On this page
OpenIPC camera over USB
OpenIPC FPV cameras (SigmaStar and Goke sensors) are tiny, light, and cheap. With a custom firmware build they present themselves to the Pi as a USB Ethernet (RNDIS) gadget and serve RTSP over that single USB cable, with no Ethernet port, no switch, and no transcoding on the Pi.
Custom firmware required. Stock OpenIPC streams over Ethernet, not USB. This setup needs a firmware build with the USB RNDIS gadget enabled. If your camera only has an Ethernet pad, use the standard RTSP-over-Ethernet flow instead.
Why USB
- One cable: power and video share the USB link; no separate Ethernet run on the airframe
- Tiny and light. OpenIPC FPV cameras are a few grams
- Native RTSP: the camera encodes H.264/H.265 itself, so the Pi never transcodes
How it works
The firmware's gadget service builds a USB composite device on boot via configfs and brings up a usb0 interface. The camera takes the address 192.168.7.1 and expects the host (your Pi) at 192.168.7.2. The on-camera streamer publishes RTSP on port 554 at /stream0 (primary) and /stream1 (secondary). Aircast pulls that URL and re-publishes it as WebRTC, HLS, and RTSP.
Connect it to Aircast
Flash the USB-gadget firmware
Flash the OpenIPC build that includes the USB Ethernet gadget. On boot it runs the gadget service (/etc/init.d/S39usbgadget), which creates the RNDIS device and assigns the camera 192.168.7.1.
Plug the camera into the Pi's USB port
Connect the camera to the Raspberry Pi over USB. It enumerates as a USB Ethernet device and the Pi gets a new network port, usb0. Nothing to type on the Pi: the next step gives that port its address.
Add the camera in the Device tab
In the app the drone serves, open Settings → Device → Cameras (or the Camera step of the setup wizard). Open I know my camera's address and paste the camera's RTSP URL as the Camera RTSP URL:
rtsp://192.168.7.1:554/stream0Use /stream1 for the lower-resolution secondary stream. For the port, pick usb0, and under Port address & transport check that This device's IP on the camera subnet is 192.168.7.2/24, the host address the camera expects. Set up & verify then checks video is really arriving.
Success: the camera's preview on the Cameras page shows the OpenIPC feed.
Recommended settings for cellular
The app the drone serves and the browser play video over WebRTC. Set the camera's primary stream to H.264, since many browsers will not decode H.265 over WebRTC.
| Setting | Value | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Codec (stream0) | H.264 | Universal WebRTC support; H.265 often shows a black frame |
| Resolution | 1080p or 720p | Match the sensor; 720p saves bandwidth on weak signal |
| Bitrate | 2-4 Mbps | Fits a typical LTE uplink |
| Rate control | CBR | Predictable bandwidth over cellular |
What's verified
- Camera enumerates as a USB Ethernet (RNDIS) gadget at
192.168.7.1 - Aircast pulls the native RTSP stream from
rtsp://192.168.7.1:554/stream0, no transcoding - H.264 plays in the browser over WebRTC
- Single USB cable carries both camera power and video to the Pi
Flash your card in about 5 minutes
The Aircast Flasher downloads the image, sets Wi-Fi and hostname, and verifies the card.
On This Page