kumari alpha 1

nate

Edit history:

nate: 2013-05-19 08:33:36 am

nate: 2013-05-18 09:08:05 pm

2013-05-18 09:07:52 pm

just a little side project to help me procrastinate on yua ...

kumari records and streams your screen to twitch or ustream. if your system is fast enough, you can use it to record speedruns while streaming, all from a single program.

kumari is released under the terms of the gpl version 2 or later.

windows
mac
i can probably post a linux binary on request.
source

system requirements

windows

pentium 4/athlon 64 or better processor
windows xp service pack 3 or better (32- or 64-bit doesn't matter)

mac

core 2 duo or better processor (sorry, no powerpc or core 1 duo support from me)
mac os x 10.6.8 or better (it may be compatible with 10.5 but i'm unable to test right now)

kumari records lossless yuv444 h.264 pcm avi. use yua (or anri after installing the cccp) to transcode the video to sda-submittable files.

limitations

performance under windows is currently abysmal. don't expect 60 fps until i port the screen capture code from obs.
you need a pretty good computer to record and stream at the same time. both gpu and cpu are important. the fps indicator will let you know the framerate you are currently getting. if your computer can't keep up and/or kumari crashes, try moving the sliders toward "speed."
right now there is only one audio input. this means you can't stream your voice unless you aren't going to submit the run to sda. if there is enough interest in two audio inputs then i will implement it. i don't know a lot about how people set up their streams.

stream key

kumari will ask you for your stream key when you go to stream for the first time.

for twitch, go to http://www.justin.tv/settings/channel/info/ . scroll down to "stream key." for kumari you need to enter:

rtmp://live.justin.tv/app/STREAMKEYGOESHERE

... where STREAMKEYGOESHERE is the text on the justin.tv page next to "stream key." it will look something like this:

rtmp://live.justin.tv/app/live_9020940_zBt4L7pK

also, you may need to replace "justin" with "twitch" to get it working (thanks djs).

for ustream, go to http://www.ustream.tv/dashboard and then click on "channel" at the left, then "remote." you should see two input fields: "rtmp url" and "stream key." for kumari you need to paste these in order separated by a slash (/). e.g.:

RTMPURL/STREAMKEY

it will look something like this: rtmp://1.4624221.fme.ustream.tv/ustreamVideo/4624221/Wv4w2HXnU5XKaygb1rNqqhNrFqLFb7W7

you will need to download and install soundflower. this is a system extension that lets you record the audio output of your computer. if you're running lion or mountain lion you will probably need to download Soundflower-1.6.6b.dmg (under "downloads" at the left on that page). otherwise you're probably safe with Soundflower-1.5.2.dmg.

once it's installed, go into your system preferences and click on sound. then click on "output" and click on soundflower (2ch) as shown below.

you will be able to hear your system's audio while kumari is open if you check the "playthrough" box. when you close kumari, be sure to change your audio output back to what it was before.

todo. basically you need to enable your "stereo mix" audio recording device and switch to it in kumari. you probably don't need to check the "playthrough" box.

Thread title:

just a little side project to help me procrastinate on yua ...
[img]http://nate.quandra.org/kumari/screenshots/1.png[/img]

kumari records and streams your screen to twitch or ustream. if your system is fast enough, you can use it to record speedruns while streaming, all from a single program.

kumari is released under the terms of the gpl version 2 or later.

[url=http://nate.quandra.org/kumari/windows/Kumari.zip]windows[/url]
[url=http://nate.quandra.org/kumari/mac/Kumari.zip]mac[/url]
i can probably post a linux binary on request.
[url=http://nate.quandra.org/kumari/kumari_source.tar.gz]source[/url]

[size=24]system requirements[/size]

[b]windows[/b][ul]
[*] pentium 4/athlon 64 or better processor
[*] windows xp service pack 3 or better (32- or 64-bit doesn't matter)
[/ul]

[b]mac[/b][ul]
[*] core [b]2[/b] duo or better processor (sorry, no powerpc or core 1 duo support from me)
[*] mac os x 10.6.8 or better (it may be compatible with 10.5 but i'm unable to test right now)
[/ul]

kumari records lossless yuv444 h.264 pcm avi. use yua (or anri after installing [url=http://www.cccp-project.net/]the cccp[/url]) to transcode the video to sda-submittable files.

