rmrichesjr wrote:Then, someone passed me a note from the people in the remote room asking me to just keep the camera still, because they found the camera motion too distracting.
Done improperly, it is too distracting. The key is slow, smooth and with a purpose. And it never looks as bad to the cameraman at the time. You'd have to watch the playback to judge yourself properly.
(I hate watching the playback of my own stuff - "up! up! up! you're cutting off that guy's head! Good, panning to the left .... Uh, that's the Tenor section - they aren't singing! Ack! Why'd you stop there? You're cutting off someone else!)
I'm using a tripod I picked up used for $150. A good fluid head goes a long ways to making it work.
RussellHltn wrote:Done improperly, it is too distracting. The key is slow, smooth and with a purpose. And it never looks as bad to the cameraman at the time. You'd have to watch the playback to judge yourself properly.
(I hate watching the playback of my own stuff - "up! up! up! you're cutting off that guy's head! Good, panning to the left .... Uh, that's the Tenor section - they aren't singing! Ack! Why'd you stop there? You're cutting off someone else!)
I'm using a tripod I picked up used for $150. A good fluid head goes a long ways to making it work.
It sounds like you have more training and/or practice at camera techniques than do I. I have had some training, but it evidently wasn't enough.
That sounds like a nice tripod. Mine was about $50 new, and it has some form of fluid damping. One trick I learned a couple of years later was to duct-tape an 18-inch piece of funny pipe (one-half inch black poly tubing) to the tripod's handle. The springiness of the pipe and the fluid damping in the tripod's head made a really nice mechanical low pass filter.
I did a short stint in community programming for the local Public Affairs office. When you use good equipment, you don't want to go back. The tripod I got is a lot sturdier then needed for small cameras, but oh, that fluid head. Enough resistance that it's easy to push against to get it to do what you want, but no friction such that you have to press to "break it loose" and end up jerking the picture.
That long handle might work. I'll have to remember it. But it only works if you have a view screen to work with rather then an eyepiece.
RussellHltn wrote:I did a short stint in community programming for the local Public Affairs office. When you use good equipment, you don't want to go back. The tripod I got is a lot sturdier then needed for small cameras, but oh, that fluid head. Enough resistance that it's easy to push against to get it to do what you want, but no friction such that you have to press to "break it loose" and end up jerking the picture.
That long handle might work. I'll have to remember it. But it only works if you have a view screen to work with rather then an eyepiece.
That does sound like a nice tripod.
Yes, using the long handle wouldn't work well if trying to use the eyepiece. In my case, the tripod was atop two classroom tables held together with duct tape. Using the eyepiece was not an option. Putting the tripod up a few feet solved having to deal with young boys pulling faces in front of the camera.
Our Stake has successfully broadcast our Stake Conference from the Stake Center to another ward building using the Slingbox technology. All works great. Now the Stake President wants to replicate and have Stake Conference broadcast additionally to two Assisted Living Facilities in our Stake boundries. Has anyone successfuly broadcast to more than just a single building using multiple Slingboxes or some other method? If so, how?
We have created our own internal wireless internet with the use of the Q-Bridge antenna's.
I just found your post on Stake Conference transmissions. This is something I was wondering about doing in our stake. How did it go with your first transmission? Was it bug free without any drops or interference to the picture? This seams like it is a big decision to make because of the commitment that must go into it. For example do you pay a lot to get the best picture or do you compromise the quality of the transmission because something might come along that is better. I would like to hear from more people, what the different methods there are to accomplish a good quality and dependable transmission of both picture and sound. How many methods are there to accomplish this.
