AES67 Input

Introduction

The AES67 Input receives uncompressed PCM audio over the network — the receive-side counterpart to the AES67 Target. It joins an AES67 RTP multicast stream and brings the audio into Composer as a normal audio input, so you can take professional Audio-over-IP (AoIP) feeds — including AES67-compatible Dante sources — straight into a scene. It carries audio only, no video.

Use it to ingest a studio AoIP feed, to receive a mix from another Composer instance over AES67, or to loop a Composer AES67 Target back into the same project for testing.

What is AES67?

AES67 is the open standard for carrying uncompressed digital audio over a standard IP network: 24-bit (L24) or 16-bit (L16) PCM at 48 kHz, sent as RTP packets to a multicast group, typically packetized in 1 ms chunks for low latency. See the AES67 Target for the sending side.

Configuration

Because AES67 RTP describes only a channel count (not a layout), the input cannot auto-detect the format — set these to match the sender:

  • Multicast address and Port — the group and port the stream is sent to (e.g. 239.69.0.1:5004).
  • Bit depth — L24 or L16, matching the sender.
  • Channels — number of channels in the stream (1–8).
  • Buffer (ms) — how much audio to buffer before playback starts. Higher absorbs more network jitter; lower reduces latency.

The incoming stream is buffered and reclocked to Composer's render cadence. The Status section reports buffered audio, packets received, underruns, and the received SSRC so you can confirm the feed is live and healthy.

Notes

  • The sender and receiver must be on the same network; for cross-subnet delivery the sender's multicast TTL must be high enough to reach this host.
  • This input pairs naturally with the AES67 Target for an out→in loopback, which is a convenient way to validate an AES67 output end-to-end.

AES67 Input - Settings

Property Description
Show advanced options Reveals advanced/expert properties in the panel. Off by default — flip to On to see fields like the jitter buffer size.

Configuration

Configuration — multicast source the stream is received from. Must match the sender.

Property Description
Autostart when application starts When On, the input starts receiving automatically when the project loads.
Multicast address The IPv4 multicast group to receive from (224.0.0.0–239.255.255.255). Must match the sender. Can be changed while running — the receiver re-joins automatically.
Port UDP port the stream is received on (default 5004). Must match the sender.
Bit depth PCM bit depth of the incoming stream. Must match the sender (L24 or L16).
Channels Number of audio channels in the incoming stream (1–8). Must match the sender — AES67 RTP carries only a channel count, so this cannot be auto-detected.
Buffer (ms) (advanced) Amount of audio to buffer before playback starts, in milliseconds (default 60). Higher values absorb more network jitter at the cost of latency.

Status

Status — connection state, controls and read-only receive statistics.

Property Description
ConnectionStatus Current connection state (Disconnected, Connected). Read-only.
Start Begins receiving the multicast stream.
Stop Stops receiving and releases the multicast socket.
Buffered (ms) Current amount of buffered audio, in milliseconds (read-only). Hovers near the configured buffer size while streaming; 0 means no audio is arriving.
Packets received Total RTP packets received since the input started (read-only).

Inherits from: AbstractInput, AbstractAudioProcessing, AbstractAudioMetering.

See also: AES67 Input in Script Engine Objects.

Shared input properties

Every input — regardless of source type — exposes the following property groups. They are surfaced in the property panel only when Show advanced options is enabled on the input.

Icon

  • Icon text — short text shown on the input's icon in the Inputs list. Useful as a quick visual label (channel number, mic name, camera position) to tell otherwise-similar inputs apart at a glance. Empty by default; has no effect on rendering or routing.

Audio mixer

  • Hide in audio mixer — when on, hides the input from the audio mixer view without disabling its audio. Useful for de-cluttering the mixer while keeping the audio routed (e.g. fixed background music, ambient beds, pre-aligned playout). [default=false]

Render Options

  • Invisible (Do not render in scene) — when on, the input is skipped during rendering and produces no picture on any layer or scene. Audio routing is unaffected. Toggle from a script for cued-in / cued-out behaviour during a show. [default=false]
  • Do not render input — disables the input's internal render entirely (no decode or capture work is done). Stronger than Invisible: that one renders but doesn't display; this one stops the input from doing any work at all. Useful for reducing CPU / network load on heavy sources (e.g. high-bitrate RTMP / SRT streams, large media files) when the input is temporarily not needed. Audio meters are cleared while disabled. [default=false]
  • Do not render input controller — chooses what drives the Do not render input flag. Let Composer decide (the default) hands control to the project-level Render Tuning optimiser, which automatically pauses inputs that aren't used by any active scene. Manual Configuration ignores Render Tuning and lets the Do not render input toggle control the flag directly — use this to keep a network source warm even when it's currently off-air, or to take a heavy input down by hand regardless of scene activity. [default=Let Composer decide]

Optional TAGS

  • TAGS — one or more free-form tag words used to classify this input (typically space- or comma-separated). Picked up by Composer's Smart Search to filter or find inputs by category — e.g. camera, music, interview, sponsor. Has no effect on rendering.

Audio configuration and processing options

For inputs capable of processing audio, additional audio configuration and processing options are available through the audio mixer and the Channel Strip Inspector.

For the full audio signal flow, see Audio processing workflow.

  • AES67 Target — the sending side. Pair it with this input for an out→in loopback or to send a Composer mix onto an AES67 network.
  • Audio Channel Strip input — a virtual audio bus for routing and sub-mixing the audio you bring in over AES67.
  • SRT input — receive-side for compressed audio + video over unmanaged or internet networks, when uncompressed multicast isn't an option.
  • NDI input — receive-side for audio and video together on the studio LAN.