Sending stems to a second console for live stream (part 4)
In part 3 of this series I outlined the ideal scenario for crafting a quality mix for both the sanctuary as well as a live stream using a second console. The idea is to have total control over each mix, but perhaps that’s a bit too much for your volunteers to handle. A simpler way to do sort of the same thing is by submixing stems from the main console, sending each group of parts to the second console. The concept of stems comes from the movie industry, where the audio track is submixed into categories such as dialog, background music, and sound effects. Then when performing the final mix if they want the music down a tad, you grab a single fader rather than 80 of them.
For a stream mix, the main issue is rebalancing chunks of things that need to be set differently than the main mix. For example, for drums it isn’t so much the need to remix the kick, snare, and overhead blend, but rather that the drums overall need to be cranked up for the stream (since you can hear them in the sanctuary acoustically). Maybe the vocals need a bit of boosting so they can be heard better on the stream.
To keep things simple, use an aux send for each subgroup you’re creating, such as drums, band, vocals, and talkies (pastor, etc), following the method I outlined two articles ago. Set the auxes post-fader for the same reasons we described then. Connect each aux output from the console to individual channels of your second console dedicated for streaming. Here’s what it looks like:
The second console operator only needs to touch up the balance between these groups, so your Pro Presenter/OSB operator (or even the main audio operator) could take care of this since it doesn’t require constant attention. You don’t need a fancy console for this; any low cost digital mixer allows you to add additional reverb, maybe touch up EQ, and add a bit of compression on the overall mix.
So we’ve covered three (and a half) ways to provide a live stream mix:
Copy of main mix (yuck)
Aux mix (pretty good)
Second console for stream (awesome)
And you can modify #3 by setting up aux mix stems to feed into the second console (pretty decent). All of these depend on your knowledge level, team members’ skill, size of your team, and resources/budget. Let me know if I can clarify any of this.
