Does an "Encoder" really help livestream audio and video quality?

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Does an "Encoder" really help livestream audio and video quality?

PastorDarin

Hey Joel!

I heard about your website and resources through ProChurch tools. You have amazing resources and really great content!

Long story short, I recently became the new pastor of a smaller church in Wisconsin (about 100 people per Sunday). Before I got here the church did their best to produce a livestream service, which they stream to Facebook. Our issues are twofold.

FIRST, we struggle to get good audio on our online livestream service. Often the audio sounds good in-house (in the church building itself), but sounds different online. This isn't always the case, but it happens enough to annoy.

There have even been times where I sound like Alvin the Chipmunk online while I am preaching! We use a Behringer X32 as a soundboard, so we send the audio from that, through and iRig Pre HD, to an iPad Pro (2020). On the iPad Pro we use the App "Switcher Studio," through which we send our livestream to Facebook (or YouTube).

We have had a little better luck with audio, since we have learned how to create two separate mixes, one for in-house, and one we send online, but for some reason the quality is not great.

SECOND, our other problem is the quality of the video image online. It is grainy and not clear.

Our current setup uses an iPhone 6 and also a iPad Pro 2020 (with a "Switcher Studio" app). We us a iRig Pre HD to connect the audio coming out of our sound board (Behringer X32) to our iPad (which has the switcher app - "Switcher Studio"). Both the iPhone and the iPad function as cameras. However the Switcher Studio App does not allow us to record in 4k on the iPad or use the wide angle lens.

All that to say, I think one of our problems is a hardware issue - we do not actually have an "encoder." So my guess is some of the reasons our audio is off, and our video is off, is because our little setup is working really hard to process all the information we are sending to it (e.g. from the soundboard, ProPresenter slides, and two video sources).

When we run bandwidth checks on our WiFi, it seems like it is up to the challenge.

All that to say, any suggestions?

We are a small church, with a small budget, but would like to take some steps to make our livestream better. Maybe we need to bit the bullet and buy a Black Magic ATEM, and a Black Magic 4k camera. We are open to doing that, but our budget is not huge on this sort of thing.

At any rate, grateful for any suggestions you can offer!
Warmly,

Pastor Darin

davegking

PastorDarin I'd love to speak more into the audio side of things. While room mics can definitely help, often times in can cause more issues with lack of resources and knowledge.

Do you have a link to your stream? Or a recording of your livestream audio I could hear? Would definitely help in pointing you in the right direction.

joelwsmith

Hey Darin! Thanks for reaching out. Happy to help any way I can.

I'll do my best to take this step by step...

First, I would suggest working on your audio. That is something that will be important no matter what gear you choose to upgrade to, and it's also the most important part for people watching the stream.

If it sounds good in the room but not online, that usually means your online/broadcast audio mix is lacking the context of the room itself. In other words, you're only hearing the direct audio and not the audio like it's happening in the room.

A great way to bridge that gap is to use ambient microphones that are mixed into your online/broadcast mix only. These are microphones, usually placed near the back of the room, that help pick up the audio as it sounds to someone that is in the room. One of the best explanations I've seen about this is from the late Andrew Stone at Church on the Move in Tulsa. Check out his video here.

Now, as far as you sounding like a chipmunk... That could be some issue with the audio signal being sent to the device, Switcher Studio, your iPad, or the interface you use to get audio into the iPad. Make sure your X32 is set to a 48kHz sample rate. Sometimes a mismatch in sample rates can cause things to change pitch.

You mention that audio and video are "off". Are you saying that the audio and video are out of sync with one another when watching the live stream? If so, that could be the sample rate mismatch I mentioned earlier but it might also be the hardware struggling, like you mentioned.

If video is grainy, noisy, or soft looking then that is usually due to inadequate lighting. If you'll notice on the iPhone or iPad, if you shoot out in bright sunlight it's typically not nearly as noisy as it is when shooting indoors or in lower light situations. Those devices have tiny camera sensors, so they need a lot of light to work best. I would plan on working on lighting no matter what, because that usually goes a lot further in terms of image quality improvements than upgrading camera gear.

Upgrading your equipment is not necessarily a bad idea, but I would recommend working on those things first before changing any physical gear. Then, once you actually do make the upgrades it will all be ready anyways.

Also, just a quick note about posting. In the future, it will help if you separate out the issues into their own discussions. This will help keep the conversations focused and will also help others when searching for similar issues.

PastorDarin

davegking !!

Here is a LINK to a video where this audio was happening. Let me know your thoughts when you take a listen.

joelwsmith

PastorDarin First thing you need to do is fix the audio issues and get the most consistent and stable stream you can with what you have. It will take some troubleshooting and patience, but what you learn doing this will carry with you with whatever updates you make in the future.

First thing to tackle would be the audio stuttering and pitch shifting. Does it occur all the time or only sometimes? What happens if you just stream with the iPad and the audio interface and don't connect the iPhone or use graphics? That stuttering and pitch shift might be happening because there's too many things the iPad has to process.

davegking

PastorDarin That stuttering seems like it would be as a result of the ipad. I think pre-recording is the right move.

PastorDarin

joelwsmith I agree, about getting the audio figured out first!

And to answer you question, it only happens once in a while. The majority of our live streams have not sounded like the link I shared, but it happens enough and at random moments, that I sure would like to be able to know why it is happening so that we can fix it when it does happen.

My intuition is that the stuttering/pitch happens because, like you said, the iPad has too many things to process.

We have a volunteer tech person at the church who does most of this and troubleshoots issues like these. I have been in conversation with them about this, and we are both scratching our heads about it.

To remedy this we have pivoted to pre-recording. And since then we have never had audio issues like this when we pre-record, and we are basically using the exact same set-up, the only difference is we have our Switcher Studio App set to offline mode, so it just records the video directly to the iPad. I would like to NOT pre-record, for the simple fact that it adds a lot of extra time to my plate and other volunteers. We would like to get back to live-streaming, but wanna be more prepared for it.

joelwsmith

PastorDarin How are you getting ProPresenter slides into Switcher Studio?

PastorDarin

joelwsmith ! The SwitcherStudio app allows you to add different devices that are on the same WiFi. My understanding is that in the SwitcherStudio App itself, we see the church computer, on which is pro-presenter, and then just decided when and where we want that image to be displayed. Doest that make sense?

joelwsmith

PastorDarin Are you using the Switcher Cast app on the computer?

PastorDarin

joelwsmith Yes. We use it through WiFi. We open switcher cast on the computer and add source through the app. It shows up as a video feed.

joelwsmith

PastorDarin I would try disconnecting that and see if it stays more stable. Usually wireless screen capture or video connections like that take quite a bit of processing, so that may be part of what is overloading the iPad.