Live Webcasting allows you to broadcast LIVE audio and/or video events through SermonAudio! Applications include broadcasting live church services, special meetings, or simply your own live broadcast for fun! SermonAudio makes it easy to "go live" at any time and as often as you like. It's easy and fun to use this feature and it will help get you extra exposure throughout the site!

Anyone with the latest version of Windows Media Player installed on their PC can listen to or watch any live webcast, but if you are wishing to be the broadcaster of a live webcast, you will need the following:

• You must be a "FULL" Broadcasting Member (more info).
• You must have the "Live Webcasting" option enabled for your account (some fees apply):
  
  
  • Only $10 is added to your base monthly fee.
  • Only $2.50 for each webcast hour (additional usage fee), OR...
  • Only $9.50 per VIDEO webcast hour (additional usage fee).
  
  
• You must have a direct connection to the Internet (dialup or high-speed).
• For dialup users, please disable the "auto-disconnect" feature as necessary.
  
  
• For video webcasters, a high-speed broadband internet connection is required (particularly with a fast upload bandwidth speed—more about bandwidth and encoding bitrates below in Step #6) and a separate, dedicated computer used for only the webcast encoding is highly recommended.
  
  We also recommend using the Canopus ADVC300 to convert your analog audio/video signal to a single digital FIREWIRE signal that you can feed to your computer (a good laptop solution).
  
  Another recommended option would be to use a high-quality audio+video capture card such as the ViewCast Osprey product line. (We do not recommend using a capture card that only captures video and depends on the computer's sound card to capture the audio.)

• You cannot be behind a proxy server.. you must be directly connected to the web.
• You must be running either Windows XP, Windows 2000, or Windows 2003.
• You must have Microsoft Windows Media Encoder installed (this tool is free from Microsoft).

After you have met the above requirements, the following screen shots will take you step-by-step through the process of webcasting a live event on SermonAudio!



Step 1: Make sure your account is Webcast-Enabled.

There's a quick and easy way to see if your account is webcast-enabled. Go to the Live Webcasts section on SermonAudio to see if your church is listed as a webcaster. Also, when you are live webcasting, the appropriate button on your homepage will automatically change from the OFF AIR button to the ON AIR button.

Step 2: Start Windows Media Encoder.

Next, you will need to start the Windows Media Encoder program on your computer. This is a free tool from Microsoft that you can download by clicking here. Once the program loads up, the first thing you should see is the following screen:

Step 3: Click the OK Button and then proceed to the next screen.

For this next step, ensure that the Audio option is SELECTED. The Video option must only be selected if you have VIDEO Live Webcasting enabled for your account. If not, then you will need to UNCHECK the Video option. Please observe the screen carefully below.

Step 4: Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen.

Be sure the first option is selected (Push to a Windows Media Server). This will allow you to initiate the live webcast to SermonAudio whenever you want and as often as you want. The site will automatically detect your webcast and appropriate activate the right buttons on-site! A truly complete and flexible solution!

Step 5: Setting the Publishing Point.

Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen. Here, you will need to fill in some details. As shown below, use radio.sa-media.com as the server name and then use your SermonAudio Member ID with "_upstream" appended to it for the "publishing point". For example, if your SermonAudio Member ID is "calvarybaptist", then the Publishing Point value would be:

calvarybaptist_upstream

Step 6: Setting the Bitrate — Important!

Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen. Here, you will be setting the bandwidth bitrate of the webcasting stream. What you select here will depend greatly on the kind of connection you have. Please review the details of this entire STEP carefully.

New!  HIFI OPTION. Broadcasters that have the HIFI option enabled for their account can webcast at higher bitrates and upload archived media at higher bitrates. You must have this option enabled for your account in order to use the HIFI bitrates. To learn more, please click here..

• Audio-only webcasts. DO NOT exceed 19kbps bitrate (37kbps for HIFI)—Screen A below.
  If you are connected with a slower dialup connection, you may need to select a lower bitrate for your webcast if you are experiencing buffering problems with your listeners. Select only ONE bitrate from the list as shown.

• Video webcasts. DO NOT exceed 148kbps bitrate (340kbps for HIFI)—Screen B below.
  Video Webcasting is only suitable for churches with high-speed broadband connections (although the end-user may still have dial-up). HIFI webcasters, please see Step #11 below..

  IMPORTANT!! It is imperative that your upload bandwidth speed is fast enough to ensure a smooth and successful webcast. Find out what your upload bandwidth speed is at your location.
  Your upload bandwidth speed must be at least 250kbps for standard live video webcasts (and at least 500kbps for HIFI video webcasts).

  Video webcasting uses a technology called "Intelligent Streaming" to deliver the video stream to the viewer. What that means is that when network conditions are poor, Windows Media Player asks the server to "thin" the bitrate by only sending video key-frames. If network conditions still do not improve, Windows Media Player asks the server to turn off the video portion completely (audio-only). When a visitor wishes to watch a video webcast, they can choose either a high-quality or low-quality stream depending on their connection speed.

Step 7: Archive the live webcast stream?

Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen. You do not need to change anything on this page. You may or may not want to archive this webcast using Windows Media Encoder.

If you are a live VIDEO webcaster, you can choose to save the live VIDEO webcast as a WMV (Windows Media Video) file which you can upload later as an archived video. The bitrate setting for live video webcasts should already match the bitrate setting required for archived videos.

Hint: If you need to, you can use the Windows Media File Editor (which is included with the Media Encoder installation) to quickly and easily TRIM your resulting WMV files.

Please note that if you want to save the audio as an MP3 file for later uploading to SermonAudio (as a proper sermon), you will still need to record/encode/upload the audio in the "traditional" SermonAudio way as described in our MP3 Encoding Help Page.

