This article introduces the different parts of the Custom stream page to help you find your way around the Wowza Video user interface.

When you click the Add new button, you can choose from several live stream options that can get you up and streaming quickly.

Custom stream

A custom stream gives you complete control over the streaming workflow. Configure the stream the way you need to meet your specific business need. Customers from the older Wowza Video UI will find most of the configurations they're used to contained in this option.

• Title — A short, descriptive identifier for the stream that differentiates it from other streams. It doesn't have to be unique.
• Description — Description of the live stream. Typically, you'd describe the purpose of the stream or other stream related notes.
• Region — The geographic region where Wowza Video transcodes and processes your live stream. Select a region that is as close as possible to where your stream will originate.
• Stream input type — The source for your live stream. 
  • RTMP, SRT, RTSP, WebRTC, Stream from file — Creates protocol-specific connection information you'll use to connect your encoder to Wowza Video. You'll access this connection information on the live stream details page. You might need to refer to your encoder's manual to make sure you add the connection information correctly. 
  • Wowza Streaming Engine, vMix, Epiphan, Telestream, LiveU, Teradek, Matrox, and IP camera — Creates a connection code or other specialized connection method for these cameras and encoders to make the setup quicker and easier.
    
    If your input type requires additional information, like a source URL for an IP camera, add that information when it appears under Stream input type.  
• Push or Pull — For RTSP or RTMP push streams that don't use Autostart, select Push to send the encoder stream directly to the transcoder at your Region. Alternatively, select Pull to route the stream through a CDN endpoint. 
• Stream Input URL — If you selected Pull to route the stream through a CDN endpoint, supply the Stream Input URL. 
• Stream profile — Input resolution for the incoming stream source. Precision in selecting the input resolution makes a difference when you stream high definition video and want the highest resolution available in the adaptive bitrate (ABR) ladder Wowza Video creates.
• Poster image — A poster image to appear in the player before the stream begins. To prevent distortion or cropping, make sure the image has the same resolution as the source video. Poster images must be GIF, JPEG, or PNG format and no larger than 2.5 MB.
• Player Countdown — A countdown clock that appears in the player before playback starts. If you include a countdown clock, provide the date, the time you want the countdown to stop, and the time zone of the event.
• Record this stream — Records the live stream and makes the video available in the Videos section of the user interface.
• Autostart — Available and enabled by default for RTMP Stream Input Type live streams, but you can disable it during live stream creation. If enabled, the live stream automatically starts when the encoder starts and sends a valid RTMP stream. If disabled, you must start the live stream yourself from Wowza Video through the Live Stream Details page. You can't edit this field after initial live stream creation.

When you enable autostart, the Push and Pull options in the Go Live Now Setup page don't display anymore and the Region field uses Autoselect.

You'll see a green banner in the Overview tab of the Live Stream Details page over the Preview Player if you've enabled Autostart. The banner indicates that your live stream is set to Autostart, but you can still manually start the live stream if needed.  

When Autostart is enabled, you can't enable security authentication for the transcoder associated with the live stream. 

• Autostop — Available and enabled by default for RTMP Stream Input Type live streams. If enabled, the live stream automatically stops however many minutes you set it to stop after the encoder stops sending a valid RTMP stream. If disabled, you must stop the live stream yourself from Wowza Video through the Live Stream Details page. 
• Scheduling — A schedule can run once or it can repeat at a regular frequency.
   

  Note: You can't change the Schedule repeats option after the schedule is created, but you can change the days and times the schedule runs.

  • One-time start and stop — Enter the date and the start and stop time for the stream. Make sure to select the Time zone the schedule should use.
  • One-time start or stop — Enter the date and either the start or the stop time for the stream. Make sure to select the Time zone the schedule should use.
  • Recurring — After setting the date and time, click Schedule repeats and indicate which days of the week the schedule should recur and when the recurring schedule takes effect and ends.
    
    
    While you can only set up one schedule when you create your stream, you can create additional schedules after the stream is created on the live stream details page.
• Watermark — If desired, select upload a watermark image to embed in your stream. The watermark is encoded into all bitrate renditions of a transcoded stream. Watermark images must be GIF, JPEG, or PNG format and no larger than 2.5 MB.
  
  After choosing the image, specify the corner of the video frame where the watermark should appear. To resize the image, enter a width and height Then, specify the opacity by entering a percentage between 0 (completely transparent) and 100 (opaque).

  Notes:

  • Watermarks aren't available for passthrough transcoders and don't appear on passthrough output renditions.
  • Watermarks aren't embedded in Wowza Video recordings.

• Closed Captions — Wowza Video can receive closed caption data with your source stream so that captions appear when the stream is played using the HDS and HLS protocols. Choose the type of caption your video source is sending to Wowza Video: CEA-608 (digital) AND OR Action Message Format (AMF) onTextData. To omit captions from playback, leave the closed captioning option set at None.

  Note: Wowza Video supports only the digital CEA-608 portion of the CEA-708 closed captioning standard. Closed captioning isn't supported for SRT ingest.