Video capture & live streaming setup questions...
Video capture & live streaming setup questions...
What's up everyone.
I've been doing a lot of research on video capture devices the last few days....and haven't really gotten a lot of definitive information on what I need or what I should be looking for. Just alot of "this is the suxxors" or "this one is better than that".
I'm not new to video editing, but I'm new to video capture and live-stream stuff.
My goal is to essentially have a rig setup that will capture my game footage, footage from a web cam, audio from the console and from headset (for commentary), and either be able to overlay/live edit both while streaming. Not a hefty goal or anything....lol.
The capture cards I've been looking at are the Hauppauge PVDVR HD2, and the Roxio Game Capture HD Pro. Both are external devices that run via USB to the computer.
I dunno if an external device is better, or internal....what kind of audio controls I'll need externally....etc.
I've got a pretty good PC rig. I just need to know what all I need hardware/software wise.
Any info is appreciated.
Another one that I think may even be the top choice right now is this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Elgato-Capture-PlayStation-Recorder-10025010/dp/B0...
Yeah I was looking at the Elgato. Looks like a good starting point. A lot more control with the software than with what comes with some of the other devices I've looked at.
But can you live broadcast and switch between multiple video/audio sources?
I don't know I'm still using a Hava myself (upgrade planned), but since the El Gato launched it's the name that I hear most when people are talking hardware these days. It looks like based on this conversation you can live broadcast? Don't know about the other.
http://support.elgato.com/index.php?_m=knowledgebase&_a=viewarticle&kbar...
Supposedly the "Best" way to do it is to use a blackmagic capture card internally in your pc. A lot of the top tier Streamers (twitch and you tube dudes) do it that way. i6Hitman does it that way for the 2old2play channel and will be very helpfully in explaining how/what/where and such. Just drop him a pm or tweet him at @i6hitman. He responds really fast to the tweets.
You absolutely can do it using the el gato or Haup for streaming or vid caping. I do know for the Haup if you want to stream AND cap your voice you will need a splitter for your audio. If you do not want to capture your individual game voice for streaming or vid caping then you will not need the audio splitter. It will capture other peoples audio (speech) and game audio, but your voice audio is not capped without a different set up. I believe the same is correct for the el gato.
If you are streaming make sure your up speed bandwidth can handle it. I think for 720p or higher the running theory is either 3 or 5 up.
For streaming you will alos need Xsplit broadcaster or like program to do the screen cap and upload. The free version is ok for Xsplit but the paid version comes with some nicer features.
Once you get it all set up (and that goes for anyone on the site) if you want to use the 2o2p channel for streaming Doodi will be more then happy to share the password with you. He has wanted the groups and clans to stream their game nights and shit for a long time, all they have to do is say so.
Yeah that's another thing I want to do is stream some of the events here on 2old2play, and my gears clan nights.
I'll shoot hitman a pm and see what he says.
Yeah I definitely wanna record my voice (for commentary), along with maybe doing some overlay graphics and be able to switch between two video feeds (like a hd cam and the 360 console).
tried to shoot him a PM and there were no matching names coming up. Whats his username on here?
i6_hitman
yes he has an underscore in his name...He is epic in fail for a site name. LOL
I just tweeted him to hop in the thread and comment, so hopefully he will when he gets a chance.
As Video Content Manager for 2old2play, I am more than happy to answer any questions you may have. Don't listen to Lbsutke, he's only middle management lmao
Twitch
Check out my How To video from my YT channel, as a starting off point... http://youtu.be/7eQpiBsqXDI
Twitch
what he did not tell you is the free version of xplit does not let you record in a normal audio codex. it is speex or something, if you want AAC you need to get their liscense or find a hacked version.
If you don't have a high end pc and do not have one of the black magic cards/capture stuff and are going the Haup or El Gato route. You will need to do other steps and you still need to address you individual audio cap. Not sure if the new Haup pvr 2 gaming edition will caputre your (individual not party) game audio or not. You might have to have a seperate mic to do that or split off the audio feed. Again this is if you are streaming. If you are just recording there are less steps but still not sure about your individual audio. I might be totally off about the audio thing, but that is how it use to be with the original Haup.
Now the Haup has a beta software you can download and it will do the streaming to twitch for you, but it functionality is very limited, as in being able to insert name plates and graphics and stuff, I do not think you are able to do that or even add an adition camera like a web cam to capture you beautiful faces. It is more like, capture the video stream and put it up on twitch, thats about it.
Yeah if you use an external cap device you basically need to have a separate audio device plugged in the pc recording your audio. I'm gonna try hooking my Tritton headsets USB & Mic plug into the PC and the rest into the xbox and see if that will work. If it does, awesome.
I've got my Elgato game capture HD coming in the mail. Should be here in the next day or so. I watched a TON of review vids and that's the best to start out with. And later on if I want to do more I can always get an internal card or another device. Once I get that setup I hope to start posting some content regularly here on 2old2play and have my own little youtube corner. I wanna start capping clan matches and possibly some local tournaments here in the area. We'll see though.
Thanks Hitman and Lbsutke for the help and info.
You're welcome..gif "1")
Apologies for not mentioning you in the thanks. I think I skipped over your post by accident when I was reading through all the replies. My bad.
Oh don't mind me I was just being an ass. In a playful way though. hehe! These other two guys contributed far more!
Please keep us updated about the ElGato. I would love to hear your guys take about using it!
Yeah let us know how the Elgato works! If u need anymore help just holler!
Twitch
twitch.tv/i6hitman and ....
