StreamVoodoo WebApp FAQ

The following questions and answers are based on the most common questions we get.

What is StreamVoodoo?

StreamVoodoo allows you to connect multiple high definition videos with studio quality sound in real time using only a web browser.

  • What is the difference between the Duo, Cinco and Switcher plans?

    • Duo allows 2 total concurrent connections in a room at a given time. Cinco is for 5 connections (cameras). Switcher allows up to 10 total concurrent connections in a room at a time.

    • Any of these plans also enables you to pull each video feed and pass them to a switcher for broadcast productions using our Magic Link process.

  • How do I start using a broadcast room?

    • Login with your username and password, then choose the name of the broadcast room (add an optional password for your room).

    • Choose your name to use in the room.

    • Grant permissions to use your camera and microphone.

    • After you see your video in the room, click the “Invite” icon to get a link to share with others so they can join you.

  • How can I change the quality of my video?

    • Each participant in a room can instantly change their own quality settings by clicking the “Settings” icon on the bottom left of the screen.

    • From there you can change your resolution (720p is default). Choose 1080p for full HD and then the bitrate sets how much data StreamVoodoo will be sending to make your video look optimal. You can change this at any time.

    • We suggest 3mb or 4mb/seconds as standard and if you are broadcasting, you can go to 6mb or higher.

    • Remember these settings are for your own video feed, not for other participants in the room.

    • Each participant in the room can set their own quality at any given time.

  • What is the difference between VP8, VP9, H264 and AV1?

    • These are encoding formats for streaming video.

    • VP8 is our standard video format. This is very good quality and is supported by every major browser.

    • H264 is a compressed format that will keep quality but the video will be more for mobile phones or devices that cannot yet handle VP8 or VP9.

    • VP9 is the most current and best codec for high quality video. This codec can work with most browsers as well. If the codec is not supported by other participants in the video room, VP8 should be used instead.

    • AV1 is the latest codec we added support for the browser and Mac versions of StreamVoodoo. It has excellent quality and consumes less bandwidth than VP9 or VP8. But you need a beefy computer to run with it.

  • What is the difference between studio quality sound ON and studio quality sound OFF?

    • Normal sound is a standard quality compressed audio that includes echo cancellation. You can use this for basic conversations.

    • Studio quality sound is our full spectrum audio with no processing. We suggest the use of headphones when you set it to studio sound ON mode.

    • The reason to use headphones is to prevent audio coming out of your speakers and going through your mic causing a feedback loop/echo.

  • What is Simulcast?

    • Simulcast enables other participants in the room to change the quality that they get from your video feed.

    • 3 options are enabled when you turn simulcast on, high - medium - low.

    • This is useful when people want to keep the video feeds from other participants at low quality and handle a better connection from them.

  • How can you playback video with audio?

    • You will have to use a virtual camera from OBS or an NDI output.

    • You need to invite yourself to the room by clicking the invite link, open a new tab and paste it.

    • Choose OBS virtual camera and open OBS and start the camera.

    • For audio pass through, set the audio routing using a virtual cable.

    • If you want to use NDI, install NDI tools and set a dedicated NDI output inside OBS by installing its plugin.

    • Choose NDI webcam/virtual input in windows or mac to use the dedicated output and choose NDI video and audio as the camera and microphone inside StreamVoodoo broadcast room.

  • When you create a room, is it forever?

    • Rooms last for 1 week after the host leaves the room. If the host rejoins the same room (by using the same name for the room) the room will be published and ready to use.

  • How many viewers can I have?

    • StreamVoodoo broadcast rooms are used to connect video sources (remote guests) into the rooms. You can bring those videos into a switcher (like OBS or VMix) and stream to social media or any other rtmp server that you have.

    • If you want to have viewers directly into StreamVoodoo, you can invite up to 10 people to join the broadcast room using our Switcher plan.

    • Contact us if you want to have a specific number of viewers without using OBS or vMix.

  • Is a connection a viewer?

    • Yes, it is a viewer but also a participant. You can change the viewer's “status” in the room by letting them choose “Audience” mode in their own settings.

  • What is a Magic Link?

    • A magic link is 1 link you get from each video in the StreamVoodoo room. This link is the output of that video with sound.

    • You use that Magic Link to share that livestream with anyone or use it as a browser source into a switcher app like OBS or vMix.