Just so others know what we've done... We've recently setup three of our outlying ward buildings to receive a Live stream from our Stake Centre via the internet for Firesides, Stake Conferences, Zone Conferences, etc. My understanding was that using a Slingbox would only allow 1 receiving unit to connect at a time (I could be wrong about that), whereas a streaming server would facilitate as many connections as we like. Not only that but using computers wouldn't be as proprietary and would allow us a bit more flexibilty in the future. Since we don't have the resources to run our own Media Server we outsourced the service for a minimal fee. Our setup is as follows:
Stake Centre:
- Windows box with a video capture card running Windows Media Encoder
- High quality IP "security" camera in the chapel
- DSL connection uploading to a Streaming Media Server (low monthly fee of <$50 for 4 unlimited connections)
Ward/Branch Buildings:
- Windows PC with dual display video card
- DSL or cable internet connection
Setup & Running costs::
1 average computer and 3 basic computers/laptops
1 IP Camera
Monthly streaming server charge (~$50/month)
*Windows Media Encoder and Player are free*
Misc cables and connectors to connect into the AV equipment
The IP camera is manually controlled using a joystick console. The video feed is received through the AV equipment (sound through the chapel sound system) and one of the outputs goes to the Stake Encoding computer which encodes in Windows Media and uploads at 400kbps to the Streaming Media Server. We can throttle the upload if needed to a lower rate if we have an Unit internet connection that can't pull it down at 400kbps (so far all three are fine)
The Units connect to a url which launches Windows Media Player and outputs the live video through the second cloned computer display (AV out through the sound card) which is fed into the AV equipment. Users toggle a switch when needed from the Satellite feed to Internet stream. The video and audio from the computer is then feed throughout the buildings to all the displays.
We have the unit computers in the AV rooms setup identically and pre-configured so that everything is mostly automated once they turn the computer on. We've done a few broadcasts already and everything has worked very well. The audio and video match up exactly and the delay is only about 20sec due to transmission and the buffer we've selected.
Video quality is great, you can tell at times as it will jog a bit during rapid motion but for a conference its great. Until now our outlying units have had to drive in anywhere from 2-4.5 hours from out of town to view anything so this is by far an improvement, saving time, money, and bringing meetings to those that normally wouldn't make the drive.
**And the best part is that we can remotely access the Stake Computer and begin a session without having to run down to the church.
Not sure if this setup would work for everyone but so far its been great for us.
Thanks Croftt
That was very informative. That's the first time I have seen anyone post such a complete description of their system. I see you stated that a DSL line
could be used. Is that what your were using? If not, would DSL be fast enough to stream conference with? I can see that if you could use DSL, you would not have to bring cable internet into all of the buildings. I'm wondering if this would work with Q-Bridge, which is like a wireless network. If anyone else has a system they would like to tell us about I would like to hear about it.
Thanks
croftt wrote:...
The IP camera is manually controlled using a joystick console. The video feed is received through the AV equipment (sound through the chapel sound system) and one of the outputs goes to the Stake Encoding computer which encodes in Windows Media and uploads at 400kbps to the Streaming Media Server. We can throttle the upload if needed to a lower rate if we have an Unit internet connection that can't pull it down at 400kbps (so far all three are fine)
...
Ground Rod wrote:Thanks Croftt
That was very informative. That's the first time I have seen anyone post such a complete description of their system. I see you stated that a DSL line
could be used. Is that what your were using? If not, would DSL be fast enough to stream conference with? I can see that if you could use DSL, you would not have to bring cable internet into all of the buildings. I'm wondering if this would work with Q-Bridge, which is like a wireless network. If anyone else has a system they would like to tell us about I would like to hear about it.
Thanks
(Until Croftt replies...)
All DSL lines I have seen have been able to handle well over the 400kbps figure quoted above. My suggestion would be to do a download speed test. If you can consistently download at least 500kbps (to give a bit of headroom above 400kbps), you should be okay.
All DSL lines I have seen have been able to handle well over the 400kbps figure quoted above. My suggestion would be to do a download speed test. If you can consistently download at least 500kbps (to give a bit of headroom above 400kbps), you should be okay.
Hope that helps.
Our limitation to the 400 kbps is strictly due to our upload speeds at the Stake Centre using our basic high speed package. Our average upload on the adsl connection we have is between 400 - 500kbps.
We've ensured each of the remote unit buildings has a high speed adsl connection (one is actually using a wireless internet provider) and all have around 3MB download speeds. Really the download speed is only an issue if the remote areas use dial-up or "light" internet which have a much slower download.
I'm not sure about the Q-bridge you mentioned. I'm definately not much of a guru but I'll definately share what I do know.
The tripod I got is a lot sturdier then needed for small cameras, but oh, that fluid head. Enough resistance that it's easy to push against to get it to do what you want, but no friction such that you have to press to "break it loose" and end up jerking the picture.
