You are planning a live event for an audience of very important people. Aside from hosting the event, you are in charge of making sure that everyone that needs to be at the event is actually at the event!
A decision is made to live stream or webcast the affair to include a larger audience than can attend, or include a more widely-dispersed audience from far-flung regions of the globe.
What do you do?
Step One: Call a professional company that does live streaming for a living. This is a “cannot-fail” circumstance and since failure is not an option, your call to a professional webcasting service means that you can compare your own DIY costs with a quote from your trusted, recommended and professional live streaming partner.
Step Two: Hire the professional company and skip directly to Step Ten. If the decision is made to DIY, you can use the tips below to help guide you.
Step Three: Set your venue. Plan your party (event or meeting) by first planning to have space for attendees in the room. A live audience during a live webcast gives it energy. Be sure the room supports having space for selected guests, space for the broadcast video crew and most importantly – for the moderator and panel, or whatever else needs to be on the stage.
Step Four: Consider your stage technology. Within the room, plan for presenters to offer visual material like PowerPoint or Keynote with a screen and projector. A public address system is likely needed if your guests and audience will number over half a dozen.
Step Five: Consider your production technology. At least one camera is needed and a feed from the stage microphones. Both the video and the audio are then streamed through a computer to a server which sends the signals to all those who log in to watch.
In many cases, to provide a second or third view of the event, additional video cameras are needed. It means people watching the web stream can also see the audience, which makes them feel more like they are participating. Additionally, multiple camera angles forming master and reaction shots make the production inherently more watchable and less “stagy”.
With additional cameras, a video switcher is needed along with a director who makes the call to the camera operators for which camera will be live at any given moment.
Step Six: Don’t forget to tell your audience about the event. Anyone with access to a computer and modest download speed, will be able to watch your video livestream. But of course, unless they know you will be webcasting on a specific date, at a certain time, then you will not reach the audience you want.
Step Seven: Capture everything that happens. If questions from the audience are expected, have a microphone (or several) so that sound is heard in the room and at home. Questions that come in through live chat or Facebook from viewers watching the live webcast (if that is pre-determined) need to be displayed or read aloud.
Step Eight: The devil is in the details. Planning for video live streaming on the part of the individual or group holding the event to be seen worldwide on the web, requires an agenda, a guest (or guests), a moderator, a guest panel (if part of the agenda) and a room to hold the event, large enough to be accommodating, but not so large as to appear empty.
Step Nine: Boost your production values. You are going to get from “A” to “B”, but that simply means your event will be seen and heard. To really satisfy your audience and stakeholders, you must find ways to improve your production, to boost it from “obviously amateurish” to “sharp” and “seamless.”
If the event is sports or music oriented and it is to be webcast; that can be a little more complex. But add a commentator or two, and have some guests for introductory comments, half-time interviews and post-event re-caps, and you may be well on your way to a very successful video stream reaching a potential world-wide audience.
Step Ten: Take the rest of the day off. Producing a professional looking webcast that live streams to very important people requires decisive action and a competent team. When success is assured, you will have earned more than a few pats on the back and a little down time as well.
About Omni Media
Omni Media Productions is an established television production company based in Ontario, Canada. Our level of expertise has provided top-notch video production services across Canada and internationally. We have gained success due to the personalized service and well-maintained equipment that we bring to every project.
Our highly knowledgeable on-staff Ontario film crews will execute pro-level videography, webcasting, and video editing services. Utilizing professionals with years of video production experience is essential for any project. Omni Media Productions strives to exceed the expectations of our clients, and helps turn their vision into a reality.