Broadcasting tutorials and tips

[Dreamerbg]

Hello everyone 

I am opening this thread to share my experience with broadcasting.
Everyone is welcome to give his tips "how to stream" here to help new people in broadcasting.

My goal here is to show the people how to stream while they are playing COH:EF and whatever they want.
With more people streaming their games this mod can get more fans and supporters

I cant show you all of the broadcasting programs, but in general they are all the same.

List of programs :
1. Xsplit
2. FMLE (flash media live encoder)
3. FFsplit
4. Xfire (didnt try it by myself)
5. OBS
All of this programs can work with twitch TV.

This is forum of the greatest mod (my opinion) for COH , so I will explain how to broadcast the game.

Most of broadcasters preffer Xsplit, because it gives them alot of options and have friendly interface.
Here is a link to good tutorial - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLkhjNvAlBU
But you need to pay for a license to get all resolutions, good audio and more than 25fps.

So if you are like me and just want to stream your game and nothing else you can use FFsplit, which is completely free for now.
This is the link to its tutorial - http://www.ffsplit.com/how-to-install/

Here is the new 5th program OBS. You can watch ist tutorial here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQVXySNiNbg .
It is completly free and maybe the best free softwere for casting. It is liter than FFsplit and Xsplit - this means that  OBS doesnt need so much resourses to cast the same quality compared to Xsplit or FFsplit.

Cant really say that FMLE is good for streaming games, but here is tutorial about it - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUWXwBV_Nwk


Basicly all of those programs have same general options:

Direct show options :

Video source
Audio source
Microphone source

Encoding options :

Video Bitrate: In general you'll want to set this to ~75% of your upload.
Video Encode Preset: In general Default will be the best preset to use. There are other presets available. The faster the preset, the more bandwidth it will use and less CPU power.
Video Resolution: Pretty self explanatory. Most quad cores will be able to stream 1280x720 (720p). This is a great starting point. Work your way up from here if you have enough CPU cycles left.
Video Frame Rate: The amount of frames per second streamed out. Again a quadcore will be able to stream out 30 frames per second without any problems.
Audio Bitrate: The amount of bandwidth available for audio. 128kbit is a good trade off between quality and size.
Audio Channels: Here you can choose between Stereo and Mono.


Now lets start with tips

After watching/reading the tutorials those tips will help you to configure the program that you want to use.

1. You need a ping test program from this link - http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=326034
With its help you will see which twitch tv server is best for you.
Here are my results - http://prikachi.com/images.php?images/990/5364990L.jpg


2. Open speedtest.net and test your internet connection to the best twitch tv server for you.
For me the best server is Frankfurt, Germany.
My results at this moment are http://www.speedtest.net/result/2233808883.png  - 30mega bits per second upload speed.

Now when you see what is your upload speed you will know how much you can use for stream.
Maximum speed that you can use for streaming is between 50% and 75% from your upload speed.
BUT if you use too much of your speed the stream maybe will be unwatchable for some of your viewers with crappy internet connection. So lets say that 5 to 7 megabits is the maximum.

3. OK, the 3rd step is knowing your processor, cuz videoencoding depends on it.
If your processor is weak (weaker than any i3 processor)  then you maybe wont get a good quality stream.
But if your processor is at least i3 or better you are OK.

4. Make e twitch tv account ( channel ) and start with tests.


This is from me for now.
In next days I will post tutorials for configuring and using Xsplit and FFsplit programs.

Thanks for reading.
And will be glad to see other streamers posting their tips here and links to their channels.



STREAM LINKS
http://www.twitch.tv/godlikedennis  - GodlikeDennis ( balancer ) - good quality gameplay and good stream quality
http://www.twitch.tv/riggsman         - Rigssman ( balancer )        - good quality gameplay and good stream quality
http://www.twitch.tv/dreamerbg      - EFDreamerBG (me)             - low quality gameplay  and good stream quality
http://www.twitch.tv/cranialwizard   - Cranialwizard (balancer)   -  "Low to Medium quality stream"
http://www.twitch.tv/generalch        - Killar (balancer)                 - good quality gameplay and good stream quality

[Riggsman]

Good job mate! I'm still tweaking things, trying and trying Any new idea/tip will be useful, I'm looking forward to your forthcoming posts.

