Live stream with spotty lighting

[AVTeckie]

I'm looking to set up a live stream for a stage setup that doesn't have the most ideal lighting setup. There are too few lights causing the video to get blown out when I try to record the entire stage.

Currently, my plan is to find a camera that can handle the "dynamic" lighting situation and capture as many pixels as possible so that we can do digital zooms in OBS and stream at a lower resolution. Idea being to eliminate as much camera work as possible and do it all at the computer instead.

Aside from the pixel and lighting requirements, the only other concern of course is setting up a video out (hdmi?) to send to the computer.

Any suggestions as to a possible camera to look at would be appreciated. Looking at the market, I think I would like to keep it under 5k if possible

 

[Andrew S10]

What camera are you currently using?

You might have to shoot in Log or HLG to keep the highlights from blowing out. A monitor that can apply a LUT to HDMI pass-through may be all you need, but it will likely introduce some latency.

Otherwise you need a camera that can apply a corrective LUT to the HDMI or HD-SDI output, and I'm really not sure which cameras support that.

I assume that you want constant AF as opposed to manual focus?

 

[uncle dunc]

Could you spend some of your money on more lights? That might eliminate the need for a new camera.

 

[Joe Lynch]

If you are trying to live stream what would normally be a theater set or auditorium, and the lighting was designed for a live performance in front of an audience, then why not set the exposure manually to get the subjects exposed correctly without blowing the highlights and then let the shadows go dark?

Are the highlights getting blown out because of shooting in autoexposure mode with a lot of dark space in the scene? If so, maybe you can make adjustments at the camera that will at least help with your problem.

Inexpensive (now) HDMI to USB capture card will get 1080P to the computer. Not sure about the availability of 4k capture card that would help with your zoom in OBS requirement, I've never tried it.

Joe

 

[AVTeckie]

Currently I have a little bit of an older Sony camcorder that shoots maximum 1080i (which was a new term to me), so admittedly it's not the best place to start. I personally have next to zero experience with video camera technologies aside from what I've learned from Corridor Digital on YouTube.

Currently my plan (which is subject to change depending on what input I get), is to have a 100% static camera setup with no camera operator, and feed the video into a PC where I will use OBS to combine with the audio from the sound system.

As I said, given sufficient quality/pixels ideally I can set up scenes in OBS that would allow us to do "digital zoom" for different circumstances and then just stream in 1080 or whatever quality we end up with at the end.

 

[AVTeckie]

I'm looking into that but I don't have costs yet. Problem is that it's an old stage that originally had lighting at the very back of the auditorium which is horrible for people on stage. About 6 years ago we got a new digital light system installed much closer to the stage, but as I recall we had space and power issues so I don't know how much all of that is going to cost yet.

Bottom line, I can get a new camera much faster than new lighting so my gut feeling right now is that short term, if I can find an appropriate camera it will be less budget breaking than a new lighting system AND a camera. Also, I'm thinking if I can find a camera that works with what we have, it will be more forgiving for future lighting setups

Feel free to prove my gut feeling wrong though!

 

[AVTeckie]

The lighting situation I have I would call "incomplete" more than anything due to budgets. Those decisions were made before I had any involvement unfortunately.

In my lighting tests with the older Sony camcorder, I had to bring the lights down to about 70% before it looked reasonable on the camera. To be honest, I did not consider manually adjusting the exposure, so used to automatic functions!

Manually adjusting the exposure might do the trick, the only issue I see is that if anyone wanders away from the lights that they're going to be too dark to see well... we might just have to live with it in the short term.

I like to think I've done a half decent amount of research regarding capture cards. I already have a cheaper 1080p capture to get started with and I've found a few true 4k capture running around $500-600 (a lot just do pass-through 4k) so I'm not too worried about that at the moment.

 

[Andrew S10]

You'll want to deinterlace your video in OBS if you can, otherwise people watching on a computer monitor will see combing artifacts.

My old Sony SR-11 had zebra stripes, check if your camera supports that feature and manually expose your shot.

 

[AVTeckie]

Based on some quick Googling, it looks like OBS can handle deinterlacing so I'll keep it in mind. Thanks for that tip!

 

[Pete Silver]

To me you wont be able to get around the problem without more lighting.

Put the camera on manual exposure for the highlights - faces are the most important.

 

[AVTeckie]

Well, we just did our first "simulated live stream" pre-recording test using what we have. I took a reference picture on my phone (Oneplus6) and despite being a good camera it still struggled. I did manually adjust exposure (thanks for that tip!) and set up the old Sony camcorder closer to the stage and that helped significantly. Still not ideal in my mind, but still better. Hopefully, over the next week, I'll get some answers about the lighting costs but in the meantime, I'll be visiting some local camera stores as well to start getting that sorted.

For those that want to see how it turned out, the recording will be streamed July 7/2020 on YouTube on the "First Alliance Church Toronto" channel.

 

[Joe Lynch]

Good to hear you are making progress! Get the most you can out of what you have, then you will know much more about what to buy after that.

Also, there is a fellow on YouTube that has some excellent videos, specifically related to church services and live streaming. He is AJaytheCEO. If you have some time, take a look at his channel. I'm not involved directly with church video production, but I have learned a lot from AJay.

Best of luck to you with your project.

Joe

 

[rmexpress22]

I expected to see worse lighting. If they can dim the lights shining on the people, that'll solve your problem. Besides that, expose for the people if that's the most important thing.

 

[AVTeckie]

It's a little deceptive, I had to dial the lights down to about 75%. I'm thinking that adding some diffusers might help even out the lighting a little, but I think I'll just have to wait for our consultant to get back to me about that. I mean, it's good lighting, it just has poor coverage so if the camera is zoomed out too much it just doesn't work well.