Video Stream; How To Stream Mpeg-4 - Axis 211M User Manual

Video Stream

The AXIS 211M provides several different image and video stream formats. The type you want to use depends
on your requirements and on the properties of your network.
The Live View page in the AXIS 211M provides access to MPEG-4 and Motion JPEG video streams, as well as
single JPEG images. Other applications and clients can also access these video streams/images directly, without
going via the Live View page.

How to stream MPEG-4

This video compression standard makes good use of bandwidth, and can provide DVD-quality video streams at
less than 1 Mbit/s. Note that the image settings of the MPEG-4 stream are the same for all clients.
Deciding on the combination of protocols and methods to use depends on your viewing requirements, and on
the properties of your network. The available options in AMC are:
Unicast RTP
RTP over RTSP
RTP over RTSP over HTTP
Multicast RTP
AMC will negotiate with the camera to determine exactly which transport protocol to use in the order listed
above. This order can be changed and the options disabled, to suit any specific requirements.
Important!
MPEG-4 is licensed technology. The AXIS 211M includes one viewing client license. Installing additional unli-
censed copies of the viewing client is prohibited. To purchase additional licenses, contact your Axis reseller.
AXIS 211M - Video Stream
This method (RTP over UDP) should be your first con-
sideration for live video, especially when it is impor-
tant to always have an up-to-date video stream, even
if some images are dropped.
This unicast method (RTP tunnelled over RTSP) is use-
ful as it is relatively simple to configure firewalls to
allow RTSP traffic.
This unicast method can be used to traverse firewalls.
Firewalls are commonly configured to allow the HTTP
protocol, thus allowing RTP to be tunnelled.
This method (RTP over UDP) should be your first con-
sideration for live video, especially when it is impor-
tant to always have an up-to-date video stream, even
if some images are dropped.
Unicasting is used for video-on-demand
broadcasting, so that there is no video traf-
fic on the network until a client connects
and requests the stream.
Note: There is a maximum of 20 simulta-
neous viewers.
Multicasting provides the most efficient
usage of bandwidth, especially when there
are large numbers of clients viewing simul-
taneously. Note however, that a multicast
broadcast cannot pass a network router
unless the router is configured to allow this.
It is thus not possible to multicast over, e.g.
the Internet.
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