  • What is a Stage Link?

    • A stage link is the same magic link but it includes a chat on the side of the video.

    • Click the stage link from any video and then when you share it, the people that access that link can input their name and have a text chat included to communicate.

  • How many people can see my Magic Link?

    • Magic Links are used to bring video into OBS or vMix. However, if you share it with people, you can have up to 10 people watching the Magic Link.

    • Contact us if you want more people as an audience for a particular event or experience.

  • What is the difference between users and connections?

    • Each user is their own connection.

    • A Voodoo Duo plan has 2 a limit of connections.

    • Voodoo Cinco can have up to 5 connections

    • A Voodoo Switcher plan includes up to 10 connections.

    • If you need more connections contact us.

  • Are links per camera input or is there a link to show all users in a room?

    • Each link has its own camera input and output.

    • If you want to show everyone in the room, you should create a second room and using the share screen functionality, choose to capture the original room, that will let you share one magic link that includes everyone in that room.

  • Can you force “Audience” mode for “Viewer Mode”?

    • You can set the invite link to be seen as “audience mode”.

    • When you sign up for our service, we email instructions on how to do it.

  • What does the A-B button do?

    • A-B for the host works like a “green room waiting area”.

    • You can move people from sub room A to sub room B by clicking on the switch for each participant.

    • This way you can prepare someone’s microphone and cameras to be ready to talk or perform live.

  • For Voodoo Switcher, what does “Control Individual Feeds” mean?

    • This means you have total control over each video and participant in the room.

    • You can change the quality of each participant in the room.

    • You can get individual outputs by clicking on each video’s Magic Link.

    • You get video with audio to use in OBS as a browser source and record or stream that to social media.

    • You can turn down the volume for each video participant.

  • What are the options if we go higher than 10 connections?

    • There is a Voodoo Transport package for clients that include 20 connections for $500/month.

    • We can provide dedicated servers with a custom number of connections.

    • Contact us for more information regarding connections and enterprise level plans.

    • Video specific questions.

  • What is the best quality you can get with StreamVoodoo for video?

    • You can set up your camera to 4k at 60fps and up to 10mbps in a browser window.

    • If you use the Mac app you can go up to 20mbps on bitrate.

    • Switching to VP9 as the encoder using a Chrome browser usually gets you to the top quality that you can get using StreamVoodoo.

    • For those qualities to perform as they should, an ethernet connection is required.

  • How good is the latency overall?

    • Stream Voodoo is performing at sub second latency.

    • If you are connecting in the USA we have 2 server locations for each coast.

    • If you are connecting in Europe, we have nodes in the UK to connect from.

    • Contact us for more information about our nodes worldwide.

    • Audio specific questions.

  • What is the best quality you can get with StreamVoodoo for audio?

    • You simply need to set “Studio Sound ON” for each participant in the room. That audio setting requires the use of headphones for the participant to send audio to the room. We allow you to use the full spectrum for the microphone and remove echo cancellation. Headphones avoid the sound coming out from your speakers into the microphone creating a feedback loop.

  • How does StreamVoodoo route audio?

    • You can choose audio for input and output inside of StreamVoodoo.

    • If you want to route audio into OBS for example, you can use a plugin called “Audio Monitor”.

    • Another application that works as a “Virtual Audio Device” is called Loopback or Blackhole for Mac and Virtual Audio Cable for Windows.

  • Why do I hear echo inside of the room?

    • Usually this happens when you set Studio Sound ON and you are not using headphones.

    • The audio coming into a microphone should not be listened into speakers if Studio Sound ON is activated.

    • Headphones will always work to remove the echo.

    • If you turn Studio Sound OFF, you will have echo cancellation and you should not hear any echo. If you do, try to lower the volume of the speaker of the person that is causing the echo.

    • You can control each individual volume and notice which one is producing the echo to mute it until it is fixed.

    • If the problem persists, try using another microphone.

  • How can I route audio back into the room and avoid audio duplication?

    • You need to use a different audio output for StreamVoodoo than your desktop audio. That is why you will get duplicated audio. Since you are trying to capture the “desktop” audio from your pc or mac and you are trying to send back the audio there into the room, it will cause the audio coming out from the room to duplicate.

    • Avoid this by always using a different “output audio device” from the microphone settings inside of the room.

Have any other questions we can answer? Send them to us here.