[size=24]limitations[/size][ul]
[*] performance under windows is currently abysmal. don't expect 60 fps until i port the screen capture code from obs.
[*] you need a pretty good computer to record and stream at the same time. both gpu and cpu are important. the fps indicator will let you know the framerate you are currently getting. if your computer can't keep up and/or kumari crashes, try moving the sliders toward "speed."
[*] right now there is only one audio input. this means you can't stream your voice unless you aren't going to submit the run to sda. if there is enough interest in two audio inputs then i will implement it. i don't know a lot about how people set up their streams.
[/ul]

[size=24]stream key[/size]

kumari will ask you for your stream key when you go to stream for the first time.

for [b]twitch[/b], go to http://www.justin.tv/settings/channel/info/ . scroll down to "stream key." for kumari you need to enter:

rtmp://live.justin.tv/app/STREAMKEYGOESHERE

... where STREAMKEYGOESHERE is the text on the justin.tv page next to "stream key." it will look something like this:

rtmp://live.justin.tv/app/live_9020940_zBt4L7pK

also, you may need to replace "justin" with "twitch" to get it working (thanks djs).

for [b]ustream[/b], go to http://www.ustream.tv/dashboard and then click on "channel" at the left, then "remote." you should see two input fields: "rtmp url" and "stream key." for kumari you need to paste these in order separated by a slash (/). e.g.:

RTMPURL/STREAMKEY

it will look something like this: rtmp://1.4624221.fme.ustream.tv/ustreamVideo/4624221/Wv4w2HXnU5XKaygb1rNqqhNrFqLFb7W7

[hidden="mac audio setup instructions"]you will need to download and install [url=http://code.google.com/p/soundflower/]soundflower[/url]. this is a system extension that lets you record the audio output of your computer. if you're running lion or mountain lion you will probably need to download Soundflower-1.6.6b.dmg (under "downloads" at the left on that page). otherwise you're probably safe with Soundflower-1.5.2.dmg.

once it's installed, go into your system preferences and click on sound. then click on "output" and click on soundflower (2ch) as shown below.

[img]http://nate.quandra.org/kumari-soundflower.png[/img]

you will be able to hear your system's audio while kumari is open if you check the "playthrough" box. when you close kumari, be sure to change your audio output back to what it was before.[/hidden]
[hidden="windows audio setup instructions"]todo. basically you need to enable your "stereo mix" audio recording device and switch to it in kumari. you probably don't need to check the "playthrough" box.[/hidden]

UraniumAnchor

Edit history:

UraniumAnchor: 2013-05-18 09:14:13 pm

2013-05-18 09:11:40 pm

Not a walrus

Awesome. I'll grab it and try it with Tower of Heaven just to see what happens.

But does anybody still use ustream?

nate

2013-05-18 09:14:07 pm

i don't really know the difference. i switched to twitch recently because i was testing it and was too lazy to put the ustream key back in. there's only one person who watches my streams anyway.

UraniumAnchor

2013-05-18 09:14:31 pm

Not a walrus

I didn't even know you HAD a twitch stream. Tongue

Sir VG

2013-05-18 09:30:14 pm

Fucking Weeaboo

I think it's a good idea to leave uStream as an option. It doesn't hurt anything and it gives MORE options to people, rather than forcing them to one standard.

Also, I count 8 people on the w00ty page who use uStream.

nate

2013-05-18 09:33:28 pm

the good news is that kumari should work with any of the sites that use rtmp (i.e. that work with fme). just have to figure out what to put in the stream key box.

UraniumAnchor

2013-05-18 09:35:29 pm

Not a walrus

Hmm, having trouble getting it to show up on twitch, might be getting the stream key wrong though. I'll bang on it a bit more.

Sir VG

2013-05-18 09:36:56 pm

Fucking Weeaboo

Quote from UraniumAnchor:

Hmm, having trouble getting it to show up on twitch, might be getting the stream key wrong though. I'll bang on it a bit more.

You need to put $50 in the box to make it work, UA.

