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sophisticated-streaming-course.md

The Geekery: Sophisticated Streaming Course Resources

OBS Studio is free and open source software for video recording and live streaming. It features real-time video/audio capture and mixing using multiple sources including window captures, images, text, browser windows, webcams, video capture cards, audio sources etc. You can set up scenes with different combinations of audio and video sources and transition the live output between them. This is pro-AV mixing for free.

The output of OBS Studio can be displayed on a monitor, sent to a streaming service such as YouTube Live or used instead of a webcam for video-conferencing.

This course introduces OBS Studio and how to use it to stream to YouTube Live. Two sessions of 3.5 hours (e.g. 1000 to 1330, 1300 to 1630)

Course Pre-requisites

Sign up for YouTube account: http://youtube.com/signup
Verify your YouTube account: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/171664
Attempt to start a YouTube live stream before the course to start the 24 hour validation countdown

Syllabus

  1. Set up OBS
  2. Basic Streaming to You Tube
  3. Adding Sophistication
  4. Streaming Hardware
  5. Multi-cam setup
    -- Break -- Homework to practice what we've learned.
  6. Practice and troubleshooting
  7. Specific aims of participants
  8. Getting Creative with transitions, overlays and widgets

Set up OBS

The first thing we do is install OBS Studio and explain the basic UI.

  1. Download OBS Studio: https://obsproject.com/download
  2. Once installed open. Cancel the auto-config option.
  3. Explain areas of the UI

Basic Streaming

Use OBS to create a basic scene consisting of a full screen, face-on laptop-camera feed and audio from the laptop's microphone. This matches entry level streaming output. No sophistication here.

  1. Save Profile and Scene Collection
  2. Add video source of laptop webcam
  3. Add audio source from laptop microphone

Live Streaming

Now we have a minimal setup we can stream to a platform. For now we focus on YouTube.

  1. Click on settings in the Control panel in the bottom right hand corner of the UI
  2. Go to the Streaming pane and select YouTube. Show the full list of possible streaming platforms.
  3. Use the button that takes you to the correct youtube page. Also show how you can manually navigate there.
    1. On YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/intl/ALL_uk/howyoutubeworks/product-features/live/#live-streaming-on-youtube
    2. On Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/facebookmedia/solutions/facebook-live
    3. On Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/features/livestreaming
    4. On Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/
  4. Start a live stream on YouTube
  5. Return to OBS and click on the Start Stream button. Wait a few seconds. Show the basic scene making it to the browser.

After this demonstration we forget YouTube and focus entirely on OBS. You can close YouTube.

Adding Sophistication

Here we explore adding elements to the basic scene. Starting with adding a graphic as a picture-in-picture (PiP). We progress to using two scenes, the studio view, and transitions to switch between the basic scene and one with a PiP.

  1. Duplicate the basic scene using the contextual/right-click menu.
  2. Alter the name of the duplicate by adding '+ PiP'
  3. Click on the new scene if it's not already selected.
  4. Add a media source and browse your local drive to find an image
  5. Adjust the size and location of the image.
  6. Demonstrate ordering of assets by using contextual and dragging sources
  7. Introduce the 'Studio View'
  8. Go through transitions including editing the preview scene on-the-fly

Streaming Hardware

Highlight some of the cool stuff out there (see links below). Show my own kite: Blue Yeti microphone, USB cameras, mounts, video capture cards. Talk about all of the kit and the possibilities e.g. using a DSLR and why?
There was a discussions about spending £+ on higher end 4K devices... 1080 is plenty.
Plug in another camera, bring that into a scene to create a wide establishing shot and a focussed face shot.

Creative Resources

OBS resources include overlays, transitions and widgets. May add scripting details later.

Transitions

  1. Download free resources from Nerd or Die - I used Glitch2 Free Extras: https://nerdordie.com/product/glitch-2-stream-package/
  2. Unzip file.
  3. In OBS, Scene Transitions pane, click + button, choose Stinger
  4. Enter a name for the new transition
  5. Browse to add the with-audio Glitch2 stinger
  6. Set tranisition point to 500ms
  7. Preview and OK

Overlay

  1. Download an overlay from https://wdflat.com/. I chose the Freeze PiP frame and edited info in the online editor
  2. Add overlay (a png image) to a scene
  3. I spoke about creating a specific scene with a PiP and its frame and nesting this by Adding a Scene in another scene. Construction scenes and broadcast scenes. Naming to distinguish construction scenes ([N] prefix) and those used for broadcast (no prefix).

Widgets

We didn't really get in to widgets. But found some interesting ones e.g. spin wheels: https://www.streamdps.com/new/36663 You can have timers, event driven widgets can use 'new subscriber' event from YouTube etc.

Online Resources

How To Use OBS Studio

  1. Official Help/Documentation/Guides: https://github.com/obsproject/obs-studio/wiki
  2. Official forum: https://obsproject.com/forum/
  3. Stackoverflow Q&A Forum - for developers: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/obs
  4. Youtube streaming: 6m:07 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtJHX7O3p5U
  5. TechGembo: A quick Beginners Guide. 8m57s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTk99mHDX_I
  6. How To Tech: Beginners Guide in 30 minutes: Lots more detail and more coverage. 37m01 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKgM18lOsr4
  7. Alpha Gaming goes from Beginner to Superstar in 20 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuSUPpoi0Vs
  8. EposVox OBS Tutorial over 5.5hours: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nK-Mu7nw5EA&list=PLzo7l8HTJNK-IKzM_zDicTd2u20Ab2pAl

Creative resources

  1. https://streamdps.com
  2. https://nerdordie.com
  3. Gamey resources: https://www.own3d.tv/
  4. https://wdflat.com/

Advanced How To Use

  1. Nick Nimmin. Slightly patronising. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2HzbY8E4yQ
  2. Advanced streaming hardware: https://www.elgato.com/en/gaming/stream-dec
  3. Affordable pro production: BlackMagic Atem: k#https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products
  4. Add-ons and plugins for branding Example: https://www.own3d.tv/product/alphagaming-series-package/
  5. Stream Elements custom alerts, overlays, merch, tips. https://streamelements.com/features/merch
  6. Overlay design critique and how to from Alpha Gaming. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk4jexkfxjc
  7. StreamFX OBS Add-In: https://github.com/Xaymar/obs-StreamFX/wiki
  8. StreamLabs software and overlays https://streamlabs.com/
  9. Add 'Subscribe' alerts to OSB using Alert Box from StreamLabs: https://www.versluis.com/2019/01/how-to-add-subscription-alerts-to-your-stream-in-obs-studio/
  10. Nerd Or Die, download overlays. This link to description of overlays: https://nerdordie.com/resources/stream-overlays/
  11. NDI Plugin for OBS. https://obsproject.com/forum/resources/obs-ndi-newtek-ndi%E2%84%A2-integration-into-obs-studio.528/
  12. NDI|HX App. https://www.newtek.com/software/ndi-camera/

Live stream a drone

  1. Share video from phone using a Chromecast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5qkKNm6hRs
  2. Local RTMP server via wifi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Llv18AdtTho
  3. Install NDI|HX on phone to stream via NDI HX Camera and share flying app screeb

Advanced Geekery

  1. Source Code: https://github.com/obsproject/obs-studio

Reference Info

  1. Speed test allowing kbps units: https://www.speedtest.net/
  2. Twitch recommended bitrates for various resolutions and frame rates. https://stream.twitch.tv/encoding/ etc.
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