Go Live with OBS

This is Vanessa Collins, your Certified Digital Marketing Specialist with your Weekly Tech Tip. Have you ever wanted to do a Facebook Live where you shared your screen? Maybe you wanted to do training or just show something interesting to your audience. But, you may have noticed if you hit share screen on from the Facebook interface, you are able to share your screen, but you can’t unshare it. You are stuck sharing your screen throughout your entire broadcast. If you want to have the ability to go back and forth, you must use a third-party platform.

There are few out there but most of them cost, except for one, Open Broadcaster Software or OBS. OBS is a free and open source software for video recording and live streaming. It allows you to do real-time video/audio capturing and mixing. You can create scenes made up of multiple sources including window captures, images, text, browser windows, webcams, capture cards and more. OBS supports streaming to most popular platforms including Facebook Live, Periscope, YouTube and Twitch (for any of you gamers in the house).

As I mentioned, OBS is an open source software which means that it isn’t owned by anyone. It was developed and maintained by a community of developers. That means that there is no support number to call if you get stuck. However, there are several forums where people who use OBS will answer your questions. In other words, Uncle Google is your friend.

So, if you want to add some real pizazz to your live broadcast, check out OBS at OBSproject.com.

Vanessa Collins is an author, publisher and Certified Digital Marketing Professional (CDMP). Coaches, Speakers, Authors, and Entrepreneurs hire her to show them how to use digital marketing to make more money in their business. Vanessa stays on the cutting edge of technology and provides timely information to her clients so that they can make fast, informed decisions about their business. She has written and published 6 books and has coached or published over 50 authors with over 100 books. She is the creator of Digital Mastery for Authors, Digital Mastery for Women and Digital Mastery Academy.