Streaming and recording solution

[Havalilsi]

Hello all. I’ve been reading through many of the posts on here trying to find a cost effective means of streaming, AND capturing a live sermon. Right now I mostly use a single camera to stream with the video going through ManyCam and the audio coming from my mixer board through a PreSonus Firebox, all into UStream’s free streaming service. Sometimes, if I don’t have someone to man the second camera, I’ll just hook it up to ManyCam also and switch them both (without a preview) which keeps the online audience from seeing the zooming and panning. Both cameras are Sony HDR- FX1s.

Of course I have to capture the service on DV tape to edit later. I miss capturing straight to the HDD but I have not been able to figure out a way to record 16:9 through Many Cam.

We have a remaining budget of $2400 to work with and I NEED a switching solution. I looked at the different hardware switcher recommendations and most of them are out of my price range. The only thing I can afford is a switcher that takes either S-Video or composite input, but I read the quality is not the best, and I still want my captured video to edit for DVD. I’ve looked around for a switcher that takes in either Firewire or Component, but they start above my budget.

I’ve tried a few different switching software solutions but they didn’t do everything I wanted:

• Record to a HDD with full 16:9 resolution
• Live output to UStream
• Include Powerpoint presentations

Right now I only have an old Intel 6400 CPU over-clocked to 2.7MHz, but it gets bogged down pretty good by any of the switching software, so I figure any one of them and a new core i7 machine should be ok to stream and record, and that plus firewire extenders or a component over cat5 solution would put me right around $2400.

I tried the following; Wirecast, Adobe Visual Communicator 3, AvTake Cut Four AV, Telestream Wirecast, and Vidblaster. And they all had plusses and minuses. The biggest shortcoming of them all was the ability to record the live stream to HDD in 16:9. None of them were able to. Did I miss something?

[wmmsaved]

I have streamed 16:9 with Vidblaster. I have also recorded uncompressed video to the hard drive so I would think that, if your settings are entered accordingly, you can record 16:9 as well. Vidblaster also offers the option of routing video to an output on your video card. 16:9 could then be fed to an external recording device there.

My questions would be whether your hard drive and/or Windows would introduce unacceptable limitations on the length of your uncompressed 16:9 video recordings to the HDD.

I suggest doing some research on the Vidblaster forums. There are some sharp folks there who can tell you for sure.

http://forum.vidblaster.com/

Michael

[streamkoinonia]

We've also used the ones mentioned. One thing you haven't tried that may help with the ones you listed is utilizing Adobe's Flash Media Encoder. You'll need to log in to Adobe's site to download, but it will run along side Avtake and most of the others using "Media Looks" for device signal and then grab your Ustream FME xml file from the advanced settings on your Ustream account. When you open FME you'll need to select that xml file by going to File>Open and then once opened save that as a new name you'll use for streaming. In FME, you can uncheck the maintain aspect ratio and see if you can set it to something like 853x480. As far as 16:9 ratio within Avtake,etc I think you need to set that up in start up screen camera setup in each input module setup in the program.
Hope that helps!

[Havalilsi]

Thanks for the replies. I was afraid Vidblaster would be the most usable, since it's also the most costly. I guess you get what you pay for.

What is the best way to get the signal from the cameras to the computer to use with Vidblaster, Component over Cat5 to some sort of capture card, or FireWire?

[wmmsaved]

I have both my cameras within just a few feet of my webcast computer so I just use short runs of video cable from the composite outputs to the composite inputs on our 4-input Osprey 440 capture card. (Osprey makes a less expensive 3-input card, too).

I do have about 100' of RG-6 that connects our PowerPoint computer to the Osprey allowing me to switch in the pastor's bullet points or any video he uses. I used cable TV coax and just put the proper adapters on each end. It was readily available and not very expensive and it works perfectly.

I DO have some baluns that will allow me to run video over cat 5 but, in testing, I've noticed some minor noise in the video that I don't get with the RG-6. I may just have cheap baluns. Don't know since I have no others with which to compare.

I haven't seen any baluns that use firewire which I think has a usable range of only about 15 feet or so on its own.

Hope this helps,
Michael