I remember reading with massive horror about a new virus sweeping through Hubei, China, and 60 million people had just gone into lockdown. A part of me was sad that this was happening but glad that such drastic action was being taken to stop the spread. As the virus spread — I was also surprised to see that the world had largely ignored the fact that a full third of the Chinese economy had been effectively “switched off”- stock markets ignored it, most people in the rest of the Western world did too, until March 2020.

我记得我曾极为震惊地读到一种新病毒蔓延到中国湖北，已有六千万人被封锁。 我为这件事感到难过，但为采取这种严厉行动制止扩散感到高兴。 随着病毒的传播，我也很惊讶地看到，世界很大程度上忽略了这样一个事实，即中国经济的三分之一已经有效地“关闭”了，股市却忽略了这一点，西方世界其他地区的大多数人都没有注意到这一事实。直到2020年3月。

Pretty soon you couldn’t buy toilet paper of all things, but weirder still, you couldn’t buy a good webcam! Most of the world’s teachers and information industry jobs were told to teach and work from home, but laptop and iPad cameras are not up to making most of us look our best. The lighting too was and remains an issue — in this article, I’d like to help you with both and cheaply too.

很快，您无法购买所有物品的卫生纸 ，但仍然很奇怪，您无法购买优质的网络摄像头！ 世界上大多数教师和信息产业工作都被要求在家教书和工作，但笔记本电脑和iPad相机并不能使我们大多数人看起来都最好。 照明也是一个问题，而且仍然是一个问题-在本文中，我也想为您提供廉价的帮助。

“Even with cameras being very cheap, one thing that researchers noticed was that you look really bad in a videoconference image because you get shadows and things” — Bill Gates

“即使相机非常便宜，研究人员注意到的一件事是，在视频会议图像中，您看起来确实很糟糕，因为您会遇到阴影和物体” –比尔·盖茨

The quote from Bill Gates is not in any way related to the other opinions had about him during the pandemic! It merely showed that it is as important as the clothes you wear, and the way you groom yourself for the workplace — none of it matters if the camera makes you look bad.

比尔·盖茨的那句话与大流行期间对他的其他看法毫无关系！ 它只是表明它与您穿的衣服以及为工作场所修饰自己的方式同等重要-如果相机使您看起来不舒服，这都不重要。

Even at his age and aggressively plain dress sense — his teleconferencing look is good.

即使在他的年龄和积极朴素的穿着感觉上，他的电话会议外观也不错。

Being a software developer (I’m no Bill Gates), photographer and teacher used to making teaching videos, I already had a fairly good setup for making a good looking video. Meanwhile, in Zoom-land, the world quickly had a crash course in video production and lighting via 5-hour-long casting sessions with thousands of critical children as feedback.

作为一名软件开发人员(我不是Bill Gates)，曾经是摄影师和老师来制作教学视频，我已经为制作漂亮的视频做好了准备。 同时，在Zoom-land，全世界进行了长达5小时的选角培训，在成千上万的重要儿童的反馈下，在视频制作和照明方面Swift开设了速成班。

Most zoomers and boomers alike found out that being visible via a camera streaming on the web is less than flattering from the typical angles these cameras are placed at. They made a grainy, greenish, and horrible video, and overnight every teacher on the planet had been turned into a troll/video director.

大多数变焦镜头和婴儿潮一代都发现，通过网络上流过的摄像头看到的图像比从放置这些摄像头的典型角度看要讨人喜欢的要小。 他们制作了颗粒状，绿色和可怕的视频，一夜之间，地球上的每个老师都变成了一个巨魔/视频导演。

So, many rushed to Amazon, Best-Buy, Walmart, NewEgg, or some other electronic outlet to buy a good webcam, but found out quickly that anything good was $100 and up, and they're just weren’t any!

因此，许多人赶赴亚马逊，Best-Buy，沃尔玛，NewEgg或其他电子商店购买优质的网络摄像头，但很快发现任何好的东西都在100美元以上，而事实却并非如此！

如何将智能手机用作出色的网络摄像头 (How to use your smartphone as a great webcam)

There are several excellent ways to make your smartphone into a webcam but it’s important to realize two small concepts:

有几种出色的方法可以使智能手机成为网络摄像头，但实现两个小概念很重要：

• Capturing the video (smartphones have way better cameras than WebCams in most cases)捕获视频(在大多数情况下，智能手机的摄像头比网络摄像头更好)
• Putting the video in a digital format like a Web Camera (phone can’t do this without help).将视频以数字格式(例如网络摄像机)放置(没有帮助，电话无法做到)。

USB Webcams usually do this and then plug directly into the USB port of your computer. Smartphones are not designed to send video out of their USB ports — so we will have to use a special app, and the WiFi networks at home and some PC software. Plan a spot for your smartphone slightly higher than your eye line and get the software!

