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Comment by mrkeen | Hacker News Reader

Any restrictions about how long you can keep it turned on? I tried to do this but found I'd need to flash the cam's firmware to override the 10min recording limit.

(I read that cameras which can record longer are taxed as video cameras, so they're deliberately crippled)

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Magic Lantern will take care of that.

To accomplish what the OP does, I use a USB HDMI in, a mini HDMI to HDMI cable, and Magic Lantern on my Rebel. It works well.

Magic Lantern allows me to leave the camera in preview without overlays for indefinite time periods. It can also provide video this way, but heat can be an issue there…

Magic Lantern was a game changer that really helped expose thousands to amateur videography. The Canon 5D MkII was the start of a revolution (an to a lesser extend, the T3i+) and the Panasonic GH4 and then Sony Alpha lines really played a role in pushing those young people from hobby to actual product videos and commercials.

Normally you can leave live view (768x512 resolution, 0.4 MP in this case, usually not much higher for modern cameras) running indefinitely. Besides the low resolution especially on older cameras the readout for live view will use pixel skipping to conserve power at the expense of quality. This is why "the pro streamers" don't use the live view image, but instead go the HDMI-to-UVC route using the camera's video mode.

Unfortunately most cameras do not provide "clean" HDMI output. That is, the HDMI output contains camera UI symbols like focus points, battery state, lighting, etc. Configuration options to disable those UI symbols are generally not available, at best one can disable some of them. A model with "clean" HDMI is usually more expensive and you have to explicitly look for it as a feature.

Live view readout via USB is something that works far more often than HDMI.

I’d expect pretty much any system camera from the last decade should include it

You are definitely expecting something that the camera makers' market segmentation does not provide. If you need clean HDMI, you can buy a camera that has it, but I estimate only a quarter of currently available DSLRs do.

Most cameras do? Especially if bought in the last ~5 years.

Nikon D750 also can do it, 2014.

You can sort-of "clean" whatever output you get from your camera because the symbols are typically around the periphery. Adjust focus+zoom so that your subject is within the rectangle that doesn't have symbols, take the camera output and put it through OBS with a crop filter and you've got something that's clean.

Why recording limit? Leave it in live view, no need to record. Or is the HDMI output not active then?

I don't think this tax applies anymore.

Live view turns itself off after a period of time. I believe with my Nikon it's 30min.

For me, having to press the LV button twice an hour seemed more preferable than flashing the firmware.

Can be disabled

Live view auto shutoff can be disabled? No it can't[1], not without modified firmware that either doesn't exist[2] or is only available from sketchy mega uploads[3]. There are other[4] hacky workarounds, but nothing clean.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Nikon/comments/c5wjg6/how_to_turnof...

[2] https://www.reddit.com/r/Nikon/comments/hqp2wu/any_way_to_tu...

[3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKSY0eEC5gM

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUrPd4b22Y4

You forgot to specify what camera you use. No need to extrapolate from your camera to all Nikons.

I said "with my Nikon". You said definitively that it "can be disabled". Your statement was incorrect - you were the one extrapolating.

Yes, because you didn't mention any camera model.

The webcam described in the article is so old, it has PAL/NTSC video out. Later generations switched to HDMI, but not all of them have a 'clean feed', so some information regarding exposure settings, battery level etc will remain in the picture.

I believe that the tax law changed in the last few years. Most cameras in use today still have the limit, even though many new (especially higher end) models have unlimited recording.

Even on long video calls (1-2 hours) I haven't had any problems but have not tested anything longer than that.

Did you read the article? The author's camera can't record video at all. He uses software that creates video from static images taken by the camera.

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