, thus breaking up the live-stream recording into several files. Whenever you see more than one file saved from one and the same live-event, you can expect the cause being disconnects of your live-encoder. Some may have been intentional by your production team, such as testing in the beginning, or prior to the start of an event. Some may be known interruptions caused by technical issues on location. Some may not have been detected during the stream as the encoder showed continuity of your stream in its monitoring windows (which is usually the case).
Please browse all resources on this topic in the Support Center. In the meantime - here are a few reminders, picked out from our Live-Stream Setup Manuals and Troubleshooting Guides, as well as from other Support Center Articles:
1. If you are using a Telestream Wirecast software encoder, please ensure that the output encoding H.264 profile is set to Baseline.
2. Please also ensure that all of your other encoder settings are using our recommended settings as found on our encoder configuration page at http://www.lightcast.com/user/page/encoder-configuration
3. In addition to the proper encoder settings, it is important to ensure that you have a reliable, consistent internet connection with sufficient upload bandwidth. It is recommended that your upload bandwidth is at least twice as much as your combined video and audio bitrate streamed.
4. Please also note that if you stream multiple events back to back, please disconnect your encoder in between live events.
5. While there is no particular maximum duration for LIVE-to-VOD recordings of Live-Events, the official recommendation of Lightcast is to limit recorded events to 4 hours. The reason is simply that the chances of interruptions of your stream, short glitches in the stream, or split recordings increase with the duration exponentially. This can lead in small or large errors on the recorded files of course.
6. Keep in mind that the servers can only record what it receives and all errors, glitches, interruptions and everything on camera will be recorded. You can control the duration through the start and end times of your Live Event, and also trim the recorded files afterwards by setting in-points and out-points.
7. Finally, broadcasting durations of less than 2 minutes can also cause corruptions in the system. Please make sure that anytime you broadcast a stream that you let the stream continue for at least 120 seconds.