The Live Streaming Thread

[Cheeky Devlin]

Seeing as streaming is becoming more and more popular I thought it'd be a good idea to have a thread where people can talk about streaming in general. Having done some basic streaming for a while (I used it as a quick and easy way of getting game footage for my blog without having to re-encode and upload big files) I've started looking at doing something more in-depth for this years Sick Kids Save Point. For the first time I've been playing with using on-screen elements such as graphics, webcam feeds and other information and I've really enjoyed trying to put together something that looks fairly good.

Currently I'm using OBS, a free but very effective streaming solution, to broadcast all the PC gaming I do to my Twitch account.
This has several advantages over the built in streaming on PS4 and Xbox One (Though I've not seen or used the XBO) in that I can completely customise the stream settings (bitrates, codecs etc) as well as create custom graphics, overlays, scenes and other elements not available to the consoles.

I also stream from my PS4 while playing, though this is far more bare bones in what can be done due to the nature of the hardware.

So who else streams and what do you use?

User Streams
Alpha Strategy Guides Alpha Strategy Guides (Twitch) - Alpha Strategy Guide Streaming Thread
Cheeky Devlin(Twitch)(Hitbox)
Infibeyen(Hitbox)
Staydead(Hitbox)

Streaming Services
Twitch
Ustream
Hitbox

Streaming Software
Open Broadcaster Software (OBS)
XSplit

Misc Streaming Links
Free Royalty Free Music
Hitbox GRcade Team

[Andrew Mills]

Thanks to Twitch's new audio-scanning BS, here's a link I came across in Twitch's comments:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... edit#gid=0

Apparently a list of free royalty-free music. Worth looking at regardless.

[Qikz]

I use OBS with twitch to stream Brood War.

[Rog]

We get a streaming thread on the day the downfall of Twitch as-we-know-it begins

[Saint of Killers]

[twitch]http://www.twitch.tv/fishplayspokemon[/twitch]

Streaming Info

Hi everyone! Welcome to our stream where our fish, Grayson Hopper, plays a Pokemon game. Unfortunately, we don't have a dedicated light for Grayson at night as he lives in a tiny dorm room and we would rather not sleep with the light on. But in the future we will be getting him a dedicated lamp and improving the quality of the stream to include recent inputs determined by the motion tracking. Things can move a little slow, so another option we're considering is making the system distributed where we have a site where you can provide a fish stream link and we'll include it in the controlling.

Also, Grayson will be moving in a few weeks and the stream may be down for a bit. We'll be taking this opportunity to add features and speed things up a bit.

Current Progress

Grayson has been playing for around 125 hours. Last time I checked, Grayson had acquired his first Pokemon, a charmander named AAAABBK and defeated his first opponent, the rival's squirtle!

(Grayson has been playing since the very start and selected his own name from one of the preset ones!)

[Psychic]

We get a streaming thread on the day the downfall of Twitch as-we-know-it begins

It's time for Hitbox to rise. No delay on the streams which is nice.

[Mafro]

[twitch]http://www.twitch.tv/fishplayspokemon[/twitch]

Streaming Info

Hi everyone! Welcome to our stream where our fish, Grayson Hopper, plays a Pokemon game. Unfortunately, we don't have a dedicated light for Grayson at night as he lives in a tiny dorm room and we would rather not sleep with the light on. But in the future we will be getting him a dedicated lamp and improving the quality of the stream to include recent inputs determined by the motion tracking. Things can move a little slow, so another option we're considering is making the system distributed where we have a site where you can provide a fish stream link and we'll include it in the controlling.

Also, Grayson will be moving in a few weeks and the stream may be down for a bit. We'll be taking this opportunity to add features and speed things up a bit.

Current Progress

Grayson has been playing for around 125 hours. Last time I checked, Grayson had acquired his first Pokemon, a charmander named AAAABBK and defeated his first opponent, the rival's squirtle!

(Grayson has been playing since the very start and selected his own name from one of the preset ones!)

Oh my god

[Holpil]

Has the idea already been raised for a shared GRcade channel? Is that even possible to share a channel?

[Andrew Mills]

Has the idea already been raised for a shared GRcade channel? Is that even possible to share a channel?

No, but it's a good one.

I've already asked KP to come up with an 'On-Air' indicator for a dedicated topic (such as this) so people know when someone's streaming live. Fingers crossed that won't take too long to sort out.

[Dual]

Fish plays pokemon hahaha

love it

[Cheeky Devlin]

Thanks to Twitch's new audio-scanning BS, here's a link I came across in Twitch's comments:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... edit#gid=0

Apparently a list of free royalty-free music. Worth looking at regardless.

Just read about the new audio-scanning. It seems to mostly be for people who play music over their streams, but will affect games like GTA that contain licensed tracks.
It doesn't affect me as I generally just play the game audio, but I had planned on using some kind of music for breaks in my SKSP stream.