UraniumAnchor

Edit history:

UraniumAnchor: 2013-05-18 10:35:26 pm

2013-05-18 09:39:17 pm

Not a walrus

Well it's not like I'll be using this for serious streaming, but I figured I can help nate out a bit. Tongue

Edit: Yeah, not fantastic results, I was just streaming and not recording and this is the box we use for the marathons, so it's not a CPU issue (though curiously I was only using 30% CPU).

Heidrage

2013-05-18 10:30:53 pm

Willing to teach you the impossible

You just made me a VERY VERY happy person. Will be using this for sure.

nate

2013-05-18 10:39:19 pm

Quote from UraniumAnchor:

Well it's not like I'll be using this for serious streaming, but I figured I can help nate out a bit. Tongue

Edit: Yeah, not fantastic results, I was just streaming and not recording and this is the box we use for the marathons, so it's not a CPU issue (though curiously I was only using 30% CPU).

hey, at least the audio stayed in sync!!

what did you set the fps to and what was it running at while you were streaming? probably have to set the fps below the max you can do since it doesn't currently insert frames (it just assumes it will catch up later). under windows right now you may be able to squeak by with 30. 20 is probably a better bet. under os x 60 should be trivial on any machine with decent video hardware (like my 3+ year old mbp).

TheThrillness

2013-05-18 10:39:48 pm

thethrillness.blogspot.com

I'm guessing you opted for H.264 over Huffyuv/Lag to maintain compatibility over different OS?

I wonder what the difference between lossless H.264 and Lagarith is in terms of space and CPU utilization.

UraniumAnchor

Edit history:

UraniumAnchor: 2013-05-18 10:43:00 pm

2013-05-18 10:42:42 pm

Not a walrus

Quote from nate:

hey, at least the audio stayed in sync!!

what did you set the fps to and what was it running at while you were streaming? probably have to set the fps below the max you can do since it doesn't currently insert frames (it just assumes it will catch up later). under windows right now you may be able to squeak by with 30. 20 is probably a better bet. under os x 60 should be trivial on any machine with decent video hardware (like my 3+ year old mbp).

I had it set to 60 but I think it was reading about 15-ish. Strangely when people were watching the stream they said it was freezing up for 3 seconds at a time and then playing a burst, but for some reason the stream recording (didn't try local recording) looked like that.

Next time I'll try setting it to 15 and see if it ends up any better.

nate

2013-05-18 10:43:34 pm

Quote from TheThrillness:

I'm guessing you opted for H.264 over Huffyuv/Lag to maintain compatibility over different OS?

I wonder what the difference between lossless H.264 and Lagarith is in terms of space and CPU utilization.

my guess is h.264 will beat the living shit out of lagarith for most 2d games, especially if you have a fast enough system to crank the small size slider.

i used kumari to capture bjw's freudenstachel run that's going up on the site soon and the entire raw file was only like 3 gig or something.

presjpolk

2013-05-19 01:22:02 am

HELLO!

This is exciting and I would like to subscribe to its newsletter.

If it's fast I will kick Camtwist to the curb so hard. So hard. Even if it is missing whatever whizzo effects features and have to do my screen arrangement actually on screen.

DJS

Edit history:

DJS: 2013-05-19 03:10:53 am

DJS: 2013-05-19 03:04:04 am

DJS: 2013-05-19 03:03:06 am

2013-05-19 02:54:30 am

torch slug since 2006

holy shit, maybe mac streaming will be better now. i need to test this someday.

re: audio setups. i usually have my microphone as "input", and then obs/xsplit has this speaker capture thingy, which is essentially capturing stereo mix. so for recording attempts, in my situation it would work if the recording only took the stereo mix, while streaming took microphone AND stereo mix, or just microphone, i could just turn on my tv's volume.

edit: i couldnt get streaming to twitch to work with "rtmp://live.justin.tv/app/blablablalbalblablab", i had to change justin to twitch.

edit2: http://www.twitch.tv/lambdan/b/405450828 (default settings) | http://www.twitch.tv/lambdan/b/405451417 (slider set to max speed)
my cpu didnt get maxed out, but still the performance wasnt great. i havent tried on osx yet because my mac is a htpc atm and its probably gonna stay that way for a long time. i might try hackintosh though...

presjpolk

Edit history:

presjpolk: 2013-05-19 06:59:45 am

2013-05-19 06:56:44 am

HELLO!

