A simple python script to open a live video stream and send it to an Oculus Rift DK2. The parameters used to select the output port are at the top of the script and can be modified for other VR goggles.

It currently uses a single 2D video source, duplicates it and displays without any deformation. This works great for wide-angle / fish-eye lens cameras used for FPV but won't look good for a narrow-angle camera -- the image will look deformed.

$ ./stream.py [ options ... ] [ device-path ]

device-path may be a /dev path to a v4l2 video source such as an analog receiver connected to a USB port through a TV-grabber (EasyCap and similar), usually /dev/videoN. Default is /dev/video1 since /dev/video0 is often a laptop's selfie camera.

device-path may also be wifibroadcast for the script to try reading video from standard input as described on the [wifibroadcast project page] (https://befinitiv.wordpress.com/wifibroadcast-analog-like-transmission-of-live-video-data/). In that case you'll use something like sudo ./rx -b 8 -r 4 -f 1024 wlan0 | ./stream.py wifibroadcast

-viewport creates additional video output windows for people who want to watch the feed on the laptop screen while the pilot uses the goggles. Or for the pilot to watch while another person uses the goggles.

-defscale <scale>

scale can be an integer percentage to set the initial video scale for the goggles. Default is 100. 100 means use the full goggles resolution (about 110 degrees FOV on an oculus DK2). 20 or 30 percent will give a FOV similar to Fatshark, Headplay and other goggles.

When the script runs the following keys can be used:

• Esc or 'q': exit.

• Left / right arrows: Move video slightly left/right, useful if analog signal has a black band on one side.

• Up / down arrows: decrease/increase video frame size by 5%.

• '[' / ']': slightly increase/decrease left-to-right-eye video frame distance, basically move the virtual screen closer / farther.

• Use the head tracker for video parameter adjustment (e.g. when holding space on the keyboard) or gimbal / aircraft steering (with some other key) though MAVlink messages.

• Add a ground-side OSD for wifibroadcast. This would perhaps need to be a gstreamer plugin written in C for performance unless it was all OpenGL calls in which case it might not matter. Could use transparency, colours, etc. to achieve something like the greenish fighter-jet glass cockpit style overlay. Could also make use of basic 3D but that could be too distracting.

Gstreamer-1.0 or later is required, gobject and GTK libraries and their python bindings. dbus-python is optional: it allows the script to inhibit the Gnome screen saver while streaming video. Installing the gstreamer python bindings should in theory pull everything else in as dependency (apt-get install python-gst-1.0).

Sometimes gstreamer will pop an internal error of some kind or a cryptic X11 error on start. The script can be retried and should eventually run.