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Shotwell Productions – Princeton, NJ
888-974-6893
info@shotwell.productions

Educational

Shotwell Productions Live Stream Setup


July 20, 2020

Hey everybody, Rob here. I’ve been receiving a lot of questions lately about my live stream setup and what I’m using. I put together this blog to show you my setup from A to Z. Feel free to reach out with any questions: info@shotwell.productions

When I first started thinking about live streaming a few years ago, it seemed like something that required a lot of additional equipment and would require a whole team to run it. Fast forward a few years, live streaming has made some big strides in technology, making it easy for anyone to stream to a variety of platforms. This created a lot of low quality, unprofessional live streams on a daily basis. My idea for a live stream setup had to be above and beyond what the general public is currently doing.

When I started building my setup, these are the goals I had in mind:

  • Multi-camera capability – high-end DSLR’s with great lenses
  • Battery-powered setup for total mobile convenience
  • Wireless access to the internet
  • Simple setup that doesn’t require too much time or too much manpower

After extensive research, talking to a few different company reps, reading lots of blogs and reviews, I decided on the following equipment:

Teradek Vidiu Go

See it here: Teradek Website

Buy it here: B&H

This is the backbone of the whole setup. This handy (and expensive) device creates its own internet connection remotely, so you don’t have to rely on someone else’s wifi or Ethernet hardwire. It does so with two separate sim card slots, that you can load in from two different cellular service providers. The Vidiu pulls data from both sim cards and combines it into one big stream. Super handy if you’re in an area with bad Verizon service, but good AT&T service. It also can connect to wifi and Ethernet hardwire, so you can actually combine as many data connections as possible for the biggest, most reliable stream. Battery-powered and lasts up to about 90 minutes, with the ability to add external battery pack via USB-C connection. Having used this for a few months now, I can happily say its a solid piece of equipment.

Here are some key features and tips that I have found over these past few months:

 

Roland V-1HD video switcher 

See it here: Roland Website

Buy it here: B&H

This piece of gear ROCKS! It takes four incoming HDMI feeds and allows you to switch between them in an intuitive way. It outputs to my 7” screen and allows you to see all four video inputs at the same time, so it’s super easy to see which camera you want to switch to next. It also gives you a bunch of effects to choose from, like crossfade transitions, Picture in Picture, and much more. Definitely get the iPad remote app for the V-1, as it gives you a ton of flexibility in terms of audio mixing and effects (reverb, compression, noise gate, etc).

* In order to operate this on NP-F battery power, you will need a Power Junkie Blind Spot power adapter: https://www.amazon.com/Power-Junkie-NP-F-Blind-Spot/dp/B07NF14XW4?ref_=ast_sto_dp

 

Teradek Ace 500 Wireless HDMI transmitter & receiver

See it here: Teradek Website

Buy it here: B&H

I love the products Teradek are making, and their customer support is awesome too. Their Ace 500 system allows you to wirelessly transmit an HDMI feed from your camera back to the receiver, which then feeds the signal into the mix. A bit pricey, but has great range and no noticeable video artifacts. I use this for my roaming camera, so I can be mobile instead of wired into the system via HDMI cable. It can mount on top of your camera via cold shoe (using your own tripod “ball mount”), or if you’re using a gimbal, you’ll want to mount it off-camera using a SmallRig bracket. For the receiver, I added a ball mount on a cold shoe base plate meant for holding up a speed light. Lastly, I have no idea why these don’t come with a battery plate (how else are you supposed to power these things??) But you can buy them separately (one for the transmitter, one for the receiver), and they accept Canon LPE6 or Sony L battery types. You can find those here:

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1493877-REG/teradek_11_0848_ace_battery_plate_for.html

 

Nady MM-242 Mixer

See it here: Nady Website

Buy it here: B&H

When you have multiple external audio feeds going (like multiple wireless lavalier mics), you’ll need to mix the levels separately before bringing them into the Roland V-1. I tried a few different things but found this mixer to be the easiest. You can actually run 8 inputs, and sum them out to one stereo or mono output. Small, lightweight, and it runs on a 9v battery.

 

Lilliput A7S 7” Field Monitor

See it here: Lilliput Website

Buy it here: B&H

Here is a simple, no-frills monitor I found on B&H for $160. Decent size, good clarity, and runs on a standard NP-F style camera battery. I picked up a shoe stand and ball head shoe mount so it can easily stand up by itself on a table.

 

Atomos Ninja V 5” field recording monitor

See it here: Atomos Website

Buy it here: B&H

I just picked up this nifty little monitor that also records up to 4K. I plan on running this after my Roland video switcher “program out” and before the Teradek Vidiu Go “program in”. This will allow me to record a clean, high definition version of the video before it gets down res’d and sent out over the internet. Especially awesome because it will allow me to give the client a clean and crisp version of their live video.

 

Table & Chair

This may sound funny, but we always bring our own 6’ folding table and folding chair, with a table cover (black bed sheet). You never know where you are going to be live streaming from, and its always better to be prepared and have one less thing to worry about, like your client providing you a suitable table to setup on and chair to sit. These items are easily available at Home Depot!

 

Audio

For live streaming, we will typically bring a variety of wireless audio capture equipment, to be able to capture clean audio in any situation. I won’t spend too much time talking about these pieces of gear, but this is what I use and consider to be critical to a live shoot:

Zoom H4 – the best audio capture device ever. Super versatile and won’t let you down:

B&H

Sony UWP wireless lavalier – wireless lav transmitter and receiver. Easy to use, and provide clean audio. We use 4 of these.

B&H

Sony UWP wireless microphone – wireless microphone transmitter and receiver. Also easy to use and provides great clean audio. We use 1 of these.

B&H

Now, where does the stream go when it leaves the Teradek Vidiu Go? Let’s talk about their corecloud.tv website.

Core Cloud is the internet gateway that receives the video signal from the Vidiu Go. This website lets you preview your stream, adjust your settings, assign stream “destinations”, and ultimately click the GO LIVE button to send your stream out to your assigned destinations. There is a cost to using this service, presumably for the encoding from raw video footage to a streaming friendly format. However, I have found that it is not very expensive, based upon my usage (28GB’s of outbound traffic cost $56, which totaled almost 10 hours of live streaming).

For the most part, the website is rather easy to use. It does have a little bit of a learning curve, but once you figure out how to create new destinations and link your FB and Youtube accounts, its a breeze. I have found for me, instead of physically linking my Facebook and Youtube accounts into Core Cloud, I use RTMP codes from each of those platforms, and I set up those destinations as RTMP channels. This seems like an easier way for me to make sure my stream is going to the right Facebook page.

And that’s it! My live stream setup from A to Z. Below are a few short samples of our recent live stream feeds.

 

Live Stream Promo

https://vimeo.com/423258636

Wedding Live Stream

https://vimeo.com/402986203

Comedy Club Live Stream

https://vimeo.com/424537380

 


Rob Shotwell
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