Tried it. Mac OS X 10.8.3, brand new quad core 2.9GHz i5 iMac. Capturing Black Magic Media Express and Llanfair.

http://www.twitch.tv/presjpolk/b/405507969

Audio got a lot of complaints that it was very low. And in the archive it seems to be very stuttery, as though it were insufficiently buffered. I know that's not on Soundflower or Audio Hijack Pro though, since it's the same audio setup I use with Quicktime Broadcaster.

Video looked great staticly, but I and others could see that it would just cut out now and then for a second or whatever. Seems to come through in the Archive as just greatly sped up sections.

I wasn't cpu or net bound at all. CPUs about half idle. Had it configured to 2500 kbps, about a quarter of my tested upload, which is what I set Quicktime Broadcaster to usually with no issues.

So this has great potential. CamTwist seems incapable of going beyond 30fps. Kumari seems to be doing more, just not consistently.

nate

2013-05-19 08:32:46 am

seems like i'll have to learn more about screen capture under os x as well. you should have been able to get 60 fps consistently on a machine like that. it must be because other programs are also generating traffic on the video pathway. makes me wonder how parallels draws on the screen since i'm able to stream 640x480 games from it no problem at 60 fps.

i know it sounds dumb, but the quiet audio is probably just a matter of turning up the input level. what is soundflower set like under system preferences -> sound -> input if you select it?

if you want to use kumari in the meantime without the stuttering and inserted/dropped frames in the audio then you just need to set the framerate below what you know it can hit consistently. just for shits and giggles you might also want to try streaming with the slider moved all the way to the left and looking at the framerate then. it's not 100% clear to me yet how cpu load affects video pathway access timing. you wouldn't think it would matter unless the cpu were nearly 100% in use on any system made in the last 10 years but then again kumari has been one surprise after another for me.

seems like i'll have to learn more about screen capture under os x as well. you should have been able to get 60 fps consistently on a machine like that. it must be because other programs are also generating traffic on the video pathway. makes me wonder how parallels draws on the screen since i'm able to stream 640x480 games from it no problem at 60 fps.

i know it sounds dumb, but the quiet audio is probably just a matter of turning up the input level. what is soundflower set like under system preferences -> sound -> input if you select it?

if you want to use kumari in the meantime without the stuttering and inserted/dropped frames in the audio then you just need to set the framerate below what you know it can hit consistently. just for shits and giggles you might also want to try streaming with the slider moved all the way to the left and looking at the framerate then. it's not 100% clear to me yet how cpu load affects video pathway access timing. you wouldn't think it would matter unless the cpu were nearly 100% in use on any system made in the last 10 years but then again kumari has been one surprise after another for me.

honorableJay

2013-05-19 03:57:33 pm

The Dork Knight himself.

I'm intrigued but at the same time confused as to the end goal for Kumari. Is this intended to be the next evolution of nori-chan, a free alternative to XSplit/OBS (with better recording features), a free alternative to Fraps, or a mash of all of those?

If this is intended to be a streaming/recording app, then the recording will have to be separated from the streaming in the UI and backend. For example:
Streaming
---> Video Source 1 = game
---> Audio Source 1 = game (tied to video source by default, can be overridden by user)
---> Video Source 2 = webcam
---> Audio Source 2 = microphone
---> Video Source 3 = WSplit/timer/keyboard display/etc
Recording
---> Video Source = game
---> Audio Source = game (tied to video by default, can be overridden by user)

In this case, while the stream and the recording share two sources (the game's video/audio) in the end they don't interfere with each other (i.e. any extra video/audio sources used for the streaming end aren't recorded). This allows users to have as simple or elaborate of a stream setup as possible but still only record the game in really high quality settings (a feature that OBS/XSplit lack). Also, this would require the handling of multiple different video/audio streams without just clumping them on top of one another (in the case of audio this might be more difficult).

If the intention is simply to record a game's window (with the bonus of being able to directly stream it with no frills attached), then it should be designed to choose only the window a user chooses rather than grabbing the entire desktop. I'm not sure how audio is handled, but being able to only grab the game's audio without grabbing the desktop audio would really help here (considering Windows Vista/7/8 actually has volume sliders for individual programs, there has to be a way to grab just the audio data from one window).