The Windows Media Encoder program can run simultaneously with the Adobe Audition audio recorder without any problem for audio-only webcasting. For video webcasting, we recommend using a separate computer for Adobe Audition.

Step 8: Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen.

At this point, you can optionally fill in the details of your live webcast (ie: Title, Author, etc). This information will NOT appear anywhere on the SermonAudio site but it WILL appear in the listener's Windows Media Player. We recommend using a generic description so you don't have to fill in new details every time.

Step 9: Finished! That was easy!

Click the NEXT Button and then proceed to the next screen. At this point you are almost ready to live webcast publicly. If the "Begin broadcasting when I click Finish" option is CHECKED, then after clicking the "Finish" button you will be ON-THE-AIR!

Notice for LIVE VIDEO webcasters! However, if you are a live VIDEO webcaster, we recommend that you UN-CHECK the "Begin broadcasting.." option (before clicking "Finish") and proceed below.

Step 10: Click the FINISH Button.

After a number of seconds, the following window will appear prompting you to enter your Member ID and Password (this is your SermonAudio Member ID and Password). This password-protection is to guard against anyone else webcasting under your account.

Please note that it may take several seconds (up to 30 seconds or even one minute) for this last step to finish. Please be patient. It is initiating the live webcast with our server and your broadcast will be publicly displayed very shortly.



Step 11: Strongly recommended step for video encoding presets!

New! SermonAudio has provided the following PRESET Encoding Setting file (modified from the default encoder settings) that you can download and import into the Encoder for your convenience:

• sermonaudio150.prx - for standard live video webcasters (150kbps).
  

  Encoding Mode:	CBR
  Audio Codec:	Windows Media Audio 9.2
  Audio Format:	20kbps, 22khz, mono CBR
  Video Codec:	Windows Media Video 9
  Video Size:	320x240 (Widescreen: 430x240)
  Video Bitrate:	121kbps
  Frame Rate:	15fps
  Key Frame Int:	10 seconds
  Vid Smoothness:	60
  Total Bitrate:	148kbps (do not exceed this)

• sermonaudio340.prx - for HIFI live video webcasters (340kbps).
  

  Encoding Mode:	CBR
  Audio Codec:	Windows Media Audio 9.2
  Audio Format:	20kbps, 22khz, mono CBR
  Video Codec:	Windows Media Video 9
  Video Size:	320x240 (Widescreen: 430x240)
  Video Bitrate:	311kbps
  Frame Rate:	29.97fps
  Key Frame Int:	8 seconds
  Vid Smoothness:	70
  Total Bitrate:	340kbps (do not exceed this)

• Portable Media Players. Portable players like Microsoft's Zune can natively play WMV video files. However, we have found that if the video size is not 320x240, it will take much longer to load these videos on to the device because it must first "convert" them to native size.
  
  
• SermonAudio Internet Radio. Although the Internet Radio is an audio-only device, it can also tune into live video webcasts from the site. However, the manufacturer has advised that only the Windows Media Audio 9.x audio codec be used (do not use the WMA Voice 9 codec).
  
  
• Dialup Users. Broadband users will of course benefit the most from the video webcasts. But there are still many who use dialup and for them, only the audio portion of the stream will be used. For this reason we recommend that the audio encoding settings are kept under 30kbps if possible for the most reliable streaming experience.

At this point, you can select OK to accept all the changes and then you can begin your webcast by clicking on the Start Encoding button as shown below!

Step 12: TIP for Improving the Quality of "Noisy Video"

New! This entire step is an optional tip to help improve the quality of "noisy video" for webcasters experiencing this problem. It is of course only applicable to VIDEO webcasters. The below screenshot shows how to make the necessary setting adjustment to help eliminate "noisy video".

Please note, this option is significantly CPU-intensive and is only advisable if your computer is fairly powerful with a higher-end graphics card (that supports hardware de-interlacing).

That's it! Congratulations!

If the webcast has successfully started, you should see a screen similar to the following broadcasting your audio in real-time LIVE! The site is designed to automatically detect when you are "ON-THE-AIR" and will make it clear to all who are on the site that a LIVE webcast is in progress.

When you are live webcasting, the button will automatically change from the OFF AIR button to the ON AIR button.

Please note it may take up to one minute for SermonAudio to actually detect that you are on-the-air. This simply means that the OFF AIR button may not change into the ON AIR for up to one minute. Please be patient. This is the nature of the technology at this point. Therefore, please anticipate for this one-minute delay in all of your live webcasts.

TIP: You can "File/Save As" this Windows Encoder session settings for future webcasts so you do not have to go through the (above) steps every time you wish to start a webcast.

You can keep the live webcast on-the-air for as long or as short as you wish. SermonAudio will automatically keep track of the number of hours that are used in your live webcasts throughout the month and then add the $2.50 per hour charge to your next billing cycle ($9.50 per hour for video).

In order to STOP the live webcast, simply press the "STOP" button on the Windows Media Encoder and close the program entirely. Please be aware that it may be up to 5 minutes before SermonAudio is able to detect that you are completely off-the-air. Do not be alarmed at this. We have taken these delays into account when calculating the usage charge for billing.

Here are some last-minute important tips to keep in mind!

• It is very important that you follow Step #6 and #11 (above) precisely in regards to the bitrate setting. This needs to be correct or we will need to terminate the webcast while in progress.
• Be sure that you do not "tie-up" the bandwidth at your location by trying to watch the webcast over the same connection that the live webcast is currently broadcasting on.
• For video-webcasting, do not "disturb" the PC that is doing the video webcast.. not even so much as clicking on the web browser. In fact, it is best simply to completely leave it alone while the webcast is in progress. Video encoding is a CPU-intensive process which can result in the webcast failing if it doesn't have the computer's 100% attention.