Who is using OBS for live productions?

JanV

New Member
I couldn't find a suitable forum group. This one seemed most appropriate.

I have searched a lot on internet and youtube, but I hardly find anyone who is using OBS for live event productions (multicam). While reading https://obsproject.com/kb/power-of-projectors I found 2 big events. The one about chess I found a picture: https://images.chesscomfiles.com/uploads/v1/images_users/tiny_mce/NM_Vanessa/phphXnS6a.png That looks awesome, unfortunately it does not tell how they use OBS and how it is "wired". And in the same picture is also vMix in use. The other event: EVO 2022, I can not found a thing.
Can anyone tell me more about using OBS for multicam events, because I only find vMix and ATEM for this kind of events. Links to articles and pictures are always nice ;-)

Thanks in advance, Jan from the Netherlands
 

AaronD

Active Member
A lot of churches use it. Does that count?

Just one example among many, and one that I built and still maintain, and can therefore explain:
 

Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
LOTS and LOTS of people livestream using OBS with a multi-cam setup. Some of those are for larger 'events'

As Aaron mentioned, lots of Houses of Worship use OBS as well (obviously large increase in sites using OBS during pandemic lockdown)

This forum is for Development of OBS Studio, not user/usage oriented, so moving your conversation to one of the support forums, most likely more appropriate. I recommend posting in the Operating System you'd most likely use, and some more details on the nature of the event. If you look in either the Windows, Linux, or MacOS forums, you'll find recent conversations on using OBS for outdoor cross-country mountain bike racing, hocky, volleyball, etc.

The camera to OBS interface can vary, depending on distance, resolution, frame rates, low-light sensitivity/dynamic range, etc. sorry.. it depends. Obviously at longer distances, USB won't work. WiFi is never a good idea (doable, sometime, in some circumstances, but without in-depth technical knowledge on networking of RF spectrum usage, and real-time monitoring, you are just asking for trouble if you use WiFi). Honestly, technical requirements event layout, and budget, will more than anything drive camera type and connectivity. The operator sophistication/training, etc. OBS Studio and vMix are largely interchangeable/alternatives to each other. How the system is physically wired wouldn't have/need to be different between those 2 (and other) real-time compositing software solutions.
Personally, I use PoE NDI PTZ camera, but quality cameras of that type are not cheap. For a compositing platform (bring together and enables switching between 'sources' [ie cameras, pre-recorded video, stills, overlays, etc]) there are lots of options (OBS Studio being one of them), with different price ranges, support options, and in many ways, your 'get what you pay for'. OBS Studio, being Free Open Source software, is free, flexible and powerful. What you have less of is support, training and documentation material, native support for licensed interfaces (ex NDI). There are plugins to fill in the capability gap, offering tremendous flexibility, but depending on the plugin varying levels of code stability/maturity, timeliness of updates/compatability, etc

These old links may still exist/be of use to you from https://streamgeeks.us/ [aligned with PTZOptics.com] Online Resources
  1. The Unofficial Guide to Open Broadcaster Software
  2. The OBS Superuser Guidebook
  3. The Unofficial Guide to vMix
  4. The Basics of Live Streaming
  5. Esports in Education
  1. Helping Your Church Live Stream
  2. The Virtual Ticket
  3. The Online Meeting Survival Guide
  4. Technology Tools for Online Education
 

JanV

New Member
Thanks AaronD and Lawrence_SoCal!

I've been using OBS for a few years now, but slately I look for things (like workflows, graphics, etc.) how others solve it and then I keep coming up with examples with vMix or ATEM. And when OBS is used, it is often for just the last bit, which is streaming to a platform (without switching).

I will not make the switch to vMix, because there is no budget to do the same as what I do now. But it is strange that very few people show "behind the scenes" how they use OBS. It seems like that people are ashamed to show there OBS set-up.

cheers, Jack
 

JanV

New Member
This forum is for Development of OBS Studio, not user/usage oriented, so moving your conversation to one of the support forums, most likely more appropriate. I recommend posting in the Operating System you'd most likely use, and some more details on the nature of the event.

I don't know how to move. I use a Windows laptop with 4 PTZ cams to live stream a radio show.
 

AaronD

Active Member
I look for things (like workflows, graphics, etc.) how others solve it and then I keep coming up with examples with vMix or ATEM. And when OBS is used, it is often for just the last bit, which is streaming to a platform (without switching).
Seems like a waste to me. There's already a free tool that does everything, and they just use it for the encoder? And pay for another tool that does what the free one already does? Seems to me like they just want to spend money, instead of actually understanding. Or maybe they believed the marketing (never do that) for the other paid stuff: "You need to buy our tool! There's no other way!" Oh yes, there is!

(And to cover the "I have a trusted friend" argument: Friends are marketing too. Every industry has known and used that trick forever. You still need to know and understand *for yourself*, to avoid getting duped. It's not that your friend intentionally deceives you; it's more like your friend is deceived themselves and doesn't realize it...)