Don't get me wrong, you make some really good programs for us and I'm guessing this will be no different. All I'm asking is what direction do you want to take with this project, this way we can all help you out better.

I'm intrigued but at the same time confused as to the end goal for Kumari. Is this intended to be the next evolution of nori-chan, a free alternative to XSplit/OBS (with better recording features), a free alternative to Fraps, or a mash of all of those?

If this is intended to be a streaming/recording app, then the recording will have to be separated from the streaming in the UI and backend. For example:
Streaming
---> Video Source 1 = game
---> Audio Source 1 = game (tied to video source by default, can be overridden by user)
---> Video Source 2 = webcam
---> Audio Source 2 = microphone
---> Video Source 3 = WSplit/timer/keyboard display/etc
Recording
---> Video Source = game
---> Audio Source = game (tied to video by default, can be overridden by user)

In this case, while the stream and the recording share two sources (the game's video/audio) in the end they don't interfere with each other (i.e. any extra video/audio sources used for the streaming end aren't recorded). This allows users to have as simple or elaborate of a stream setup as possible but still only record the game in really high quality settings (a feature that OBS/XSplit lack). Also, this would require the handling of multiple different video/audio streams without just clumping them on top of one another (in the case of audio this might be more difficult).

If the intention is simply to record a game's window (with the bonus of being able to directly stream it with no frills attached), then it should be designed to choose only the window a user chooses rather than grabbing the entire desktop. I'm not sure how audio is handled, but being able to only grab the game's audio without grabbing the desktop audio would really help here (considering Windows Vista/7/8 actually has volume sliders for individual programs, there has to be a way to grab just the audio data from one window).

Don't get me wrong, you make some really good programs for us and I'm guessing this will be no different. All I'm asking is what direction do you want to take with this project, this way we can all help you out better.

nate

2013-05-19 04:34:07 pm

the direction is currently unknown. feedback like yours helps me decide what i want to do with it. i made it to serve my own purposes and if other people are convincing enough then i will add features that help others too.

honorableJay

2013-05-19 06:14:49 pm

The Dork Knight himself.

Well, I do like the idea of recording a game window without limiting the framerate of the program itself (one feature that Fraps seriously fails in). For myself, I'd like to see the performance under windows fixed so that I can record to any codec I want. I'd like a Fraps-style codec (light compression on the fly that doesn't fill my hard drive up too badly) since I don't have the best hard drive write performance for high res recording (I can do 720p with Fraps currently but not much higher, maybe 1280x1024). Pretty sure it's not easy to write your own codec so don't worry about it.

Other than that, the only other thing I can think of would be to setup Kumari like AmarecTV: allow it to access capture cards at the various resolutions/framerates the device supports or capture a game window of the users choice (with framerate/res options), directly record the raw footage, and allow it to be exported to a program like OBS/XSplit for streaming purposes. If others want you to setup streaming (since from what I understand Macs don't have the best software for this) then I'd suggest keeping the recording end and streaming end separated so they can act independantly. This will let users like me use it like AmarecTv and others use it like OBS+Amarec.

Well, I do like the idea of recording a game window without limiting the framerate of the program itself (one feature that Fraps seriously fails in). For myself, I'd like to see the performance under windows fixed so that I can record to any codec I want. I'd like a Fraps-style codec (light compression on the fly that doesn't fill my hard drive up too badly) since I don't have the best hard drive write performance for high res recording (I can do 720p with Fraps currently but not much higher, maybe 1280x1024). Pretty sure it's not easy to write your own codec so don't worry about it.

Other than that, the only other thing I can think of would be to setup Kumari like AmarecTV: allow it to access capture cards at the various resolutions/framerates the device supports or capture a game window of the users choice (with framerate/res options), directly record the raw footage, and allow it to be exported to a program like OBS/XSplit for streaming purposes. If others want you to setup streaming (since from what I understand Macs don't have the best software for this) then I'd suggest keeping the recording end and streaming end separated so they can act independantly. This will let users like me use it like AmarecTv and others use it like OBS+Amarec.

presjpolk

2013-05-19 07:15:08 pm

HELLO!

Testing update.