USB网络摄像头通常会这样做，然后直接插入计算机的USB端口。 智能手机并非旨在通过USB端口发送视频，因此我们将不得不使用特殊的应用程序以及家庭WiFi网络和某些PC软件。 为您的智能手机规划一个略高于视线的位置，然后获取软件！

获得工具 (Getting the Tools)

1. Download IP WebCam (Android) or IP4K (Apple) — it’s very solid and has more features than most professionals and teachers would ever need. It’s also fast. I will be describing the process for IP WebCam as I’m working on Android but instructions are very similar if you have an Apple device. These apps turn your phone into an Internet Protocol (IP) camera. The app will encode it to be available anywhere on the network — so set a password if you plan to use this at work or school.

   下载IP WebCam (Android)或IP4K (Apple)-它非常坚固并且具有比大多数专业人士和教师所需要的功能更多的功能。 它也很快。 我将在使用Android时描述IP WebCam的过程，但是如果您使用的是Apple设备，说明也非常相似。 这些应用程序可将您的手机变成互联网协议(IP)相机。 该应用程序会将其编码为可在网络上的任何地方使用-因此，如果您打算在工作或学校使用此密码，请设置密码。

2. Start the stream inside the app (at the bottom) — it will tell you the IP address of the stream. You can test it in Google Chrome or Safari by typing it into the URL as “http://196.168.1.100/8080” (replace this with the IP address inside the app). In IP Cam, click the browser option to get a live view.在应用程序内部(底部)启动流-它会告诉您流的IP地址。 您可以在Google Chrome或Safari中对其进行测试，方法是在URL中输入“ http://196.168.1.100/8080”(将其替换为应用内的IP地址)。 在IP Cam中，单击浏览器选项以获取实时视图。

3. Plug your phone into a good charger as these apps use a lot of the Phone’s battery power over time.

   随着时间的流逝，这些应用会消耗手机大量的电池电量，因此请将手机插入优质的充电器。

4. If you can, connect your laptop or computer to the router directly with an Ethernet Cable or use the 5 GHz band on your router for best results — or just have the router very close to you for a good signal. Make sure the phone and computer are on the same network.如果可以，请使用以太网电缆直接将便携式计算机或计算机连接到路由器，或者使用路由器上的5 GHz频段以获得最佳效果-或者使路由器离您很近，以获得良好的信号。 确保电话和计算机在同一网络上。

5. Here’s the tricky part — getting the IP stream into Zoom, Skype, Hangouts or Teams. You will need an encoder — for this next part, you’ll have to bear with me for good reason. It might seem complex initially, but once it’s set up, you can mix up what you show on the screen, from slides to different camera views, to screen sharing all in one nice control panel!

   这是棘手的部分-将IP流添加到Zoom，Skype，环聊或团队中。 您将需要一个编码器-在下一部分中，您将有充分的理由忍受我。 乍一看似乎很复杂，但设置完成后，您可以在一个漂亮的控制面板中混合屏幕上显示的内容，从幻灯片到不同的相机视图，再到屏幕共享！

   There are slightly simpler ways, but this one is free and opens up HUGE opportunities for making some really great video content — both pre-recorded and live-streamed.

   有一些简单的方法，但是这种方法是免费的，并且为制作一些非常好的视频内容(包括预先录制和直播)提供了巨大的机会。

Download OBSOnce you have OBS Downloaded and opened — it can look very intimidating and new, but do not fear! We are starting very simply and slowly. I will guide you through all the setup and show you what an amazing tool this software really is.

下载OBS一旦您下载并打开了OBS，它就会看起来很吓人和新颖，但不要害怕！ 我们正在非常简单和缓慢地开始。 我将指导您完成所有设置，并向您展示该软件确实是一个了不起的工具。

Download the OBS Virtual-Cam pluginThis plugin installer will allow you to turn whatever you see in the OBS Viewer into a WebCam for any of the Software we are looking to use, like Zoom.

下载OBS Virtual-Cam插件此插件安装程序将使您可以将您在OBS Viewer中看到的内容转换为我们想要使用的任何软件(例如Zoom)的WebCam。

放在一起 (Putting it all together)

Now that we have the Phone IP app, OBS and it’s plugin sorted, let’s glue all the pieces together.

既然我们已经对Phone IP应用程序，OBS及其插件进行了排序，那么让我们将所有内容粘合在一起。

In OBS Studio you’ll see a bland broadcasting setup that looks like this:

在OBS Studio中，您将看到一个如下所示的乏味广播设置：

The first thing you will go is add video sources to your scene. Click the “+” symbol in the Sources Panel.

您要做的第一件事是将视频源添加到场景中。 单击“源”面板中的“ +”符号。

A window will pop up that asks what type of video source — we want a “Media Source”.