...it is strange that very few people show "behind the scenes" how they use OBS. It seems like that people are ashamed to show there OBS set-up.
I think it's more that we rarely get asked. And when we do show something that does *exactly* what we want, the army of "techno-idiots" puts it down as "too complicated". That crowd doesn't seem to realize the uniqueness of everyone's use case, and to make it work well for "___" purpose DOES require that level of technical understanding and effort.

If you give the appearance of idolizing the default "proof of working" configuration, which is intentionally designed for that specific purpose, without understanding that it causes other problems......

But I guess that's the sort of crowd that a free thing attracts: "I don't care about your awesome production! I just want to stream my game!"......
 

lucasnmachado

New Member
I can say in a "just playing around" setting, I've had some instability and crashes in OBS if I try to feed too many inputs/sources into it simultaneously, and that probably only gets worse with higher resolutions. You'd probably still want to use a switcher for all of your inputs and mix that down to a single source into OBS.

The other part is that OBS's built-in media player absolutely sucks. It'll play a video, but as of the last time I used it, it will do absolutely nothing else. You can't cue it up, you can't pause it, you can't fast forward to certain points. It's just a box with a video in it and whoops it is already playing. You MIGHT be able to work around this with maybe VLC or something outputting over NDI or RTMP into OBS or your switcher, but I can't say for certain that it would work as well as you might need it. Momix

EDIT: I've been informed that the built-in media player is better now than when I'd last used it! But it still might not be great.

I can only speak for my own experience at a very large broadcaster with a kind of "price is no object" mentality for needing solutions that just work, but when it comes to pro shows, 25% of the price of a product is the service it provides, and 75% is having someone they paid to yell at when it doesn't work flawlessly. So maybe the biggest pitfall is potentially and very suddenly becoming that person if something goes wrong.

I think it's totally possible, but it may not be the best solution in every single case. In terms of real-world implementations, I think that the Games Done Quick marathon, which actually just started up today, runs a pretty giant pro-production mostly out of OBS. Maybe they've done a rundown on how their production is run?
 

AaronD

Active Member
I can say in a "just playing around" setting, I've had some instability and crashes in OBS if I try to feed too many inputs/sources into it simultaneously, and that probably only gets worse with higher resolutions.
You must have had an underpowered or poorly cooled computer for handling live video. A lot of modern machines won't do it, and a fair number of slightly older ones will. It's not about technological improvement, but the design itself.

Most laptops don't have adequate cooling. It would make them less portable if they did. But they do work well for their intended use, because all they *really* need to do is load something quickly, and then sit and cool off while the user looks at it. The most demanding thing they're actually *designed* to do from a cooling standpoint, is play back a commercially-released movie.

Very few people want to *make* movies, and so those machines are not designed to do that. If you try, it'll heat up, throttle back, and *that* kills the quality. It's not OBS that doesn't work; it's the amount of data that you're trying to shove through a machine that's not designed to do that.

You'd probably still want to use a switcher for all of your inputs and mix that down to a single source into OBS.
That just complicates things, if you have an actually-capable computer...unless you really value a *physical* interface. It *is* kinda hard to beat that. Otherwise, no, just bring everything directly and individually into the computer, and do it all in there.

For audio, yes, you want to do that outside of OBS, and bring in a single, finished soundtrack to pass through unchanged. For one rig, I use a DAW on the same machine as OBS. (Digital Audio Workstation: essentially a complete sound studio in one app) For another, I use an auxiliary mix in the Front-of-House digital console.

The other part is that OBS's built-in media player absolutely sucks. It'll play a video, but as of the last time I used it, it will do absolutely nothing else. You can't cue it up, you can't pause it, you can't fast forward to certain points. It's just a box with a video in it and whoops it is already playing.
Uhh...yes? That's kinda what it's for? "Studio mode" in OBS allows you to "cue up" a scene, which might have a video in it, and then take that scene when you're ready. The video starts when you take it.

To jump around, there's a playhead now, when you select the video source, that you can drag around, and the playback follows that. But the general effect - regardless of how it's done - doesn't seem like something you'd want to do live. It creates a kind of jarring, unprofessional appearance. If you want to skip around, use a video editor to create the clips you need, and then play those like you meant to. (yes, this means you need to plan ahead)

I can only speak for my own experience at a very large broadcaster with a kind of "price is no object" mentality for needing solutions that just work, but when it comes to pro shows, 25% of the price of a product is the service it provides, and 75% is having someone they paid to yell at when it doesn't work flawlessly. So maybe the biggest pitfall is potentially and very suddenly becoming that person if something goes wrong.
That's certainly true...but if you have that attitude, is it really something worth sharing? Blaming others for your own shortcomings? Because it *will* come through the camera and screen at some point.

Learn the tools for yourself, and use them well. Take the time and spend the effort to actually do that. Lay the foundation that nobody looks at, so then it can support you later.
 
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