Question / Help Successfully Streamed Video Podcast To YouTube But Need Better Quality

[Criss Cain]

Hello all,

First off, thanks so much to anyone involved in the development of this software and to everyone in this very inviting and educational forum. I'm very new to all of this stuff but I'm working on a video podcast and we "successfully" streamed our first episode on Tuesday evening with a couple major issues. (Through, with a degree in voice it's pretty amazing I've even made it this far...)

My macbook info:

1) The video quality is terrible and it seems to be the best I could achieve while maintaining a steady stream to YouTube. I've got an Upload speed of 5.0mbps and I'm using an ethernet cable connection. Not sure of my issue.

2) The sound quality is terrible, especially when we played our guest's video clip. The audio doesn't even come through, for the most part. (This has also been the case when I've attempted iTunes in past sessions.) In OBS, one audio input is set to record from Soundflower (64ch) and the other takes the sound directly from the clip which is captured through OBS's Media Source. I'm also using Audio Hijack with these settings:

Here's a link to our first experimental episode on YouTube. (Side not; Don't judge it by the first episode. It's terrible. This was very much a test of the equipment with no written material, whatsoever...)
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__yKUGhAAHA

I've also attached my log file for that evening.

I would GREATLY appreciate any, and all, advice anyone could offer!

Thanks very much,
Criss

 

[Light And Magic]

I am happy to see that you use Audio Hijack, it is my 'secret' tool of getting all audio connections right on my streams.

But the video is kind of poor indeed, and you must remember that Skype itself will be eating away a lot of your Internet connection, it is a giant resource hog just like OBS is, so the two will probably fight for bandwidth and cpu.

Your MacBook is on the low end of the spectrum for this to work, if I may say so, but I let the developers comment on that.

 

[amsyar ZeRo]

I'm not very pro on this,but i wanna ask,why are you using Soundflower 64ch,not 2ch Criss Cain?

 

[Light And Magic]

Good question, Amsyar, I was thinking the same.

 

[Criss Cain]

Well, I'm probably doing it that way because I don't really know what I'm doing... :) How much difference will it make to switch to 2-chan?

 

[amsyar ZeRo]

Well, I'm probably doing it that way because I don't really know what I'm doing... :) How much difference will it make to switch to 2-chan?

Hmm...I don't think many differences will it make.But you can just try and see if it gives you a better quality:]

 

[TickleMeOzmo]

With 5MB upload, you are KILLING your bandwidth, that's the problem with the poor kwolety.

Here's the fun math! 5MB = 5000kbps. That's MAX. Now, you will start seeing degradation in the quality if you go over 80% of your upstream. That's the rule, live by it, no questions. 5000 x 0.80 = 4000. So you are functionally limited to 4000kbps upload.

According to Google's Live Encoder Settings page, a 720p stream can be anywhere from 1500kbps to 4000kbps, depending on movement and detail. Let's ASSUME you've set your Streaming Output (in OBS) to use a 2500kbps average, well, that does not include audio. If you have 1 audio stream, that's 96kbps. Not much, but you'll see why it's important in a moment. So, streaming a BLACK background with silence, you are uploading 2596kbps, which means you only have 1404kbps to spare!

Here's the bad news. Skype. Skype's Bandwidth Calculation page recommends anywhere from 640kbps (512kbps for video, plus 128kbps for audio) to 2512kbps for a group chat with 3 people. You are WAY OVER your allocation.

And that's without downloading anything, nothing running in the background, nobody else is using the computer at your house. You are bandwidth constrained.

Three workarounds:

1. Save the recording locally, upload high res at a later time; means no LIVE video broadcast.
2. Drop the video bitrate in OBS; means crappier quality video.
3. Try Google Hangouts for your guests, where only the speaker has video preference; means guests don't have equal face time.

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Secondly, your audio didn't come through on the clip because Chrome is "greyed-out" in Audio Hijack. Have Audio Hijack restart Chrome so that it can capture it. It should be blue (like the other 4 icons) rather than gray.