Wowza Community

Generating Thumbnail(Previews) from Livestream periodically

Hi Dear Wowza Community,:slight_smile:

i searched a bit about how to generate thumbnails from livestreams every e.g. 30 seconds in the forums. but none of the solution worked for me.

at the moment i have running an external application which connects to every stream, records 1 second(program rtmpdump) and make a thumbnail out of it (program ffmpeg). but it crashes after a while and is not really a good solution.

i tried the wowzaModules but cant get it to work:

ModuleCreateSnapshot

https://www.wowza.com/docs/how-to-take-a-single-frame-snapshot-of-a-live-stream-for-thumbnail-creation-modulecreatesnapshot

also tried:

(ModuleTranscoderTimedSnapshot)

https://www.wowza.com/docs/how-to-take-timed-thumbnail-snapshots-of-a-wowza-transcoder-stream-moduletranscodertimedsnapshot

were are the screenshoots are stored? i can not find any screen shoots.

do you have better solutions or hints for me?

thank you a lot for your time and help

kind regards

Hi there, can you confirm that Wowza Transcoder is running and actively transcoding the video portion of a stream when taking these snapshots?

The images should be saved in the directory that is set as the in the application.xml file. By default this is set to [install-dir]/content, if you modified this, then they should be saved to the specified directory.

And here is another option for capturing thimbnail images:

How to get thumbnail images from Wowza Transcoder with an HTTP Provider

I hope this helps.

Salvadore

I would say the reason there are no files in the content folder is because none are being created as you are not using the Transcoder on the stream.

Yes, the two methods for creating snapshots are to be used with the Wowza Transcoder.

The third method you mentioned:

How to take a single-frame snapshot of a live stream for thumbnail creation (ModuleCreateSnapshot)

Has to be called from a Flash client and creates a single snapshot.

You may wish to use the Transcoder, or seek the help of a consultant to develop a custom module that will meet your needs. Or you may be able to write one yourself.

Salvadore

Hi Salvadore,

first of all thank you for your prompt reply, but i can not find anything in the content folder.

i tried both plugins.

Why is the HTTP Provider only available only for Transcoding users? Because iam not using.

so this http://[wowza-ip-address]:8086/transcoderthumbnail?application=live&streamname=myStream&format=jpeg&size=320x240

is not working for me :(.

i also tried:

(ModuleTranscoderTimedSnapshot)

https://www.wowza.com/docs/how-to-take-timed-thumbnail-snapshots-of-a-wowza-transcoder-stream-moduletranscodertimedsnapshot

is also only available when you are using the transcoder addon?