Why should I stream live and how do I do that?

These are questions that are frequently asked, especially in the Christian spectrum. Livestreaming in the parish or church is so much easier than you think, but has so many advantages.

1. the livestream can be watched by people who are distant from the church and thus get a first impression of the church. They may become “online members” or be encouraged to attend the service.

2. people who are ill or cannot come for other reasons, get the opportunity to participate live in the happenings in the community.

3. the worship service can be viewed or shown in hindsight. This provides an opportunity to evaluate the service and perhaps find ways to improve it.

Often people ask why you should take the trouble to stream it live and not just upload a video afterwards on a platform.

It has to be said that it appeals much more to the audience when it is live. It rather gives you the feeling of really being a part of what is happening, as it is being experienced by the local people at the same time.

In addition, it is actually less effort to stream the events live instead of putting a video file afterwards on the Internet. And this despite better effect.

“But how? It’s soo expensive!”

  • Depends on the execution, here I show you three variants, which are easily feasible for most communities in budget and effort.

Possibility 1

For the first possibility, you only need two things:

1. a fully functional smartphone and 2. an active Internet connection

First you have to start the “YouTube” app on your smartphone. Next, press the small video camera icon, which is either located in a red circle at the bottom of the screen or at the top of the bar next to the search icon. Then a choice appears, where you can choose between “Record”, “Livestream” and your own video files.

If you now press “Livestream”, a window opens with some formal things, like the confirmation of the identity or, if not yet done, the registration. Now you have to adjust some settings like the privacy or the chats in the stream. Just take a photo as a thumbnail and you are online with your own livestream.

Possibility 2

With the next variant, it will already cost something, since for this a PC/ laptop and usually also a “Capture Card” is needed. The Capture Card is already available from 70€ on Amazon to buy, an example of this would be: https://www.amazon.de/MiraBox-HDMI-Game-Capture-Technologie/dp/B07G84G7VF/ref=sr_1_2_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1547241997&sr=8-2-spons&keywords=capture+card&psc=1

In addition, the corresponding cables and a camera are understandably required for this.

The software that does the rest is “OBS” and can be downloaded here: https://obsproject.com/de

To set up the whole thing I recommend to have a look at YouTube tutorials on this topic, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UtXvJq-l5M

Possibility 3

As a third option, I show a product that is already widely used in the USA by small to medium-sized communities. With more than 1000€ it is a more expensive solution, which also brings more work, but it is my personal favourite.

Sling Studio: https://www.myslingstudio.com/solutions

With this product you can switch between up to 10 cameras live. The ingenious thing about this is that everything works wirelessly. You can also use mobile phones, which you can connect wirelessly to the product via an app, or cameras that you can connect via an extra radio hub. Everything can be controlled via a tablet or a PC/laptop.

Although the 1000€ may sound expensive at first, this device is the best price-performance ratio compared to other live editing software, consoles or interfaces.