macOS Camera Control – Background replacement setting applies globally to all cameras (not per-camera)

The built-in “Camera Control” / “Video Effects” system applies the same background replacement setting to all connected cameras, instead of allowing separate configurations for each camera.

The issue occurs across multiple Macs and chipsets — including a Mac Mini M4 (2024) and a MacBook Pro M1 Max — and in multiple apps such as OBS Studio.

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Connect two or more cameras (either webcam or other video input sources such as avermedia capture cards).
2. Open an app that can use multiple cameras (e.g., OBS Studio 31.0.1).
3. In the menu bar, open the Camera Control (purple/green camera icon) for each input.
4. Enable background replacement on one camera and disable it on another.

Expected Result:

Each camera should maintain its own independent background setting.

For example, one camera could use a virtual background while another shows the real environment.

Actual Result:

Any change to the background setting for one camera (on/off or image selection) is instantly applied to all connected cameras.

This happens even though the UI shows separate controls per camera.

Additional Notes:

• Issue confirmed on both macOS Sonoma, Sequoia and Tahoe.
• Reproducible on both Apple Silicon M1 Max and M4 systems.

Reference discussion: OBS Forum Thread

Impact:

This makes it impossible to use macOS’s native background replacement in multi-camera setups (e.g., presenter + overhead camera), since all cameras share the same visual effect.