Stream a service

This guide takes you from nothing to a finished, recorded live stream: set up the encoder and destinations once, schedule the service, check it privately on the day, go live, end it, and find the recording afterwards. It works the same in the web app and in Tech Manager.

Before your first service: set up the encoder

1. Go to Publish > Live Streaming > Encoders.
2. If it says No encoder yet, click + Add encoder, then Set up the ingest if asked. Your encoder now has one permanent address and key.
3. Point your encoder at it:
   • OBS on a booth computer running Tech Manager: click Send to OBS.
   • vMix: open Address and key, copy the Server URL and the Stream key (click Reveal first), and paste them into one stream slot in vMix's stream settings, set to Custom RTMP Server. Close vMix's Settings window so vMix saves it. Leave your other slots as they are: Start sending starts only this one.
   • Anything else (an ATEM Mini Pro, a hardware encoder): open Address and key, copy the Server URL and the Stream key (click Reveal first), and paste them into the encoder's stream settings.
4. In Quality, keep High unless your internet upload is weak (choose Standard) or strong and steady (choose Highest).

A plain ATEM Mini cannot stream by itself; connect it to a computer running OBS or vMix.

One encoder is enough for most churches, even with several services a week. Only if two rooms stream at the same time, click + Add encoder at the top right of the Encoders page and give the second one the room's name. It gets its own address and key, its own Booth computer (chosen in Set up the encoder) and its own watch page; your church's watch page keeps playing the first encoder.

Before your first service: choose where it goes

1. Go to Publish > Live Streaming > Destinations. Your watch page is already there.
2. In Connected Accounts, connect YouTube and/or Facebook and allow the permissions asked for.
3. Click + Add destination and add your YouTube channel, Facebook page or a Custom RTMP server. You never paste a YouTube or Facebook stream key.
4. Leave On by default on for the destinations every service should use.

Share your watch page link

1. Go to Publish > Watch Page.
2. Copy the Watch page link for your website, bulletin and social posts. It shows the live stream when you are live and your library the rest of the week.
3. Optionally turn on Prayer requests or Live chat under Taking Part, and click Save.

Schedule the service

1. Go to Publish > Live Streaming > Live Streams and click + Add live stream.
2. Choose Single, or Recurring to create every week at once.
3. Enter the Name, Date, Start and Planned end. Check the Encoder line shows your encoder (with more than one, the right room's; click Change to pick another).
4. Check Destinations, and in Recording keep Record this live stream on. Under When the stream ends, pick Save as draft (trim and publish later) or Keep it published.
5. Click Schedule live stream. The live stream's pre-flight opens.

On the day: get the picture in, privately

1. Open the live stream from Publish > Live Streaming > Live Streams (Open pre-flight).
2. Leave Readiness preview chosen in What This Run Is (or pick Rehearsal for a practice run that never goes public).
3. In the Booth card, click Start sending (offered for OBS and vMix), or Listen now and then start streaming from your encoder yourself. On vMix, Start sending starts only the stream slot pointed at WorshipMetrics.
4. Wait for Receiving at a bitrate. The status says Preview: video is reaching WorshipMetrics and only staff can see it. Keep a holding slide up: being private controls who can watch, not which seconds were sent.
5. Watch Cloud Preview and read the Ready Check until it shows All clear or only things you expect.

Go live

1. In the Publication card, click Go Live.
2. Check the list of destinations in the dialog and click Go Live.
3. The status turns to Live. Your watch page and every destination that was switched on are now public. During the service, watch Feed Health, mark moments with Clip This Moment, and moderate Live Chat if it is on.

End the service

1. Click End live stream in the Publication card.
2. If the dialog shows a box that starts Also stop, leave it ticked so the booth stops pushing video; otherwise stop the encoder at the device.
3. Click End live stream. The status shows Ended while the recording is prepared (usually about a minute), then Published.

After the service

1. Go to Publish > Library. The recording is there as a draft (or already published if you chose Keep it published), with the title, speaker, scripture and sermon series from the live stream.
2. Trim it, check the details and publish it. Until then a draft replay stays off the Library and the watch page.
3. Clips you marked are in the Library a few minutes after the service; make Reels from the recording on Publish > Reels.

Troubleshooting

Go Live is greyed out

Read the sentence under it: No video is reaching us yet. means the encoder is not getting through; No Destination is on. Turn one on first. means nothing would go public.

YouTube or Facebook did not go live

The run screen's Destinations card marks the row Failing with the reason. Your watch page and other destinations keep going. Reconnect the account on Publish > Live Streaming > Destinations before the next service.

Two services clash on one encoder

The schedule form shows Encoder conflict: an encoder carries one live stream at a time. Click Move this one to to start it after the other service. If both really run at the same time in different rooms, put one on another encoder: the form offers a Use button for an encoder that is free then, or Add a second encoder if your church has only one.

Start sending says vMix isn't set up to send to WorshipMetrics

Tech Manager found no vMix stream slot with your Server URL, so it started nothing. Paste the Server URL and Stream key from Publish > Live Streaming > Encoders into one Custom RTMP Server slot in vMix, close vMix's Settings window, and press Start sending again. If it says two slots point at WorshipMetrics, clear the one you don't use.

Our stream key was shared by mistake

Between services, go to Publish > Live Streaming > Encoders, open Address and key and click Regenerate key. The old key stops working at once; give the new one to your encoder (for OBS, click Send to OBS again).

Good to know

• Getting video in (Start sending) and going public (Go Live) are separate on purpose, so a sound check never goes out.
• Only End live stream ends a service; the planned end is a guide.
• Publish > Live Streaming > Stream Health keeps a report of each stream your switcher sends, for working out what went wrong.