Btw Guys, my stream is;
http://www.twitch.tv/riggsman

If you use Twitter add me so you get the notification when i stream.
https://twitter.com/Riggsman

Love it, touch it, squeeze it pls

[GodlikeDennis]

Nice guide buddy. We could probably also use this thread to post our twitchTV accounts.

http://www.twitch.tv/godlikedennis

[Walentin 'Walki' L.]

Very nice topic! Keep on posting your streams!

#stickied

[Riggsman]

After watching some video tutorials somehow I managed to get a smooth stream. The best way imho is to use Dxtory & Xsplit together. So what Dxtory does is; capturing the video and sound info directly from the video card and use Xsplit to project it. So you use these two software together.

Why we need Dxtory? Because if you use only Xsplit to capture something ( which I did all the time and didn't get good results), it simply captures your screen and use too much resource to project it, basically everything running on the desktop eats your cpu and drops frame rate during the stream but instead of selecting a screen region you just select Dxtory feed and that's it. I'm pretty satisfied atm because I don't have to play in windowed mode and expand it to full screen which lags my mouse or disrupts my ingame movements.

More over you can't have good sound with Xsplit if you use the free version however with Dxtory you don't need to purchase Xsplit anymore because sound&video feed is done by Dxtory not by Xsplit. So Xsplit is just a client but Dxtory is your main video & sound feeder.

Check this out how to configure those things;

1- This video shows how to set up xsplit mostly so watch it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPB0HvCpG9Y&feature=g-hist

2- This video shows how to set up those two softwares together
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erq6-oWTq4g&feature=g-hist

If you check my recent videos you may n see the difference between the Ostheer games that I've broadcasted ( xfire ) and with Dxtory/Xsplit combo.

Ps: I got Dxtory from a file resource which doesn't need registration but it works 100%.

[Dreamerbg]

Yes, thats try, but I have problems with the Dxtory - it didnt capture in correct resolution and cuts of my screen :/

But yes, if it is working OK for you - use it.
If someone needs Dxtory or Xsplit , I will send them to him, just PM me


Just tryied some new configurations with FFsplit and I've got my first viewers.
They were hungry for EF action, so please , if someone is streaming games - register your stream channel to http://broadcast.fulltimegeek.de/ where is focused a big part of COH comunity and show them what they want - a real battels, with real tanks and fights to the last man

I give to my viewers link to the Osheer stream and they were soo happy

[Riggsman]

Watch the second tutorial video it's pretty easy and set your screen size on Xsplit simply stretching it manually. That's it.

[Dreamerbg]

It is not a good idea to put different settings on Dxtory and broadcasting program (Xsplit)
Fps and resolution must be the same

[Dreamerbg]

It is not a good idea to put different settings on Dxtory and broadcasting program (Xsplit)
Fps and resolution must be the same

I made some tests and I must scratch this post.
U can use different resolutions without problem.
But the output resolution is from the broadcasting program, so U can use 1080p in Dxtory, but if you are using 720p in Xsplit/FFsplit the stream will be on 720p.

[Dreamerbg]

I want to post a suggestion that Riggs made hour or 2 ago :

Is there any way to post in the forum links to our streams where ppl can see when someone's stream is going live ?

[Killar]

Sure it is. Coh2.org is doing the same thing.

One thing about your stream: Its kinda narrow, maybe you set your resolution correctly. Its not widescreen, but its really sharp. Already wanted to click on the minimap

[Dreamerbg]

Atm I am with anothed monitor for the winter
Its max res is 1280x1024

[Dreamerbg]

FFsplit got a new update.
Its  still not 100% stable, but now you can use it almost like Xsplit.

What I mean?
You can screen capture your desktop and at the same time your game with Dxtory.
Your viewers will see your game when you are ingame and your desktop when you alt+tab(exit) from your game.

I am still testing this but it looks promissing.
Next week there will be a new tutorial about this new FFslit version on their site.
I will post some tips if there is need to do this as well.

[Killar]

Thx for the info Dreamer, will test it out.

[Dreamerbg]

If you have problems with Dxtory settings - Restart your PC !!!