How does one apply ONVIF Bridge's custom stream settings to Milestone RTSP streams of connected cameras? Are ONVIF Bridge's settings supposed to be different from what the RTSP metadata says?

My company has an RTSP Client that we are trying to integrate with milestone via milestone’s ONVIF Bridge. We are trying to pull multiple RTSP streams from the milestone server via the ONVIF Bridge and stream them to multiple destinations.

The problem we are facing is that the custom stream information (resolution, fps, bitrate, GOP, etc.) that ONVIF is providing us (port 580) is different from the metadata of the RTSP streams (port 554). Our client has 100’s of cameras and would like to change the bitrate and GOP values of all their cameras from one place to make all their streams more stable for playback. With 100’s of cameras, it is not feasible to change each camera’s settings individually, nor do they want to individually change each camera directly.

As a solution, our client was told by their Milestone contact that the custom default settings in the ONVIF Bridge’s Advanced Settings can be applied to all RTSP streams going through the bridge. In addition, he said that the RTSP Client must use the custom default settings provided by the ONVIF Bridge on port 580 to change the RTSP Stream.

How can we accomplish this? Currently, our RTSP Client treats the RTSP stream metadata as the correct information if it is different from what the ONVIF Bridge is telling us. This is because the Bridge’s administrator manual states the following:

“The settings do not reflect the actual configuration of the cameras, and do not affect the video stream … The ONVIF client will use the actual settings from the RTSP stream.”

Dear Theodore Matula,

You cannot change camera settings via Milestone Open Network Bridge (ONVIF Bridge). If you need to change the camera settings, you need to do it via Mangement Client in the Recording Servers settings. If all your cameras are the same model you may try to configure them from Managemen Client->Devices->Cameras and set one and the same settings to a group of cameras.

As for the different stream information you receive via ONVIF and RTSP - that is correct. By default RTSP provides the real configuration and ONVIF provides the configuration that is set in the Open Network Bridge configuration in Management Client. There is an option there - “Use configuration from cameras”, if enabled ONVIF should return the same as RTSP.

/Svetlana