What gear do I need to livestream?

Chris Biscardi
InstructorChris Biscardi
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Published 5 years ago
Updated 4 years ago

While there are many useful tools and toys to pull together for a livestream, the truth is you don't need any of them to start.

Chris Biscardi: [00:01] On the top of what gear you need to stream? Basically, you don't need anything to click the go live button for the first time.

[00:11] What Horacio is saying here is, "It would be amazing to help people understand that not having the 'proper gear' should not stop them to start streaming!"

[00:22] He's absolutely right, because while I personally have been doing this for a few years at this point, I do a bunch of other things, like make Egghead video screencast of which this one is. I do other types of recording and video processing and things like that.

[00:40] I have a consulting practice in which I like to have high quality video and audio for interacting with my clients, because it's all remote.

[00:50] I have a very extreme setup. I have an SM7B right here. It's a fairly expensive, very nice mic. If you can afford it, I highly suggest it. Do you need it? No, especially not to start out.

[01:02] The content of a stream is not around the kind of equipment that you have. The content of a stream is around who you are as a person, because people are coming to see you. You will have a bunch of people in chat who know nothing about the programming language or the framework or the design tool you're using or whatever you're working with or teaching.

[01:26] You will have a bunch of people who have no idea, who are seeing it for the very first time. That's the content. The content is you being a person they enjoy spending time with more than it is the particular tool, or framework, or language that you're using.

[01:45] In that vein, as long as you meet a very minimum bar...If I have a fan running, and I put it right next to this mic, what you're going to hear is that fan in the background a lot. As long as the background noise, like that, is not overwhelming you, you aren't recording in the middle of a Starbucks, then you're going to be fine.

[02:09] Just get started. You don't need a mic. You don't need a camera. Just get started.