www.byzcath.org Forums streaming TV

I forgot who called me and wanted to know about streaming TV (Byzantine) over the net.

I said that the software either costs money - or - you find the brains on the net who develop this stuff in the first place (and then corporations take their code and create a product from the free code and sell it to you).

Here is the free streaming server. It does everything you need - and more. I advise you to run it under Linux but there is also a version to run under Windows.

http://www.videolan.org/streaming/

either feed a live camera into it (DV port from your camcorder) or feed a file into it or several. Set up your weekly programming and forget it - let it rip all by itself.

By the end of this year MS and SBC will have thier first areas working (you get your canle TV feed over the same dsl line you have your computer hooked up to the net with) and they will offer this guy $100,00.00 to pull his free codoe off of the net to kill any new competition. And of course - he will take the cash and you will have to pay some coporation iif you want to stream your TV station across the net.

Cheers.

-ray

Ray,

That would have been me. I have had my hands full for the last few days and so I have been under the radar so to speak.

John

Ray,

Apple also has their Darwin Streaming Server too, which runs under Unix. But like I said, life has been a bit hectic lately so I haven't been around.

John

No prblem.. I downloaded VLC because I was so impressed by it. I intend to run it on my computer and stream my cable TV channels to my wirelss PDA - why? just because it is a neat thing to do

So if VLC disappepaprs in a few months - you know I will have a copy of the free version. Sometimes these things are free while a ton of prople contribute to the code - and when it really amounts to something it goeos commercial and pay. Well - I got the free version right here.

-ray

Same here...

Downloaded the source code and it is safely backed up to CD, Tape and DVD.

One of these days when I get some free time I will actually do a build on it.

John

You code??!! Terrific!!!

I downloaded the compiled for XP - and I tell you - it is a terrific program. It has become my main media player. When I set up up to stream my TV card output - I will message you a URL so you can watch my cable TV from your house over the net. Or I will stream a DVD movie to you for a test.

In fact my son has a small Dell - 1Gig herzt - and with Linux (he knows Linux - you know the young nimb minds) that should be plenty to serve out over a hundred simultanious strems. As a programmer you know that Linux does true multitaking while Windows multitasks well only when you ask it not to do more than one thing at a time

-ray

Actually I pretend to code. I can do builds on my Mac since it is Unix and I have GCC.

I used to code way back in the Apple II days, but then I repented and asked for forgiveness. The Lord said "Go and Code no more." and I have been almost faithful to his command for about 15 years.

John

Gentlemen,

I don't know what you guys are talking about but hope to learn a little as I rub shoulders with you.

However, a note in "Church News" under the Otpost '05 thread got me to thinking. Apparently some of the Otpost used to be broadcast over a local radio station in Pittsburgh. Why it stopped I have no idea and Gordo has given us many ideas for programing for a station and you fellows and others have talked about Byzantine TV and Radio, etc. It seems to me that the Otpost should be an anual special on any future TV,Radio, media outlets we have.

Just another idea for the Aug. 6 meeting.

Dan L

I just downloaded Windows Media Player Encoder - read a bit of the docs - and had my computer streaming my TV card - station 12 TBS - out to my PDA. The encder will also inset canned pre-files (meaning that when a client connects for a stream he can be shown an introductory logo screen of short ditty before he is connected to the main media stream).

REAL - easy and free!

Microsoft Movie Maker is also free - and fairly robust. And it takes a camcorder stream (plug the cable from your camcorder into the computer and capture the stream info a file).

So now we are all set - and the last part we need is someone with a camcorder and a laptop with large HD and a firewire connection. Plug it all into MS Movie Maker on the laptop - and it is compressed on the fly to a WMV file - transfer that file to the machine with the encoder and a cable internet connection (my local cable company charges $80 a month for a commercial grade IP connection) and we are streaming a TV station over the net.

In a very good world - we would want a Sony DV2100 camcorder (I will have to check that model number) and a wireless mic. In a perfect world we would set up two Sony camera (at different angles) and record and then shift angles periodically by editing (so people do not get bored with the same view).

So all that is relatively easy and cheap on a small scale. We could bump the scale up if you guys were really serious about running a top quality TV station. But what I presented so far - is really very adequate for streaming an internet TV station over the web.

Having all that logistics out of the way (I have it all figured out) the difficult part is�.

Broadcast schedule.

What will you broadcast ? Every day? Only on Sundays? How many hours? What is the content?

So you need to sit down and draw up a programming and broadcast schedule.

You need people willing to be on camera. You need a tech to setup and operate the recording. You need to pre-view all that is recorded and edit if necessary. Then you need to store the files to be broadcast with a schedule of release (when they will air).

Of course - you can record such things as biblical study sessions at your local church - so record a Wed evening session - edit it - and hold it for release one week later.

