Why is My Recording Shorter than my Event?

Q: Why is my recording shorter than the event?

A #1: Your event may have exceeded the 8-hour recording limit.

Recordings capture up to eight hours of content. If a live stream or transcoder runs for longer than eight hours, the most recent eight hours are recorded. To record more than eight hours of a single broadcast, stop the live stream or transcoder and start it again to create multiple recordings.

A #2: You may have experienced network issues between your encoder and the transcoder.

By default, recordings are based on the incoming source stream. This means that we will record what is received directly from your source and not when the source has passed through the transcoder.  So, it is representative of the exact quality you have made available to the transcoder. 

In the recording process, if there is an issue with the source (quality issues or network issues) the recording process will drop the back recorded chunks as they will cause issues when we convert the chunks into a final MP4 file.  By default, we record 10-second chunks. So, the quality of the stream will affect the length of the final MP4 file we provide to you. 

NOTE:
If you make ANY CHANGES to your encoder after you have started the Wowza Video live stream (transcoder), the best action you can take is to stop the live stream (transcoder) and then start it up again to prevent file corruption. 

 

Resources:

Record live streams and transcoders in Wowza Video