Telestream Wirecast Makes Live Video Flexible and Fun
[Note: This sponsored interview was recorded at Streaming Media East, 2012.]
While there are plenty of simple options for live video streaming, Telestream Wirecast provides a step-up: it's just as simple to use, but it offers more options to the creator. At a red carpet interview during the recent Streaming Media East conference, Eric Norrell, applications specialist for desktop products at Telestream, talked about the product's many partnerships.
"The nice thing about our piece of software is I can actually be streaming to Justin.tv, Livestream, Ustream, all at the same time. YouTube Live, now. We have a new partnership with Wirecast for YouTube," explained Norrell. "They came to us, wanting to provide quality streams into their platforms, so we produced a product for them. And they actually give that away for their preferred premiere partners so that they get nice content coming in for their servers."
Telestream Wirecast works with more professional products, as well.
"We've integrated with, like, the DeckLink series, Intensity series from Blackmagic, which really give us a lot of flexibility with multi-camera shoots and professional-level content. We've partnered with a lot of big players out there. I mentioned YouTube, but Teradek," said Norrell. "All sorts of cool ways of getting video in and places to send the video, so it's great that we have partners on both the distribution end and the ingest end."
While Wirecast offers excellent features and compatibility, the main reason Norrell wants people to try it is because it's a pleasure to use.
"It's really fun, and it's free to download, and I would encourage people to check it out. I have a lot of fun with it, and it is a really fun product to work out of," Norrell added.
Watch the full red carpet interview with Eric Norrell of Telestream:
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: Hi, I'm Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen. I'm the editor of StreamingMedia.com and Streaming Media magazine, and we're here at Streaming Media East in New York City, doing our red carpet interviewers with some of the thought leaders in the industry, some of the more interesting companies out there, and Telestream certainly has some very interesting products. I'm with Eric Norrell, who is the application specialist for the desktop products at Telestream, and perhaps the best known product that Telestream has is Wirecast. Can you tell our viewers a little bit more about Wirecast and what it does?
Eric Norrell: Certainly. Wirecast is a really fun product to play with, but what it really does is it allows multi-format live webcasting and streaming. It allows you to do your switching, your compositing, as well as your end stream and your VOD stream. So, you can do multi-format outputs, switch dynamically between media sources, camera shots, desktop sources, presentations. You really have it all in one piece of software. It's cross-platform and easy to use.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: It is easy to use, although it's certainly a little bit more complex and offers a lot more features than your basic cloud-streaming service, like a Livestream or a Ustream. Why would someone who is currently using one of those services might want to step up to Wirecast, and then let's talk about at the upper level, the professional level, what do professional users get out of Wirecast. But back to sort of the consumer or the hobbyist level.
Eric Norrell: For sure. And the nice thing about our piece of software is I can actually be streaming to Justin.tv, Livestream, Ustream, all at the same time. YouTube Live, now. We have a new partnership with Wirecast for YouTube. They came to us, wanting to provide quality streams into their platforms, so we produced a product for them. And they actually give that away for their preferred premiere partners so that they get nice content coming in for their servers. But, from a base level, if you or I had a Ustream of a Livestream show, we'd be able to get on there, you just put in your channel user name, you hit Go, you select a preset, and it's easy to get online. In maybe four or five minutes, you've got your webcam. So that's a lower level use of the product, because it really can interface with any HD-SDI, HDMI camera. We've integrated with, like, the DeckLink series, Intensity series from Blackmagic, which really give us a lot of flexibility with multi-camera shoots and professional-level content. We've partnered with a lot of big players out there. I mentioned YouTube, but Teradek. All sorts of cool ways of getting video in and places to send the video, so it's great that we have partners on both the distribution end and the ingest end.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: Right. Now, obviously, the last year has been huge for online video from the way that user-generated content has been put into play covering news events from Arab Spring to the Occupy Wall Street events. We've got the presidential campaign in full swing right now, so there's a lot of live video streaming. Do you think we're at a tipping point now where online video streaming live is really going to become as commonplace as live news reporting on television?
Eric Norrell: I think so. I mean, a lot of companies have started doing that. They asked users to send them content for the news distribution. But I think it really is going that way, especially in education. That's a huge market, obviously, for video as a way to replace textbooks, which go out of date every few months. If you can just sit down, record something, and produce educational material that way. But sports all the way from high school, amateur, independent leagues, even some of the pro leagues are using it for a lot of their web distribution. It's really interesting to see what people are doing with the product because you never know until you start talking to customers. It's going to be interesting, I think, in 2012 to see how it effects politics, because it's so easy. I mean, with the live streaming. A couple of years ago in Egypt, there was a lot of live streaming stuff that helped some change there, and it's really interesting to see where people are going with the video. And, obviously, the Occupy movement was huge for live streaming and very interesting content coming from all over.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: Right. And we focused on live streaming in this conversation, but you can use Wirecast to create content for on-demand viewing, as well, right?
Eric Norrell: Exactly. And, basically, what you can do is save streamed Flash video to the web, but you want maybe a QuickTime or Windows Media file for your edit system, and you can actually -- and you have a QuickTime codec that's available to your system. You can drop that into a little bit more editor-friendly format.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: Great. Anything else you want to tell us about Wirecast that we haven't covered?
Eric Norrell: It's really fun, and it's free to download, and I would encourage people to check it out. I have a lot of fun with it, and it is a really fun product to work out of.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: That it is. It's a great way to make that -- If you're new to video editing and streaming live or producing shows, it's a great way to make that next step forward. If you're a professional at it, it gives you everything you need, really, in a compact, easy-to-use package, and it's available at www.telestream.net, correct?
Eric Norrell: Yes.
Eric Schumacher-Rasmussen: Great. Thanks, Eric. That's wraps it up here from the red carpet with Eric from Telestream.
This article is Sponsored Content
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