Get Streaming: How to start streaming on Twitch

Streaming on Twitch seems like an alluring thing, but sometimes it can be incredibly daunting to start. In this series I’m going to call Get Streaming, I’m going to go through some easy steps to get you started to stream on your favorite platform, whether it’s Twitch, YouTube or any other platform you might want to use! The great thing about streaming is that it’s basically the same, regardless of which platform you use.

There are a lot of different people online who have posted articles similar to this online, and what they post might not be exactly the same that I have. There are many different ways to do this, and this is the way that I’ve found that works best for me! Leave me a comment or chat in my Discord Server about it! (I have a specific channel for creators, lovingly labeled #creator-chat)

Pre-Production and Planning

Before you press that “Start Streaming” button, there are many things that you need to consider. First off, what are you going to stream? Are you playing games? Are they single player or multiplayer? Are you going to just stream yourself (Just Chatting) or something you like to do (Makers & Crafting)? The limits really are between your imagination and your platform’s terms of service!

Equipment

Live streaming requires three things:

• Video
• Audio
• Internet

To get the bare minimum, you just need the three things listed above, and I’ll show you how to get these. In this article, I’m going to set that we want to stream a Nintendo Switch Game as our end goal. It doesn’t have built-in streaming like an Xbox One or a PS5 would, so it might be a little more involved…which is why I want to use that.

Video

To get the stream going, you need a program to stream. Personally, I use OBS.live, which is the StreamElements version of OBS Studio. Install the program and open it to get to the main screen.

Now we have the program, but if we tried to start streaming now, OBS wouldn’t know where to stream or if it did, would just stream a black screen!

So to get the Nintendo Switch (or any other HDMI device) to show up on the screen, we’ll need to use a capture card. I use the Elgato HD60 Pro for mine, as I use a desktop and like the fact that it’s built-in to the computer.

Once you install the capture card, head to your “Sources” tab in OBS and add a “Video Capture Device” and select the capture card that you installed.

Now you should have video coming in from the capture card on your OBS screen!

You can also plug in a USB Webcam and add it as a Video Capture Device to show off you as well! Be sure that your webcam is higher than the game in the list or else it will be hidden by the gameplay.

Audio

Now most capture cards (especially HDMI ones) should have the audio built-in to the capture, so you won’t have to worry about the audio for that. If you like, you can use the “Monitor” function in the Advanced Audio Settings to hear it in your headphones, but if you see movement in your mixer on OBS when there is audio from the device you’re capturing, you will hear it on stream.

We have the audio from the game, but we wouldn’t be able to hear you yet! The best part of the stream is the streamer’s personality showing through the stream and we do that by using a microphone! There have been many I’ve used throughout the years, but currently I use an Elgato Wave 3 Microphone in my setup. Once your microphone is plugged in, head into the “Settings” in OBS (It’s a couple buttons under the “Start Streaming” button) and head to the “Audio” tab. In the Mic source, click it and select your Microphone. Now it should show up in the mixer and be a global source, meaning that regardless of what scene you’re on you will be able to have the microphone active.

Now that we have video and audio, all we need is internet and we’re on our way to streaming!

Internet

Assuming that you have internet already, I recommend that, if possible, you use a wired connection to stream. While you can use wi-fi to stream, it can occasionally drop. Use tools such as the Twitch Inspector to see if your internet is hefty enough to stream. If you have issues with encoding, try lowering your resolution. It might help.

Production

Now you’re ready to stream! Figure out what you’re streaming, then go live! If you’re on Twitch, as I’ve been using as an example, be sure that you also check your Twitch Dashboard to make sure that the game or category that you are streaming is up to date! You can also set your stream title and any related tags here as well!

Everyone’s experience is different on Twitch, but my abridged advice is: Be Yourself. It’s a lot easier to not have to keep up a personality for 2-5 hours. Be gracious to your viewers and be cognizant of what’s happening in chat. Since you’re streaming live, a lot of viewers may be looking for that interaction.

Post-Production

After a stream, head back to your dashboard and check out the Insights tab! It will have a summary of who watched your stream as well as any clips that were captured during the stream. Take some time to learn about the Insights tab (maybe I’ll do an article about that later) and see if you can use the data to understand your viewers and what works and doesn’t work for your stream.

Conclusion

First off, take it easy on me as this is kind of my first blog post in a while. I haven’t written in a while, but I have a lot of passion for content creation and helping people succeed. A lot of streaming is trial and error. The hardest part is starting. Once you get streaming for the first time, you should get more comfortable with what is happening in your own stream. If you have any specific questions about streaming, leave a comment on the article or leave a message in the Creator Chat channel on my Discord.

Thanks so much for reading, and happy streaming!