Recording a Presenter's Laptop at a Conference // Show and Tell Ep.35

[@isidoromaich7226]

The few times I had to grab presentations I have used other ways, not very sophisticated but worked for me as non-professional I am :) a) if you ask very kind for the ppt files then you can run on a local machine by yourself at the same time (investment $0 :) b) install some kind of remote desktop/vnc software on the presenter's pc, people is reluctant to install strange apps in their computers but I was lucky they already had TeamViewer installed.

[@heretorecord]

Excellent points! THanks for sharing! I tend to do lots of tech conferences with live coding so the first option wouldn't always work out for me, but TeamViewer is a great idea :)

[@TheSwampDaddy]

Here to Record would TeamViewer work on a Linux box? Also, how would you get that TM source into your ATEM?

[@TheSwampDaddy]

Hi John, great informative videos keep up the great work!

[@cedricallard1746]

Hi ! Thanks for all your videos. Can you explain why it's important to record the prensenter's laptop ? I find that if the live editing during the conference went smoothly, I don't need to go bakc with the prensenter's laptop. Thanks for your imput

[@heretorecord]

Typically it’s a good idea to have a backup of everything where possible. Also some times you don’t live edit so it’s better to record the feed for editing later. If they send you a power point you will have an awful time syncing that to the video when editing!

[@cedricallard1746]

@@heretorecord Thanks for your feedback. And keep up the good videos :D

[@evy.agency4720]

Hey John, thanks for another helpful video. How reliable does the following workflow sound to you? Client laptop displaying Powerpoint > HDMI (full size) out > HDMI splitter (any brand you recommend?) one HDMI to us, the other to a venue projector > BMD HDMI to SDI > SDI > ATEM TVS HD > PGM > SDI > HyperDeck Studio Mini SDI In > SDI out > SDI > BMD Web Presenter > USB > Streaming laptop (OBS + Vimeo Live). All the BMD stuff could fit in a 2RU case (Like the SKB Studio Flyer with the streaming laptop on top of it). Seems fairly complicated for what should be a simple thing! Cheers, Ed

[@evy.agency4720]

Hey John, just a follow up to this. With the BMD HDMI to SDI converter, does it 'remember' the A/B setting? Or do you need to make sure it's set correct each time you use it? Just wondering as I'd be a pain to install software on client laptops in the above suggested workflow! Cheers

[@heretorecord]

Hey - your setup sounds great to me. It’s not far off what we do. It’s certainly complicated but if you want to add cameras then it makes sense! As for your follow up Q - yes the device will remember the settings so you can leave it running with no issues.

[@TheSwampDaddy]

John, what hdmi splitter are you using here? Also, is there a certain brand of hdmi cables? What are those?

[@hennedo]

Put an EDID Manager between Laptop and splitter, then u won't have ANY problems with the resolution, also: I found that (at least here in germany) DVI is still used very often, so plan in some DVI Splitting / Cabling / EDIDing..

[@TheSwampDaddy]

Hennetube can you recommend a EDID manager? I have a need to bring in 1024x768 from old Linux laptop. He comes out DisplayPort To hdmi then to a scaler and it still doesn’t work since the Source laptop video changes unexpectedly. I think there was a problem with the ED ID negotiation.

[@DevRel1]

Wait... I was thinking of using the Black Magic with a SD Card to record and use it's OUT to go to the projector? Will that not work?

[@heretorecord]

Yes you could indeed do that - I prefer the splitter as this way you don't put the Video Assist in the middle of the single as a point of potential failure. You could also - in theory - turn off the Video Assist or test playback within impacting the projector.

[@nanoIQ]

This is golden! Thank you so much!

[@joshkwabla]

Thanks John, Great Vid

[@neokomtv7981]

Hi John, since all the ATEM-Switchers are fixed to one resolution and framerate, how do you deal with different settings on different speaker-laptops? The Up/Down/Cross-Converter could be an option, do you have experience with it?

[@heretorecord]

I use the Decimator MD-HX and it solved all the issues that you’re mentioning. I haven’t had a problem since I got it and it’s my go to scaler!

[@neokomtv7981]

Great, thanks!

[@TheSwampDaddy]

Here to Record it works from any smpte video source to any other smpte video standard. But my VESA compliant DisplayPort output from a Linux laptop natively using 1024x768 would not work with this decimator.

[@mesoneens]

Hi John, what whould you suggest if the event have old projector with VGA out only. I had that issue today and the splitter would not let to connect both projector and TVS, i assume it's a resolution issue, since i couldn't set 1080i for projector, only 1024. in the end i had to use camera shot with screen

[@heretorecord]

+Nikita I’m going to have that issue at a conference next year but haven’t quite thought of the options yet! I think a scaler will be needed that have VGA support. I believe DataVideo or Roland both have some options.