This channel had been closed
Ouch! May we ask what happened?
his account is now under twitch.com/watchtower or watchtowergames I think or something like that.
His old account got pooped on by a DCMA violaltion..rofl..Oh my crazy funny little Canadian buddy...
I got my Elgato capture card in the mail. Got it all hooked up and it works well.
Did some research on the live commentary part....and pretty much everyone says that you basically need a second mic connected to the PC to do that through the Elgato software.
I've got a Tritton AX180 headset, and was trying to think of a way to rig it up so I can talk to friends while gaming, AND capture my audio using 1 headset/mic setup connected to both PC and the Xbox.
I tried an audio splitter at the controller which put out a lot of feedback through the head set. And only the PC could detect any audio from the microphone.
Any suggestions? Im hoping I won't need to buy a separate microphone. But it's looking like thats gonna be the case.
ugh..I was going to say go the splitter route...hmmm
Honestly I have no other suggestions. I can only come up with trying a different splitter or going the mic route.
yeah after doing some more research, I'm gonna have to get a standalone mic for the pc. It's gonna be a while before I can afford a decent one though. But that's alright.
I signed up for Twitch.tv and got my X-split all setup with webcam and all that. So when i do play pc or xbox stuff I can stream to that. Hopefully will start writing some content for a podcast and a weekly livestream night for gaming.
Gatsu I hope you read this thread today. Cause Woot has a pretty nice MIC for like 80 bucks.
Check out the link.
damn I missed it.
I was at a fighting game tournament yesterday and noticed there was a guy there streaming the event. So I went and talked to him about what he prefers to use, and he had a nice little usb audio mixer. Cost him around $50. I may go this route because there are a ton of music stores around my town that sell decent mics for cheap. And this way I can record multiple vocal audio tracks at the same time, turn each one on and off and all that.
cool man, sounds like a good plan. If I see stuff posted I will try to post here and link for you guys.
Sorry, just saw this. I was going to suggest getting a reasonable good mic for your PC and pointing the Elgato Live Commentary software to that mic. Then it is just a matter of doing some test streams to get the audio levels set between game play and commentary so your "commentary voice" is at the same level as the game play voices that the Elgato is capturing.
My Haup DVR 2 gaming edition arrived!!! (thanks Doodi). Hitman is going to help me today setting this stuff up and lets see if my old n busted comp can handle the streaming portion.
I will try to take notes and stuff and let you guys know if things are working out or not.
Well good and bad news, I will start with the bad news first.
The free version of Xsplit does not work with the Haup (and I am asusming the elgato, please correct me if I am wrong) for streaming. You need to purchase (or torrent) a personal or premier liscense to do the game capture option within the program. the personal (cheapest tier) to be able to do the game capture is 40 bucks a year and with my comp/setup I am not sure it would work then.
I can get around it, but it would consist of doing a screen cap of the game play from the capture software (or like) it comes with. Considering my system is pretty damn old (Core 2 duo proc) running Xsplit and the other capture software, then streaming it up to twitch would be a craptastic feed.
Now Haup does offer a free streaming software to use (called StreamEez) and it does work. But the options of doing things like inserting name plates, a webcam, etc. are not allowed. It does allow you to adjust the audio and bitrate of the stream and lets you connect to Twitch. But I need to play around with the bitrate. For some reason my game play had a lot of latency even though my upload is anywhere from 5 to 11 MB.
I am going to try and do some just old fashioned game capture footage and try to upload to the you tubes and see how it looks.
The good news was the easy setup and being able to tell you guys the free version of Xsplit will not work. I also tested out Open Broadcaster streaming software but later found out they do not support Haup YET.
Ok so I was able to cap about 8 vids yesterday. 2 of blops 2 and 6 of H4. Now as discussed before you will not hear any "game voice" because I do not have a splitter for my astro mix amp.
Just a couple of notes of things I have run into and it may sound trivial or video noobish, but I am going to post it anyway in case anyone else has the same question/result.
So once you have the raw file capped you can play it with pretty much any video player availabe. It is even ready to upload to the You Tubes, BUT please keep in mind the raw file is pretty big, anywhere from 400 mb to 725 mb. So this will take a while to upload depending on your upload speed.
One way to "optimize" the file into a smaller file size is by using a program called Handbrake. It is free and can reprocess the vid file into a smaller file size but still keep the apsect ration the same (for example 1920 x 1080 or 1280 x 720). I think it just does the bitrate at a smaller amount (original bitrate was at 8000, redone bitrate is around 1600). So I need to play with it a little bit so see if I can set the bit rate a bit higher, the smaller files are ok video wise but are a little funky.
I also suggest if you are using youtube for you video sharing service to set up different playlist to help seperate out videos on you channel. Just makes it a little cleaner. (that is a pro tip from i6Hitman!! Thanks Hit)
Well below are the vids, the 2 blops files are straight raw file uploads, the H4 ones are smaller bitrate coverted files:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtbKn_8SQuo&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYmab460DvA&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROntG7Q9f7k&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB3K3DCXZAI&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=204QmwGPqic&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC_hKHKeXPE&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vaxi6rNF_k&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDm5HgIVw74&feature=share&list=UUsL4P-z9v...
So I figures out how to get rid of the pixlelatoin from the vids. I messed around with the settings for the rendering and bumped up the bitrate to 5k and selected the two pass encoding. Really cleans up the video.
But a 800+mb film comes in around 500+ megs. So the upload and processing will take a little bit of time for You Tube.