将弹出一个窗口，询问哪种类型的视频源-我们需要“媒体源”。

1. Click on “Add New” and click “ok”.单击“添加新”，然后单击“确定”。
2. In the window that pops up Untick the box that says “Local File”.在弹出的窗口中，取消勾选“本地文件”框。
3. Now, type in the IP Address in the app of your choosing, making sure to add “/video” at the end, if nothing appears.现在，在您选择的应用程序中输入IP地址，如果没有任何显示，请确保在最后添加“ / video”。
4. Manually click and type in Network Buffering to 1MB — or 0 MB if you can convince OBS to do so — if you increase this, it will cause a lag.手动单击并键入1 MB(如果您可以说服OBS这样做，则输入0 MB)，如果增加该值，则将导致时滞。
5. Your new Media source window should look something like this:新的媒体源窗口应如下所示：

With any luck, you should have a video stream directly to OBS Studio.

运气好的话，您应该直接将视频流传输到OBS Studio。

Now, start Virtual Cam in the menu at the top, and this same view in OBS should be available as a WebCam in Zoom, Skype, Hangouts of wherever!

现在，在顶部菜单中启动Virtual Cam，OBS中的该视图应可作为WebCam在Zoom，Skype和任何地方的环聊中使用！

All you need to do is inside those programs, select the Audio and Video setting, and select “OBS-Camera” as the Video Source!

您需要做的就是在这些程序中，选择“音频和视频”设置，然后选择“ OBS-Camera”作为视频源！

You may run into some common problems and I’ll hopefully address them below:

您可能会遇到一些常见问题，希望在下面解决这些问题：

1. The video lags behind the audio.

   视频落后于音频。

   Solution: adjust the resolution down in the IP Camera software to use a lower resolution (I recommend 1280x720) at 50% quality. Make sure that you have excellent WiFi. I’ll discuss further problem shooting in the discussion below if you’re still struggling.

   解决方案：在IP Camera软件中调低分辨率，以使用50％质量的较低分辨率(我建议1280x720)。 确保您拥有出色的WiFi。 如果您仍在挣扎，我将在下面的讨论中讨论进一步的问题解决方法。

2. The video doesn’t look good.

   视频看起来不好。

   Well, it could be the lighting, the camera, the network or the thing that the camera is pointing at — so let’s try get the lighting sorted out and that’s about all I can fix from my side.

   好吧，它可能是照明设备，摄像机，网络或摄像机指向的东西，因此，让我们尝试整理一下照明设备，这就是我可以在我身边修理的所有东西。

照明 (The Lighting)

Lighting for video is tricky but here are some pointers:

视频照明很棘手，但这里有一些提示：

1. Soft, diffuse lighting. Never full sun or a single small source of light like an exposed lightbulb. Try bounce light off large white walls or ceilings.柔和的灯光。 切勿充满阳光或像暴露的灯泡那样单个小光源。 尝试从大型白色墙壁或天花板上反射光线。
2. Never have brighter light-sources behind your subject, unless we are going for the divine intervention look.除非我们要进行神圣的干预，否则请不要在您的主体后面有更明亮的光源。
3. Lighting from above and to the side is classic Rembrandt lighting and tends to bring out the 3D features in a face that makes them look good.上方和侧面的照明是经典的伦勃朗照明，并且倾向于在脸上使3D功能变得美观。
4. Please clean up the background — I had a skype interview recently with a company rep. Half her sock drawer was trying to escape and I couldn’t focus!请清理背景-最近我接受了一家公司代表的Skype采访。 她的袜子抽屉有一半试图逃脱，我无法集中注意力！

So — cheap ways of getting this done? If it’s bright outside, sit facing a window. If it is not, some freestanding lamps positioned to light up a wall or roof will give better lighting than the glowing chandelier or desk lamp usually used to light up conference call videos.

那么-完成这项工作的廉价方法？ 如果外面很明亮，请面对窗户坐下。 如果不是这样，那么比起通常用于照亮电话会议视频的发光枝形吊灯或台灯，某些定位成可照亮墙壁或屋顶的独立式灯具将提供更好的照明。

If you REALLY want to step up your game and have a mirrorless camera I’ll be writing another article on that soon to tie in with that!

如果您真的想提高您的游戏水平并拥有无反光镜相机，那么我将在此撰写另一篇文章，以配合您！

Please reach out via comment if you benefitted or run into issues carrying out the steps. I’d like to keep making Teaching, Software, and Tech content, so feedback helps me know what you value most.

如果您从中受益或在执行这些步骤时遇到问题， 请通过评论联系 。 我想继续制作教学，软件和技术方面的内容，因此反馈可以帮助我知道您最看重的是什么。

Follow me on Twitter @maketeach.

在Twitter @maketeach上关注我。