[@TheSwampDaddy]

Here to Record look at the DAC70. I have one on order.

[@TheRacingLineTV]

Thanks for this, but i saw in you here using a BMD Video Assist, have you experienced dropping frames while recording on this? So when play back, recorded videos kinda jumps or pause, delay sort of. Plus i also noticed that you are using an AverMedia Portable recorder, does this drop frames also while recording? Thanks.

[@heretorecord]

+theracinglinetv inhave not found dropped frames on either device (not that I’ve noticed anyway). Are you using the right speed of SD cards? The AverMedia is a bit of a flaky device at times though when tying to record.

[@TheRacingLineTV]

Using class 10 sd cards at 64gb the most, is there an appropriate one? When its recording, I noticed there is this red signal on the screen, saying its dropping frames, when i play it back, it did dropped frames. So you mean the Video assist is much reliable than the AverMedia? or have you tried other devices that is more reliable to record via HDMI? Thanks

[@neokomtv7981]

The Video-Assist (at least 4k-Version) has an indicator for frame dropping: A red sign is blinking on the right corner of the display while recording... However, I think the Video-Assts is very reliable when using the right cards, even on 4k ProResHQ Recording. We use the Angelbird Pro AV 300Mb/s for 4k and the Sandisk Pro Extreme 95mb/s for HD Recording. Sandisk Extreme 64Mb/s starts to drop frames after approx. 15sec, so I wont recommend them.

[@heretorecord]

Funny I just shot a conference and was having dropped frames at 1080p25 on supported cards. Really sad to see this and will have to investigate what the issue is :(

[@zingerpro]

Hey John, I was wondering about the Avermedia recorder, does it accept the signal and work when sending a program feed to it from the Atem? Is there a way to control its recording settings such as Progressive/Interlace format and such? Also, i saw in ine review that it is limited to 32gb cards/files, I wonder if that's still the case or did they updated it with a firmware or something? Thanks, and you have a great channel! Eli

[@heretorecord]

Ohh that's a good question - I don't have mine anymore so I can't test it out for you, sadly. However, with that said, I can't see why you would have any issues sending the ATEMs HDMI output to the Avermedia. THere are also some settings within the PC/Mac application to change settings but I have found them to be very minimal. As for the SD card sizes, i'm not 100% sure - you may want to check with AverMedia on that one!

[@zingerpro]

I'm asking because it could be a very easy and cost effective way to get a file for the client for viewing instead of having a huge Prores file or something like that from a recorder, or using a video grabber which is not only expensive but uses a computer... An h264 file is better if i need to hand off a file that is for viewing or maybe even for uploading. What do you use now instead of the Avermedia?

[@heretorecord]

I haven’t replaced it yet. I was using it as a backup but decided that I didn’t need that (maybe I’ll regret that decision some day). I would try out the AverMedia for sure but I always recommend using the none SD card method (connect and capture directly to your computer) as I always found less issues with that. Then you’ll have an mp4 file right on the computer that you can write to a usb drive and hand to the customer!

[@zingerpro]

What issues did you had with the SD card method?

[@heretorecord]

I think I mention it slightly in my video but it’s about trust. If you hit that button and it flashes at you (when in SD card mode) then troubleshooting the issue is very difficult. However in PC mode, you can see the preview of what is being recorded and I found that it works (pretty much) every time.

[@randomgeocacher]

How reliable have you gotten this to work, have you experienced it break with any odd computers? Asking because I experienced several issues with running Atomos Ninja 2 in-line, while it worked great in all my own testing with normal computers it was very unreliable with hacker computers (obscure Linux variants, Mac running Parallell etc, seems like they might be disrespecting the HDMI limitations of the recorder) I got the advice to run a Decimator MD-HX or such to scale down to 1080p25, but I saw post by LeAVuser on atemuser forums saying that it wasn't reliable either; "Decimator products are currently not designed to support VESA computer formats and are instead designed for SMPTE broadcasting standards. While it is possible to get Decimator products to work with computers they can often be inconsistant and where one product will work others may not." So basically, how well does this device work in practice? Is it prone to breaking when computers decide to emit weird HDMI signals?

[@heretorecord]

Personally the only issues faced have been down to HDCP but otherwise all laptops have worked with this setup. I cannot recall if I have had any macs running parallel yet so it is hard to know what is going on there! Hoping not to run into a similar issue as yours as it sounds like a whole different converter might be needed.

[@TheSwampDaddy]

randomgeocacher yes this can be and in my case was my problem exactly see my post above. Some old laptops will throw the decimator a curve ball. My testing with all Macs worked well. With an old PC output to DisplayPort and then via hdmi via 1024x768, no go!

[@JorgieMathew]

Screen recorder!! Is it not helpful.