Hi all!
With everyone being forced to stay at home at the moment I am looking into live streaming solo performances of my music from my makeshift home studio. I was wondering if anyone has experience of this and could recommend what pieces of kit they use to broadcast over the internet?
I have researched the subject for a while and realise that aside from acquiring perhaps three camera angles I need something to gather their feeds and integrate the stereo audio signal from GP into my 2012 MacBookPro: a video switcher?. I only have an iPhone SE at the moment as one video source but am thinking of picking up 2 more second hand for the other camera angles or am I barking up the wrong tree?.. perhaps I need to look into buying 3 dedicated cameras with HDMI connection instead?
Iām hoping to find a way where the video angles are randomly switched to the live feed while Iām performing my music.
OBS studio is good and inexpensive start. I also converted an older camcorder using a Mirabox HDMI to USB 3 converter (<150ā¬) and you can add more. For the audio GP does the job of course. But regarding the streaming plateforme, I donāt knowā¦ I tested YouTube live, but I think my uploading bandwidth is not high enoughā¦
From what I tested, using an iPhone as a camera leads to realy too high latencies (and I tested an app which was supposed to have low latency).
With (probably) any camera having an HDMI output and an HDMI to USB3 converter (e.g. mirabox hsv323) you get acceptable latencies. OK, I had to do it for piano lessons and the teacher of my children has to have the sound of the piano roughly synchronized with the fingers. For this, the smartphone software solution was not quick enough, but using it for a wider view of the studio, it could work.
Looking like to get the quality picture with tolerable latency plus being able to set an automated pattern between camera angles while Iām playing Iāll need to go the HDMI root with a hardware 3 way video switcher of some sorts and invest in some cameras with interchangeable lenses. Iām sure I could use my iPhone SE as one of the camera angles if I can find an appropriate adapter to harness it into the setup. However Iām keen to grab 3 x 4K/1080P full lens cameras without time limitations in record mode and that donāt overheat!
Iām looking to set up a system that gives the viewer an exciting sense of the performance rather than simply having a single camera fixed in one position.
Iām seeing a latency of 0.2-0.5 seconds too ( depending on the video resolution). And of course, ab A/V difference of that magnitude is really confusing. However, my approach to synchronize audio and video was to just delay the audio. Since streaming over the internet adds a latency anyway (about 1-2 seconds on Zoom, ~ 30 seconds on YouTube), another half second of delay doesnāt matter that much ( as long as audio and video are in sync)
PS: you can add that delay in OBS so youāll still get to monitor your audio with the usual low latency.
The two main approaches are NDI (network AV, works fine over WiFi) and USB (youāll probably have a Lighting-to-USB cable at hand), so generally, there are no special adapter needed.
Good advice for ādirectā streaming this could solve the problem. However for piano lessons (I made the teacher and ācalledā my children for testing), it was not OK for me. By the way, I remember that you also adviced zoom.us. I have to tell that my experience was not good at all regarding audio. Even by changing the zoom audio config, I still had a kind of noise gate effect pumping the sound of the piano at each silent passage. They perhaps do so to avoid larsen effect, I donāt knowā¦ Well, I was not amazed by the sound. There is perhaps a secret, but I didānt found it
Can you elaborate on what you changed? Did you use the screen sharing audio or the regular conference audio?
These can make a significant difference, although even the best audio quality I got from Zoom was not up to Studio or Hi-Fi standards.
In my tests, Full HD over Wi-Fi did in fact really hurt the latency, even over 802.11ac - I got over a second for that configuration which maybe I could tolerate for the pure piano playing (when no conversation is going on, even 5 seconds latency donāt hurt that much, as long as audio and video are in sync). But itās certainly a bit annoying.
Over USB, with 720p, I get the formerly mentioned latency of 0.1 - 0.2 seconds which is perfectly fine for me
I do this every week, two micās one for vocals , one for my guitar, into my Motu 828X interface , MacBook Pro. Two outputs to my iRig pro duo, with break out cable to my iPhone XS, which is my camera.
Then straight to Facebook Live.
Good luck!
