OBS Setup

OBS Studio is the engine that captures, mixes, and streams your broadcast. PitLane drives it over WebSocket. Once connected, PitLane can build your broadcast scene for you, switch scenes, control recording, trigger replays, and refresh overlay sources, all without touching OBS.

The in-app Setup tab walks you through this page's steps with live status lights. This page is the full reference.

Requirements

• OBS Studio 28 or later. WebSocket support is built in from version 28.
• OBS running on the same PC as PitLane.

Enable the OBS WebSocket server

1. In OBS, open Tools > WebSocket Server Settings
2. Check Enable WebSocket Server
3. Note the port (default 4455)
4. Set a password and click Apply

Connect PitLane to OBS

1. In PitLane, open File > Settings... and pick the OBS tab. The gear icon in the OBS panel header jumps straight there.
2. Enter the connection details. Host is localhost, port is 4455 unless you changed it, and the password is the one from OBS.
3. Turn on Connect on startup if you want PitLane to reconnect automatically each launch.
4. Click Connect.

You can also connect from the OBS panel itself, from Broadcast > OBS > Connect, or from the in-app Setup tab. The status dot in the OBS panel header shows the connection state.

Build your scene with the wizard

The scene wizard builds a broadcast-ready OBS scene in one click. Open it from Broadcast > OBS > Scene Setup..., from File > Settings... > OBS under Scene Setup, or from the in-app Setup tab. The OBS panel also offers it when it finds no PitLane sources in OBS yet.

The wizard offers two serving modes.

Single broadcast layer (recommended)

One browser source carries every overlay you have showing. The source points at PitLane's /broadcast page, which composites your overlays into one layer. Hiding an overlay in the Overlays panel drops it from the layer. This is the lightest option for your PC, and you never edit OBS sources again. Which overlays appear, which family is active, and every color all stay controlled from PitLane.

Individual sources (advanced)

One browser source per overlay type, each pointing at a /slot/<type> page. The slot always shows whatever overlay of that type is currently active, so swapping overlays never breaks your sources. Use this mode when you want to move, scale, or filter each overlay separately in OBS, or show different overlays in different scenes.

What the wizard creates

• A new PitLane scene, or sources added to your current scene. Your choice.
• An AC game capture underneath the overlay sources, so your graphics sit on top of the sim instead of a black screen. The checkbox is on by default for a new scene. Skip it if your scene already captures the game.
• Browser sources sized to your OBS canvas, named with a PitLane · prefix so they are easy to recognize.

If OBS is not connected, the wizard degrades to copy-paste mode and gives you the URLs to add by hand.

Migrating old sources

If you set up browser sources by hand in an earlier version, they point at individual overlay URLs. The wizard detects those and offers to migrate them onto managed URLs, so family swaps and overlay changes reach them automatically. You can also delete old sources in OBS if a scene no longer needs them. Sources in other scenes keep rendering in the background and cost performance.

Adding sources by hand

You can always skip the wizard and add browser sources yourself.

1. In OBS, click + in the Sources panel and pick Browser
2. Paste a URL from the table below
3. Set the width and height to your canvas size, such as 1920 by 1080

Slot types are timing-tower, lower-third, battle, telemetry, track-map, ticker, session-info, event-board, sponsor, and custom. The wizard offers all of them except custom.

All overlay pages have transparent backgrounds, so they layer cleanly over your game capture. Keep the game capture below the browser sources in the OBS source list.

Scene tips

A typical broadcast uses several OBS scenes.

• Race. Game capture plus your PitLane layer.
• Replay. The same layout, often with a replay graphic toggled visible.
• Starting grid and Break screens for pre-race and intermissions.

Switch scenes from PitLane's OBS panel or with hotkeys. Ctrl+F1 through Ctrl+F3 are bound by default, and scenes 4 and 5 are bindable.

The program monitor and OBS

While OBS is connected, PitLane's program monitor switches to the OBS Virtual Camera so you see exactly what OBS outputs, overlays included. This also stops PitLane from running its own duplicate capture. You can pin the source to always PitLane or always OBS in File > Settings... > OBS, under Program Monitor.

Refreshing browser sources

If overlays look stale in OBS, click the refresh icon in the OBS panel header or use Broadcast > OBS > Refresh Browser Sources. OBS reloads every browser source in every scene, PitLane's included, without losing your source configuration. Overlay pages also watch their own connection and reconnect on their own after a PitLane restart.

OBS controls from PitLane

Once connected, the OBS panel provides

• Scene list. Click to switch. Studio Mode is supported, with separate preview and program plus a transition button.
• Source list. Toggle individual sources.
• Transport controls. Start and stop recording, pause it, and go live with a two-click confirm. The replay buffer tile is status only, since the buffer is armed automatically when OBS has it enabled.
• Automation. Map OBS scenes to session states (pre-race, racing, post-race) and configure the replay trigger's scene, duration, and return scene.

Connecting, the wizard, refreshing sources, replays, streaming, and recording also live in the Broadcast > OBS submenu, and all of those can be bound to hotkeys. Scene switching is bindable too, as OBS Scene 1 through 5. Source toggles and automation are panel only. See Camera & Hotkeys.

The overlay server

The overlay server starts with the app by default and serves on port 9100. Its status sits at the top of the Overlays panel with a Start and Stop button, and there is an Overlays light in the status bar. The Broadcast menu has the same toggle, plus the port and connected client count.

To change the port, open File > Settings... > Setup. The change takes effect the next time the server starts. The wizard uses the current port automatically. Sources you added by hand need their URLs updated to match.