Use your iPhone or iPad as your webcam in video conferencing with NDI: Updated for Mac

Newtek's NDI tools for Mac now includes the Virtual Input tool allowing you to use the NDI HX Cam or Capture apps on your iOS device to stream to your Mac. Virtual cam not working? I also discuss how to remove the code signature from Zoom so that you can re-enable virtual cams on newer versions of zoom (beware, you are opening yourself back up to some newly patched security holes so do this at your own risk).
I walked through using the NDI app on your phone more generally for Windows in this previous video:
• Use your iPhone or iPa...
To remove the signature, type at the terminal:
codesign --remove-signature /Applications/zoom.us.app/
If this fails you'll need to install xcode with this command:
xcode-select --install
For this video I was using Mac OS Catalina 10.15.4 and Zoom 5.0.2
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LINKS TO RESOURCES
Where to the the NDI tools:
ndi.tv/tools
Zoom support thread discussing virtual cams back in early April
devforum.zoom.us/t/zoom-deskt...
Blog post describing some of the Zoom security issues:
objective-see.com/blog/blog_0...
Discussion thread related to the virtual cam plugin for OBS that has the same root cause, this link will help you go deeper understanding the issue.
github.com/johnboiles/obs-mac...
Particularly this comment:
github.com/johnboiles/obs-mac...
developer.apple.com/documenta...
developer.apple.com/documenta...
nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-...
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CONNECT WITH ME
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/ mathewda
Connect with me on LinkedIn
/ damathew

[@MikeODonnellMagic]

Wow! Thank you! I will be doing if/when zoom disables virtual camera next month.

[@DavidMathew82]

Glad it was helpful!

[@RobinsonRDavid]

Great. Thanks for the update!

[@DavidMathew82]

I saw your comment on my first video, glad you found my update video for for Mac users. :-) FYI, fortunately the workarounds in this video for virtual cams not working on Macs seemed to be resolved about a month after I made this video, you should run into less issues now. Thanks for watching!

[@DavidMathew82]

Good news! Today's Zoom update (5.0.4) on Mac re-enables support for virtual cameras! So the remove signature thing should not longer be needed. I just tired it on my mac (updated to the new version) and NDI HX Cam works now with now hacks!

[@danielphaneuf6701]

No luck here Dave. Catalina is at 10.15.4, Zoom is 5.0.4 (25694.0524). I checked firewall and NDI Virtual Input is allowed. My MBP is on same 5GHz Wifi as my 2 IOS devices (iphone 8+ and iPad Air). I can see my 2 devices and select them in NDI Virtual Input in MacOS at the top of screen. I see the pulldown in Zoom Video Settings for NDI Video but total black for both devices when NDI Video selected instead of FaceTime HD Camera.

[@DavidMathew82]

You might try to put the app into low bandwidth mode by tapping the gauge icon, see if it shows up when broadcasting at a lower resolution. i'd also recommend restarting your computer if you haven't done so since installing the NDI virtual input app. If none of that is working maybe try a wired connection at least to your laptop so you can eliminate that signal needing two hops to get from your phone to the computer. If you installed the other stuff from NewTek when you downloaded the virtual input you likely have another app called the NetTek NDI Video Monitor, you might try to run that and see if you can view the video in that. That would at least help narrow down if it's something specifically with the virtual input application or possibly something else. I've seen this happen when trying to help someone else set this up and I'm still not quite sure on exactly why sometimes they show up to select the camera in the NDI dropdown but then just give a black signal. Sometimes it just takes a few tries? Anyway, let me know if you find any solutions in the mean time, if I find any additional suggestions for a fix I'll post here if I come across anything new.

[@danielphaneuf6701]

@@DavidMathew82 Thanks David. Wired connection to laptop done. NDI Video Monitor installed and working for both iphone 8+ and iPad Air with latest iOS 13.5.1. Still Total Black with Zoom and no pulldown in Cisco Webex (only FaceTime HD).

[@DavidMathew82]

@@danielphaneuf6701 I found this forum topic on Newtek's site with someone else asking this. The company rep did mention possibly turning off anti-virus or security software suggesting it can sometimes interfere so you might give that a try. I'll drop the link to that here. I'm also going to post into that thread to let them know others are having this issue as well. forums.newtek.com/showthread.php/162541-Iphone-Shows-in-Virtual-Input-but-not-in-Studio-Monitor?highlight=virtual+input+black Another option would be to try and see if you can use EpocCam, supposedly it has a wired option to get your cam into your computer. I'm going to make a video on my attempt to try it out soon but just wanted to let you know that's another option. (the wireless mode for it still uses NDI so not use it will resolve in wireless mode but the connect with USB to lightning option might use a different software mechanism that could work)

[@hcmtj2512]

your main video is SO CRISP! What type of camera are you using? And, what application are you using to place yourself in a circle in the lower right?

[@DavidMathew82]

Thanks for watching! You can find info about my gear on my website here: www.emergentproducts.com/studio/ (Scroll down to the "Best" section on camera gear). The link also includes info on my desk mounted setup which make things much more convenient to film this kind of video. This video I just recorded in one take (done a few times to get it right) using OBS Studio which is free and open source. It allows you to layer in live media sources like cameras, screen capture, video, graphics, etc. It's not the most intuitive to learn but it works for livestreaming and video recording and is free. For future videos I'm still using OBS to record video from my camera into my hard drive via HDMI capture but then I'm editing it in Adobe Premiere Pro, so if you watch newer videos that I publish I'll be using this method instead which gives me a lot more control over the content but also a lot more tools to have learned to get there. If you're just looking to do simple screen capture with a talking head overlay then OBS is a pretty good option. Check out EposVox on KZbin for some good intro content on OBS. (kzbin.info). If you want to do more advanced video stuff but don't want to pay for the Adobe products then check out davinci resolve, I haven't used it myself yet but it's very popular and also free.