When it comes to live streaming, everyone wants in. Five years ago, churches didn't think about live streaming unless they had attendance in the thousands. Nowadays, even the smallest churches are wanting to stream.
There is a serious benefit to live streaming: The stats are clear that most people check out your online campus before they come to your church. So it's an incredible tool to reach new people and to connect with those attendees who travel for business, etc.
That being said, creating a respectable video stream is harder than it looks.
This article is written for those guys who have pastors who are interested in live streaming, but need to understand the investment that it requires. So here are a few things your pastor needs to know before pulling the trigger on live streaming:
It takes more than a camera and a laptop to make it happen.
One of the questions I used to get as an integrator all the time was, “I want to stream. Do I really need anything other than my laptop and this camera that we already have?” The answer is always, “yes.” We're going to break this up into two areas: Gear and Internet.
Gear
At the very minimum, the job requires a dedicated computer, an analog-to-digital converter, a camera, as well as a live streaming provider. Lastly, you need the people who know how to make all this stuff work together.
...without the right people you will not be ready to produce a respectable stream.
First, in order to do it right, it can't be any old computer. It needs to be a computer that is dedicated specifically to the streaming operation. If your church is running presentation software, or any other computer-based operation during your services, it needs to be done on a separate computer. It also needs to be a reasonably new, fast computer. I personally recommend a minimum of eight gigabytes of RAM and a solid-state hard drive. Solid state drives offer much faster access time than the standard hard drives with spinning disks. This may sound like overkill, but you need to ask this question, “When someone is checking out our services for the first time online, do I want their experience to be smooth or glitchy?”
Secondly, a good analog-to digital audio/video converter is a must. It may look like a little black box, but it's an integral part of the viewing experience. Don't buy the cheapest one on the market. You can find reviews of various converters on www.churchproduction.com, and other places.
Of course, a quality camera is also very important. If the shot does not look good on your monitor, then the streamed image will look horrid. Lighting for video is an art and a science. Remember to light the subject according to what looks good on the video monitor, not just to the naked eye. Church Production has produced numerous articles on the subject. Here are links to just a few:
Lighting for Video: A Tech Director's Round-Table
Does Your Pastor Know Good Lighting From Bad"
Four Ways To Take Your Lighting To The Next Level
The stats are clear that most people check out your online campus before they come to your church.
For a good starter camera, plan on spending three to four thousand dollars. Don't expect to get this at your neighborhood big box electronics store.
If you are planning to use multiple cameras or you want to show sermon notes on the stream, you are going to need a video switcher. Good switchers start around the two thousand dollar range and go up well into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The next thing that you need is a streaming provider. There are lots of options --- many of which specialize in helping churches. Just Google “church live stream provider” and you should find a range options available for your situation.
People
Beyond the hardware in your streaming infrastructure, make sure that you have someone, either on staff or a very committed volunteer, who knows how to make all this stuff work. You can spend money on the right hardware, but without the right people you will not be ready to produce a respectable stream. If you have to pay someone to set it up and train your team, it will likely be money well spent.
Internet
Once you have the right hardware and personnel in place, you need to focus on your internet service. First, you need to have a dedicated line for your streamed signal. Second, make sure that your upload speed is around four megabytes per second. Most churches struggle with internet bandwidth because so many people are using the internet during church services that it slows their speed down considerably. However, if you have a dedicated line for your streaming this won't be an issue. With only one user and one signal on the line, the speed will be as consistent and glitch-free as possible. Secondly, make sure the upload speed on the dedicated line is where it needs to be for streaming. When most people select a service from an internet provider, they focus primarily on the download speeds. For most church applications this is fine, but for your dedicated line for streaming, it's the upload speed that matters. Make sure you have at least four megabytes of upload speed available to you.
Streaming is extremely beneficial when the church is able to make the proper investment and they have the right production and IT support people in place. A high-quality stream can help boost attendance, connect people when they are unable to attend, and allow your church to have a much more contemporary web presence.
