How to get 16:9 and both eyes for recording?

[Catbert7]

I'm looking to record some VR and I see that there are YouTubs vids where people have managed to record with a 16:9 aspect ratio without distorting the video and also incorporating the vision from both eyes. How is this done!? I figured there must be a well-known solution but I've been scouring the internet and not found anything helpful :( If anyone who knows can share it with me I'd really appreciate the help!

[BOLL]

If you're using OBS you can use this plugin: OpenVR Input Plugin[obsproject.com]. It captures the full resolution headset monitor frames and has built in crop modes, with one being 16:9.

To get both eyes you would have to add the capture source twice and pick each eye individually. For me I don't find having two eyes in a video sensible as I just watch one eye anyway, but if the purpose is for people to watch it in stereo 3D cross-eyed it's one way of doing it.

One thing that can be undesirable working with the headset monitor feed is that Chaperone and overlays show up in the footage, but for me I won't give up the convenience of not having to add every game individually ;) But then I switch games all the time.

[Catbert7]

Originally posted by BOLL:

If you're using OBS you can use this plugin: OpenVR Input Plugin[obsproject.com]. It captures the full resolution headset monitor frames and has built in crop modes, with one being 16:9.

When you say crop modes, are we talking about cropping out the corners of the mirror display or cropping out top/bottom on the 6:9 aspect some games display or what?

Originally posted by BOLL:

To get both eyes you would have to add the capture source twice and pick each eye individually.

Sorry, I wasn't specific. I mean that I want a single image that combines the view from both eyes so that it looks like a normal video.

Just so I'm being clear on everything...
What I currently have is this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umdFkvoGtJc&t=20s
or the mirror display

What I want is this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6gQIgeLCcU

Looks to me like a combination of both eyes and it's clearly not stretched or otherwise distorted.
Is that what the OBS plugin can do for me?

[BOLL]

Both eyes will not merge to a single image without a stitch line, I have tried it, unless you do some funky stitching in real time that is. If you split them and put them side-by-side, it might match but only at a single depth at the time. Things further away will break up.

What Nathie has done is most likely capture the game output, the window that pops up on your monitor for that specific game, this to avoid getting Chaperone and overlays in the footage. Then you often automatically get the right proportions but sometimes a limited resolution.

What the plugin would do is take the Headset Monitor output, what you see if you enable the Headset Monitor from the SteamVR Status window, and pipe it into OBS in the background. The monitor doesn't even have to be visible for this to work.

The crop modes takes these raw frames and crops them to display as various formats. This[i.imgur.com] is an image where I tried various crops against the frame mask to get various formats myself, as I crop manually, red is 16:9, blue is 4:3, and green was just an attempt at maximizing one property.

TL;DR: Merging two eyes hard. Capture single eye and crop, or capture specific game view.

[CryCry]

I know this thread is pretty old but I'll still post the trick i do for streaming
(Works the same way for recording)
In case someone else is still searching for a simple solution.
This is the trick i came up with to do streaming raw footage from the HMD
which might seem a bit odd to some people but it works 100%
and you don't need to install any extra plugins or softwares.
All you need to have installed is SteamVR.
I use Streamlabs OBS to Stream (Doesn't matter if you use the regular OBS)

Step 1: Open SteamVR and make sure it has loaded up successfully.
Step 2: Right click the VR HMD Icon on SteamVR and click "Display Mirror"
Step 3: Go to your OBS/Streaming Software & choose game source as "Headset Mirror"
If you're unable to do Step 2 you can just right click the VR icon on your taskbar
then click "Display Mirror"

You can now also click the top left corner of the "Headset Mirror" called "Main"
and it will give you different options for mirroring from the HMD.

Only downside to this method is that if you minimize the headset mirror it won't capture it.
So i simply put it behind the streaming software.
(or you can always leave it visible on your screen)

This will let you record and stream raw footage that is being seen by the user.

[BOLL]

@mr_cryzler34, that's the method I used for a year or so, then the input plugin I mentioned dropped and it's actually calling the same API endpoint to retrieve the output frames, so you get the same raw frames just without having to open the mirror window. And this at the highest resolution instead of whatever you can scale the window to. 😅

[CryCry]

Originally posted by BOLL:

@mr_cryzler34, that's the method I used for a year or so, then the input plugin I mentioned dropped and it's actually calling the same API endpoint to retrieve the output frames, so you get the same raw frames just without having to open the mirror window. And this at the highest resolution instead of whatever you can scale the window to. 😅

Ahh okay that's good to hear it's nothing too new of a method.
The plugin doesn't seem to work on streamlabs obs though so that's why I'm using this method...
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/355491976 Quality seems alright though?

[Devious]

Originally posted by CryCry:

I know this thread is pretty old but I'll still post the trick i do for streaming
(Works the same way for recording)
In case someone else is still searching for a simple solution.
This is the trick i came up with to do streaming raw footage from the HMD
which might seem a bit odd to some people but it works 100%
and you don't need to install any extra plugins or softwares.
All you need to have installed is SteamVR.
I use Streamlabs OBS to Stream (Doesn't matter if you use the regular OBS)

Step 1: Open SteamVR and make sure it has loaded up successfully.
Step 2: Right click the VR HMD Icon on SteamVR and click "Display Mirror"
Step 3: Go to your OBS/Streaming Software & choose game source as "Headset Mirror"
If you're unable to do Step 2 you can just right click the VR icon on your taskbar
then click "Display Mirror"

You can now also click the top left corner of the "Headset Mirror" called "Main"
and it will give you different options for mirroring from the HMD.

Only downside to this method is that if you minimize the headset mirror it won't capture it.
So i simply put it behind the streaming software.
(or you can always leave it visible on your screen)

This will let you record and stream raw footage that is being seen by the user.

this doesnt seem to work with Population one even though i launch it through steam vr
it just stays capturing the laoding screen in steam vr

[QQ]

Nice

[◯ | fried shrimp]

Originally posted by CryCry:

I know this thread is pretty old but I'll still post the trick i do for streaming
(Works the same way for recording)
In case someone else is still searching for a simple solution.
This is the trick i came up with to do streaming raw footage from the HMD
which might seem a bit odd to some people but it works 100%
and you don't need to install any extra plugins or softwares.
All you need to have installed is SteamVR.
I use Streamlabs OBS to Stream (Doesn't matter if you use the regular OBS)

Step 1: Open SteamVR and make sure it has loaded up successfully.
Step 2: Right click the VR HMD Icon on SteamVR and click "Display Mirror"
Step 3: Go to your OBS/Streaming Software & choose game source as "Headset Mirror"
If you're unable to do Step 2 you can just right click the VR icon on your taskbar
then click "Display Mirror"

You can now also click the top left corner of the "Headset Mirror" called "Main"
and it will give you different options for mirroring from the HMD.

Only downside to this method is that if you minimize the headset mirror it won't capture it.
So i simply put it behind the streaming software.
(or you can always leave it visible on your screen)

This will let you record and stream raw footage that is being seen by the user.

2 years on from this post and this is probably the only in-depth discussion/answers I've found 🙏