How I Automated OBS Streaming with JavaScript (And Saved Our Office Hours of Setup Time)

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📌 TL;DR

I built a tool that automatically launches two OBS instances, connects to different RTSP streams, applies AI-based filters, and starts streaming to different RTMP servers — all with one click using Node.js + OBS WebSocket API.

👉 GitHub Repo

🚨 The Problem We Had

At our workplace, we operate multiple mini PCs in a remote location — each with 2 camera feed — and we needed to livestream them 24/7 to different platforms. The steps were tedious:

  • Manually open two OBS windows
  • Set up each RTSP stream
  • Apply AI detection filters (via obs-detect plugin)
  • Configure different RTMP destinations
  • Hit “Start Streaming” on both

Each time the PC was rebooted, all configurations had to be re-applied manually. Why initiate a reboot? To prevent thermal buildup and memory leaks—continuous 24/7 operation can lead to system degradation and reduced performance over time.

As you can imagine, this wasted time, was error-prone, and not scalable.

💡 My Eureka Moment: OBS + JavaScript

After some research, I discovered that OBS has a WebSocket API — and there’s an official JavaScript library called obs-websocket-js. That opened up a world of automation.

From there, I built a Node.js script that could:

✅ Launch multiple OBS portable instances

✅ Detect if a media source exists, or create one

✅ Auto-apply AI filters from the obs-detect plugin

✅ Configure each stream’s RTMP server and key

✅ Start streaming — no clicks required

🔧 How It Works (In Simple Terms)

I created two folders: 

C:OBS_InstancesOBS1  
C:OBS_InstancesOBS2

Each folder holds a portable OBS installation. Basically, a copy of the original OBS directory and pasted on both instances. A Python script launches both and Node.js connects to them via WebSocket.

Using obs.call(), I set up:

  • Media Source: RTSP input from the camera
  • Filters: Object detection + pixelation
  • Output: RTMP settings
  • Streaming: Triggered automatically

All configurations are driven by a .env file so you don’t touch the code to change URLs, ports, or stream keys.

✨ The Result

Now, with a single double-click (autorun.exe), both OBS instances:

  • Launch silently
  • Auto-connect to their respective RTSP feeds
  • Apply detection filters
  • Stream to different RTMP destinations

If either OBS crashes or the PC restarts, we just click again — no more 10-minute manual setup every time.

📦 Project Structure

  • obs.js – Node script that configures OBS via WebSocket
  • autorun.py – Optional Python launcher to wrap both processes
  • .env – Environment variables (RTSP, ports, RTMP keys)
  • autorun.exe – Compiled version of the launcher

➡️ Full source code: GitHub Repo

📹 About obs-detect Plugin

Each mini PC has obs-detect installed — an AI plugin that identifies people in video streams and blurs them out using either pixelation or Gaussian blur.

In the automation script, I added a function to apply these filters automatically: 

await obs.call('CreateSourceFilter', {
  sourceName: 'CameraSource',
  filterName: 'Detect',
  filterKind: 'ai-detect',
  filterSettings: {
    ObjectCategory: 'Person',
    MaskingOptions: true,
    MaskingType: 'Pixelate',
    BlurPixelSize: 20,
    Dilation: 10,
    AdvancedSettings: true,
    ContinousTracking: true,
    Model: 'Medium',
  }
});

🚀 Try It Yourself

If you’re running multi-stream surveillance or broadcasting cameras remotely — automating OBS with JavaScript is a game changer.

Whether you’re in security, content creation, or a hybrid office setup, this approach saves time and guarantees consistency.

🧠 What I Learned

  • OBS is more scriptable than most people realize.
  • Combining Python (for process control) and Node.js (for logic) worked well.
  • Using .env and Promise.all() made the solution clean and scalable.
  • Writing tools to remove repetitive tasks = huge ROI for small teams.

Thanks for reading!

Feel free to fork the repo, suggest improvements, or reach out if you’re solving something similar. Happy streaming! 🎥

—

Kurt Chan

Portfolio | GitHub

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