Part of the problem is widespread of MacBooks. When this coronavirus thing was just starting, I thought about maybe working from home and bought a cheap 720p Logitech webcam for my home desktop PC. Year and a half later my picture still looks a magnitude better than most of coworkers' using their MacBook camera.
A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
131–136 of 136 posts
Re: A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
#132Earlier quoted context omitted.
The point of the article is not "how to do it", but rather to observe that this kind of thing, previously a (relatively) niche concern, has become important to a general audience. The article even suggests that there's a business opportunity for fashion businesses to create tailored videoconferencing spaces, which is predicated on the notion that most people lack the time or inclination to set up their own bespoke se…
Over a year ago now I had commented that it's funny watching the TV networks struggle to figure out what teenagers on TikTok had dialed in: Their streaming setups. I imagined that the broadcasters, when they had to switch to remote, had video and audio engineers you could put together a kit for their stars. But for a while it seemed like so many were "You have a laptop with a camera and mic Good to go!"
My FIL does TV debates in India, and his setup is to skyoe/zoom/meet into their station.
He's using an iPad mini to run all the apps tbh, and it works fine more or less.
Re: A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yowch. Sorry to read that. I built Camo. Can you drop us a note? Should be lower latency than a regular webcam as we can rely on device hardware to encode.
I love Camo. Any ETA for the Android version?
Thank you. We're going to be bringing more people onto the beta this week. We had a bit of a pause whilst we revisited a few bits. Hopefully you're on the list — I don't think we're too far away now!
Re: A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
The point of the article is not "how to do it", but rather to observe that this kind of thing, previously a (relatively) niche concern, has become important to a general audience. The article even suggests that there's a business opportunity for fashion businesses to create tailored videoconferencing spaces, which is predicated on the notion that most people lack the time or inclination to set up their own bespoke se…
> in much the same way that it would be hard to take a poorly-dressed person seriously The sooner we can get over this obsession with people dressed "nicely" and instead listen to people who know what they are talking about, the better. Any monkey can wear a jacket and tie. I hate that society automatically elevates well dressed people the way it does. To me it only signals that they have money.
> Any monkey can wear a jacket and tie.
Not really.
Suits are flattering to the male figure because they smooth out the difference between a man's waist and his thighs, and accentuate the shoulders. That's not a fashion statement, that's an explanation of why suits are timeless.
With that said, they're fairly difficult to get fitted right. So wearing a suit that actually fits you says one of two things - you either buy new suits all the time to ensure that your suits actually fit you (in which case, yes, a suit signals that you have money), or you have the self-discipline to maintain your figure so that you don't need to buy a new suit all the time as you gain weight.
The fact is, either quality is desirable. It's those qualities that make suit-wearing the signal that it is. People who don't have at least one of those qualities, can't pull off wearing a suit.
Re: A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
#135As someone who records nearly daily, I'm going to critique: > What’s required for an impeccable streaming setup? > 1) Good lighting that can be precisely calibrated, both in brightness and in colour temperature For most uses, fixed brightness is fine as long as you can adjust the light's distance. Lighting doesn't need to be color-temperature adjustable because that's what the white balance on your camera is for -- j…
You've suggested $200+ worth of equipment for an entry level setup. I realize in Silicon Valley that's probably the price of a hot dog but in the rest of the world its not cheap for just looking professional in meetings. Full time streamer is obviously different.
Also that much kit needs some space to setup semi permanently which is also going to complicate things. Each individual item isn't that big a deal on its own but everything together starts prove what the article was saying.
Re: A good livestreaming setup is a well-tailored suit
#136As someone who records nearly daily, I'm going to critique: > What’s required for an impeccable streaming setup? > 1) Good lighting that can be precisely calibrated, both in brightness and in colour temperature For most uses, fixed brightness is fine as long as you can adjust the light's distance. Lighting doesn't need to be color-temperature adjustable because that's what the white balance on your camera is for -- j…
You've suggested $200+ worth of equipment for an entry level setup. I realize in Silicon Valley that's probably the price of a hot dog but in the rest of the world its not cheap for just looking professional in meetings. Full time streamer is obviously different. Also that much kit needs some space to setup semi permanently which is also going to complicate things. Each individual item isn't that big a deal on its ow…
The original article was comparing it to a well-tailored suit. The equipment suggested certainly isn't any more than that.
And of course it's overkill for meetings for most people. It's for people whose profession is their appearance in part -- streamers, interviewees, presenters, hosts, salespeople, certain executives, etc.
For most people, a tiny clip-on ring light together with a cheap lapel mic, maybe $50 combined, would provide biggest bang for least effort/cost/space. And you don't even need the light if you're lucky enough to be facing a window and it's daytime (you always need a mic though). Plus making sure your built-in webcam is at eye level, not down below.
As for space, fortunately everything large in this world of equipment comes on tripods, and is foldable to flat. I store all my large items (ring light, mic stand, laptop stand, backdrop) in a 9"-wide sliver of space in the side of a closet, and the small things (webcam, webcam mount, mic) in a desk drawer. I've got the setup and takedown processes both down to 5 minutes.