Is OBS Studio Hurting Your Church's Volunteer Team? (The 5-Minute Training Alternative)
OBS is a powerful, full-featured piece of software that lets churches live-stream. Oh, and did I mention…it’s free? It also has a large community of users that can help churches learn to make the most of the software. Sounds great, right?
But for many, it's become a silent volunteer killer. If your stream relies on one tech guru and weeks of training, this post is for you.
And during the pandemic, thousands of American churches turned to OBS to help them get online in one nerve-wracking week in March. Ever since then, many of us have used OBS. But as the crisis passed, a major, hidden cost of this powerful software became clear.
The Real Cost of “Free”
Here’s the problem: OBS’ is not easy to learn. That is, it’s not very volunteer friendly.
Now, if you’ve used OBS and you’re reading this, you might immediately protest. “Hey, I love OBS! I learned it, and it’s great!” And that’s probably true. I’m sure you did learn it. But ask yourself this question: How long does it take to teach a brand new volunteer to use OBS?
How long until they’re reliably getting you online and getting everything done you need your OBS operator to do? The answer is weeks of training.
Fair enough, if there isn’t a quicker alternative…except there is.
Certain combinations of hardware switchers can drop weeks of training to less than 5 minutes of training.
That’s huge.
Real World Benefits
This afternoon, I was talking with a client. About three months ago, we converted her church from OBS Studio to the hardware solutions we typically use (By the way, you can see what that is in the video below). The client told me what that difference has meant in practical terms in their church:
Increased Volunteers: Previously, only one person could manage the complex camera switching. Now with the Blackmagic hardware, she has built a team of volunteers. The easier system dramatically increases your volunteer pool.
Intuitive Training: Because the hardware is more intuitive (big physical buttons, obvious controls), it's far easier to train people.
Level-Up Time: Training time is now spent on helping people level up (improving shot composition and camera selections) instead of learning the basics of getting online.
Simple Troubleshooting: Because there’s no PC involved, the set of potential issues is dramatically shorter. Problems are much more rare, and resolving them is much easier.
We see these benefits in every single church we work with. We have not yet seen an exception.
Ready to stop being the only live-stream expert at your church? Watch the video below to see the Blackmagic ATEM Constellation setup and learn how to implement a 5-minute training system for your volunteer team.
