Use case
SwapCam for streaming
The basic workflow
SwapCam presents your transformed feed as a camera source inside Chrome. Anything running in a Chrome tab that lets you pick a camera can therefore use it — browser-based studio and broadcast tools included.
Set the transformation up before you go live. Open SwapCam, pick your source face, enable the transformation, and confirm the preview looks right. Then open your streaming tool in a tab and select SwapCam where it asks which camera to use.
Where this does not reach
Camera selection
- Select the camera inside the tool, not the operating system. SwapCam appears as a source to the browser; your OS camera settings do not control it.
- Re-check after a reload. Some tools reset their camera choice when the tab reloads. Confirm the source again before going live.
- Keep the SwapCam tab open. The transformation runs in the browser. Closing it stops the transformed feed.
Performance considerations
Streaming and real-time transformation compete for the same machine. Encoding a stream is already sustained work; adding a continuous per-frame transformation on top of it asks for more.
How much headroom you have depends entirely on your computer, which is why we do not publish frame-rate figures. What is worth doing is testing at your intended settings — same resolution, same encoder, same length — before a real stream, and watching whether the feed holds steady over time rather than just at the start.
Closing unused tabs and background applications is the cheapest improvement available, and it matters more here than in a short call.
Troubleshooting
If SwapCam does not appear in your tool’s camera list, if the feed goes black, or if the transformation stops partway through a session, the troubleshooting guide covers each of those in turn, along with camera permissions and conflicts with other applications holding the camera.
Responsible use
Streaming reaches an audience that cannot ask you what they are looking at. Do not use SwapCam to impersonate a real person, and be straightforward with your audience about using a transformed camera — many platforms have their own rules on synthetic or altered media, and those apply on top of the responsible use policy.