We get a streaming thread on the day the downfall of Twitch as-we-know-it begins

Classic timing I know.

So what are the alternatives to Twitch then? UStream is the obvious one, but what other sites are there?

[Infibeyen]

Has the idea already been raised for a shared GRcade channel? Is that even possible to share a channel?

No, but it's a good one.

I've already asked KP to come up with an 'On-Air' indicator for a dedicated topic (such as this) so people know when someone's streaming live. Fingers crossed that won't take too long to sort out.

That's a good idea. Could that indicator be clickable to take you straight to the stream?

EDIT: If people are going to consider Hitbox, I've set up a GRcade Team on it, let me know your username if you'd like to be part of it.

[Cheeky Devlin]

http://grcade.co.uk/t:asg-streams-will-now-appear-in-the-board-description?f=24

Cool addition for ASG there. Wonder what Karl has in store for the rest of us?

EDIT: I've also updated the first post with links to user streams and some streaming software. Anything anyone finds that might be useful, or relevant let me know and I'll add it to the OP.

[Qikz]

I went to make a user streams thread but completely forgot this thread existed.

I switched from twitch to Hitbox as it's about 15 million times better and the quality is much higher. My stream you can now find at http://www.hitbox.tv/qikz . I went to setup a GRcade team but seems someone already did it, so if I could get an invite that'd be sick.

Has the idea already been raised for a shared GRcade channel? Is that even possible to share a channel?

No, but it's a good one.

I've already asked KP to come up with an 'On-Air' indicator for a dedicated topic (such as this) so people know when someone's streaming live. Fingers crossed that won't take too long to sort out.

Having it on a single thread is a bad idea from a usability standpoint imo as if multiple people are streaming it wouldn't be reasonable to have it all under one thread, it's better to copy Teamliquid and use something like this:



It's on a panel off to the side on every page like so:

I think personally that you want people to be able to see when users are streaming anywhere on the forum to give it more advertisement that it's happening. It may be unworkable, but it'd be a nice addition to have something like it. Perhaps in the top right corner?

[Cheeky Devlin]

I went to make a user streams thread but completely forgot this thread existed.

I switched from twitch to Hitbox as it's about 15 million times better and the quality is much higher. My stream you can now find at http://www.hitbox.tv/qikz . I went to setup a GRcade team but seems someone already did it, so if I could get an invite that'd be sick.

Has the idea already been raised for a shared GRcade channel? Is that even possible to share a channel?

No, but it's a good one.

I've already asked KP to come up with an 'On-Air' indicator for a dedicated topic (such as this) so people know when someone's streaming live. Fingers crossed that won't take too long to sort out.

Having it on a single thread is a bad idea from a usability standpoint imo as if multiple people are streaming it wouldn't be reasonable to have it all under one thread, it's better to copy Teamliquid and use something like this:



It's on a panel off to the side on every page like so:

I think personally that you want people to be able to see when users are streaming anywhere on the forum to give it more advertisement that it's happening. It may be unworkable, but it'd be a nice addition to have something like it. Perhaps in the top right corner?

I think I'm gonna look into Hitbox myself. See how big a change it is from Twitch.

I'm not sure how well it would work, especially if multiple users are streaming simultaneously. Something like the Teamliquid example you showed would be great, but even a new box under the "Who Is Online" segment would be good. "Users Currently Streaming" or something similar.

[Infibeyen]

I went to setup a GRcade team but seems someone already did it, so if I could get an invite that'd be sick.

That's me, I added you into it. Devlin, if you set up an account let me know your username and I'll add you in too!

[Cheeky Devlin]

I went to setup a GRcade team but seems someone already did it, so if I could get an invite that'd be sick.

That's me, I added you into it. Devlin, if you set up an account let me know your username and I'll add you in too!

Cool, it's CheekyDevlin.

[toxic]

Does anyone here use XSplit? Is it worth paying for that over OBS?

[Andrew Mills]

Does anyone here use XSplit? Is it worth paying for that over OBS?

I found XSplit gash and OBS, whilst not exactly as user-friendly, is much better and compatible overall. So, yea, I'd recommend OBS over XSplit.

BTW: With regards to the stream notification, what might work is a banner at the top of the forum that rotates when multiple people are streaming (perhaps with their name and the game they're playing with an image in the BG)? Just a thought.

[toxic]

Does anyone here use XSplit? Is it worth paying for that over OBS?

I found XSplit gash and OBS, whilst not exactly as user-friendly, is much better and compatible overall. So, yea, I'd recommend OBS over XSplit.

Thanks Andrew. Your responses do tend to carry a bit of weight with me, so I appreciate it! A lot of people have said that actually. I was going to go with OBS, but sadly it looks like it won't work with my capture card. I've downloaded a bunch of solutions, so I think I'll just have a go and see which works best, if at all.

Would anyone be interested in watching a Destiny livestream for three or so hours every Sunday night?