I am using vMix HD to livestream to YouTube, Twitch, and Periscope. I received a request to add a "Table of Contents" to my YouTube description so that viewers can jump to specific times for a given topic.

It appears that this must be done manually, with blog posts recommending scrubbing through the ENTIRE video, noting the times for different topics, and then manually typing out the TOC. Needless to say, this would be very time consuming for longer streams / videos.

Is there a simple way to have vMix save timestamps to a file somewhere while recording a stream? Perhaps I press a keyboard shortcut or a Stream Deck button, and vMix records 12:16:23 in a file somewhere.

I see that OBS has a plugin called InfoWriter that does this:

https://obsproject.com/f...esources/infowriter.345/


I found this forum thread which sounds like it is asking for something similar, but looks fairly elaborate and requires the use of Replay.

https://forums.vmix.com/...--or-something-like-that

If it can't be done in vMix, I suppose I can look into having a Stream Deck button call a DOS batch file that records a timer value or offset times from the start of the stream.

Success!

Wrapping up this little conversation with myself:

I created a new Shortcut and assigned it to a Stream Deck button.

Function = WriteDurationToRecordingLog
Value: TOC Timestamp

vMix creates its usual log file in the Logs subdirectory where the recording is being saved.

Every time I press the Stream Deck button, it adds a timestamp and the Value to the log file.

7/16/2020 3:23:53 PM, StartRecording
7/16/2020 3:24:09 PM, 00:00:16.7000000, TOC Timestamp
7/16/2020 3:24:12 PM, 00:00:19.6330000, TOC Timestamp
7/16/2020 3:24:15 PM, 00:00:22.4320000, TOC Timestamp
7/16/2020 3:24:34 PM, 00:00:41.8660000, TOC Timestamp
7/16/2020 3:24:40 PM, 00:00:47.5000000, TOC Timestamp
7/16/2020 3:25:09 PM, 00:01:16.1330000, TOC Timestamp


I can now create additional Shortcuts that assigned to other Stream Deck buttons or keyboard shortcuts to send different messages to the log depending on the type of event I want to log to make the TOC creation process easier.

vMix is pretty darn amazing.