You can stream live Liturgy each Sunday (just bring a dsl line into the church in order to push the stream out into your server located else where).

You have all the makings for a low budget EWTN.

You will need a �store� to sell icons and bibles and stuff (support the station) and just think that whatever EWTN does - you can do also.

The quality of the broadcast is not really on the streaming server side - it is on the recording side (the camcorder, the wireless mics, the editing, the choreography ) as the server does its job well - it streams whatever you give it (files, live, etc..) you just have to have the bandwidth (pull) or lease the bandwidth from someone else (push).

So - who is the General Manager of the new BYZN-TV station??

I have my UFO theories I would like to warn the world about before it is too late!!!!

-ray

Hmm...

just a quick look into leaseing a streaming server and bandwidth ($10.00 a month per viewer) makes me think that leaseing would be cheap for only a short time - but once you pass the 500 viewers a month mark (easy to do) now you are far cheaper to have your own server and bandwidth and serve up multi-cast (the stream is set scheduled and peeople connect to it on-the-go as it airs - just like real TV). Uni-cast (as opposed to multicast) is taxing on the server and computers - it is content on demand (starts from the start of the show when ever it is pulled) so for every new connection made - a new stream is added - eventually your computer and server is doing 500 things at once and bogging down - while with multicast the server does just one thing - and people tap into it as it does its one thing.

I can't offer to do it for free (because it will cost me and I really never know where my next paycheck will come from) but I can setup and operate your braodcast facility from here - if you want that. Pass the shows to me and tell me when to air them - and I will build a web site for BYZN-TV and do the broadcasting. So I can create and operate your broadcast station - complete with web site. And advise you on all production. But I can't do it for free. Low cost - but not free.

YOu might want to get several bishops involed and record dirrent shows around the Byzantine universe. Bible study from New Mexico - spiritual direction from a priest in California ... talks on icon art from someone in some other place. Most of the shows can be done with a stationary camcorder ($200-$500) and an external mic. Stuff which many people already own. They just need some production advise - a couple of $20.00 quartz construction lights from Home Depot - advisie on how to place the mic - and how to get the recorded file out of the camera and into thier computer to send it to the broadcast seerver.

Nothing is real difficult - it just takes some coordination.

-ray

Ray,

This is what i am proposing at Whiting this weekend. We do need to get something together, but I would like it to be more than just Parma.

I am also going to be talking about getting one of the parishes wired for television so that we can feed the divine liturgy either to cable or to someone who might be willing to broadcast it.

Streaming, for me, is but a small part of the whole. I would like to make it as cross platform as possible so that those with Macs or Linux are not left out in the cold. Radio, Television, Film, and internet as a comprehensive mix is what I believe we need to strive for.

John

John,

Not to get off topic, but I just came across another possibility for spreading the message, Pocasting. I just checked out a website called the Catholic Insider which is devoted to this. With the popularity of MP3 Players among the young (and the not so young like me :rolleyes: ), I think it could be a possiblity. I posted it in Forum two.

In IC XC,
Father Anthony+

Pod-casting.

It is a form of internet radio.

The software and methods I have been talking about do that too.

-ray

PODcasting simply uses RSS to 'push' to your computer the intenet address of where to go to get the MPEG stream.

You don't have to go to google and search for it and then type into your player - where to go (that is called 'pull')

But you can not 'cast' the stream without the streaming server - which is the same hardware and software I have been talking about.

PODcasting is just an easy way to tell your computer where to go to get the stream.

-ray

With all respect, I think you are thinking in analog and film terms of yesterday.

It all boils down to MPEG.

Mothin Picture Experts Group.

The digital standard to all audio and visual.

All computers do MPEG. Windows, OSX, Linux and Unix... etc...

The propriatray part is the delievery system. The container. The compression evelope. Open up the delivery container (WMV, RAM, MOV, MP3, MP4) - open it up and what you have is an MPEG. The MPEG is extracted from the compression container - and it is the MPEG which is playing on all systems. Not the container.

VLC can stream pure MPEG version 1 or 2. Any computer and every operating system can handle it. There is no audio-vistual without it.

Film, TV, radio, what have you - it all creates an MPEG. Even live TV creates an MPEG and streams it.

The bulky analog system of yeasterday are still around - but the newer systems are simply - computers. And the anolof and film must now be transfered to MPEG before it can be broadcast anywhere. Recording, editing, broadcasting - all done from a computer - and an MPEG file - on a hard drive.

Anyway... I did my part. The analog past is being quickly phased out (hesitate the huge existing investment in analog and physical film investment) and being replaced by a few computers manipulating MPEG files. What was once done by a huge investment of equoment is now done on one desktop computer and an MPEG (digital) stream.

Most of the music you hear on movies and radio is done on music work stations. A computer.

Anyway...

Have fun John.

-ray