Dialed down to max speed, 45 fps: stream was reported to have no issues at all. Same resolution as before. CPU so low.

Jumped up to 60fps: stutter returns.

Lowered resolution, 60 fps: stutter remains.

http://www.twitch.tv/presjpolk/b/405785022 <-- Once debugged on my end audio-wise, this 45fps test was higher res and framerate than anything Camtwist ever put out. At the LOWEST QUALITY SETTING. I am excited.

I'm sure some people care way more about the screen recording than the streaming stuff, but the streaming is what has me hyped. This is promising stuff.

Flip

2013-05-19 07:39:41 pm

1-Up!

If I can successfully stream with this then it truly is idiot-proof. Looking forward to trying it out.

nate

2013-05-19 08:09:50 pm

Quote from honorableJay:

Well, I do like the idea of recording a game window without limiting the framerate of the program itself (one feature that Fraps seriously fails in). For myself, I'd like to see the performance under windows fixed so that I can record to any codec I want. I'd like a Fraps-style codec (light compression on the fly that doesn't fill my hard drive up too badly) since I don't have the best hard drive write performance for high res recording (I can do 720p with Fraps currently but not much higher, maybe 1280x1024). Pretty sure it's not easy to write your own codec so don't worry about it.

if i'm understanding you correctly, this is what the x264 preset sliders currently in kumari do. all the way to the left for what you are talking about most likely (don't waste too much cpu on compression, but don't write raw pictures because that is wack). btw i did write my own screen capture codec a while ago (essentially sse2-accelerated diffs and rle) but i think x264 has pretty much blown it away so no one around here will be seeing it.

Quote from honorableJay:

Other than that, the only other thing I can think of would be to setup Kumari like AmarecTV: allow it to access capture cards at the various resolutions/framerates the device supports or capture a game window of the users choice (with framerate/res options), directly record the raw footage, and allow it to be exported to a program like OBS/XSplit for streaming purposes. If others want you to setup streaming (since from what I understand Macs don't have the best software for this) then I'd suggest keeping the recording end and streaming end separated so they can act independantly. This will let users like me use it like AmarecTv and others use it like OBS+Amarec.

i don't currently have any plans to support capture cards. kumari is supposed to be a screen recording/streaming tool. recording/streaming are already independent in the compression/output paths but there is currently only one video source and only one audio source which i will probably need to change.

[quote="honorableJay"]Well, I do like the idea of recording a game window without limiting the framerate of the program itself (one feature that Fraps seriously fails in). For myself, I'd like to see the performance under windows fixed so that I can record to any codec I want. I'd like a Fraps-style codec (light compression on the fly that doesn't fill my hard drive up too badly) since I don't have the best hard drive write performance for high res recording (I can do 720p with Fraps currently but not much higher, maybe 1280x1024). Pretty sure it's not easy to write your own codec so don't worry about it.[/quote]
if i'm understanding you correctly, this is what the x264 preset sliders currently in kumari do. all the way to the left for what you are talking about most likely (don't waste too much cpu on compression, but don't write raw pictures because that is wack). btw i did write my own screen capture codec a while ago (essentially sse2-accelerated diffs and rle) but i think x264 has pretty much blown it away so no one around here will be seeing it.

[quote="honorableJay"]Other than that, the only other thing I can think of would be to setup Kumari like AmarecTV: allow it to access capture cards at the various resolutions/framerates the device supports or capture a game window of the users choice (with framerate/res options), directly record the raw footage, and allow it to be exported to a program like OBS/XSplit for streaming purposes. If others want you to setup streaming (since from what I understand Macs don't have the best software for this) then I'd suggest keeping the recording end and streaming end separated so they can act independantly. This will let users like me use it like AmarecTv and others use it like OBS+Amarec.[/quote]
i don't currently have any plans to support capture cards. kumari is supposed to be a screen recording/streaming tool. recording/streaming are already independent in the compression/output paths but there is currently only one video source and only one audio source which i will probably need to change.

TheThrillness

2013-05-19 08:22:07 pm

thethrillness.blogspot.com

I agree with Jay. I'd like some sort of capture card implementation as screen capturing really limits what this program is actually capable of. Can't complain though since Amarec is probably coded by many highly skilled programmers and nate is just on his own.