- Ecamm Live topped our charts last year
as best live streaming app on Mac
but is it still the best live streaming software
on Mac in 2018?
Let's take a look.
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Hey, it's Justin Brown here from Primal Video,
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So, let's jump into it.
Ecamm Live is an incredibly well priced solution
when it comes to live streaming software on Mac.
It packs in a ton of awesome features
but there is a lot of other competition
in the live streaming on Mac space as well.
So, how does Ecamm Live stack up?
So, we're gonna dive into a bit of review.
We're gonna look at all the good stuff that's in there,
all the stuff that might not be so good
and pretty much everything that you need
so that you can decide whether Ecamm Live
is the best solution for you.
And let me know in the comments
what's your go-to app or software for live streaming.
I'm really keen to hear what you guys are using.
All right, so let's start with a bit of an overview
and the features of Ecamm Live.
So, the platforms that they currently support
you're going live to include Facebook,
which is Facebook Pages,
Facebook profiles and Facebook Groups,
anything that your Facebook account has access to
but also platforms like YouTube, Twitch,
and Periscope as well.
Now they've also got RTMP support
which means that you can really open it up
to broadcast to almost anything these days,
whether it's your own server or some other corporate
or custom platform out there as well.
So, you can pretty much broadcast
to anything from Ecamm Live.
Now, I'm pretty sure last year when we reviewed Ecamm Live,
they actually only had support for Facebook
and I think it was just Facebook Pages
and profiles at that time,
so they've really come a long way, really, really fast,
adding in all of these extra support.
So now, let's take a look at some of the features
and things that you can actually do inside of Ecamm Live.
The first one being that you can broadcast in full HD.
So, you can send a feed out from your computer to Facebook,
to Twitch, and all of those platforms in 1080p.
It also has built-in local disk recording,
meaning that it's actually saving a copy
of whatever you're broadcasting out
to your local computer as well.
So when you finish your live stream,
you've actually got MP4 file or an MOV file
that you can actually upload then to somewhere else
or keep as a backup.
So it's great for repurposing your content
or just for keeping a copy of your lives.
Now, following on from that,
you can also enable Record Only mode,
where you're not actually broadcasting out
to Facebook or wherever.
You're actually just recording
and broadcasting to your own movie file.
So, you can bring in a lot of the features
and things you're about to cover
and just use it to create a movie.
So, for creating course content
and those sorts of things, it's an amazing tool
just for that alone.
Ecamm Live also supports multiple cameras,
so you're not just limited to one webcam
or your primary webcam
that might be built into your computer screen,
you can also plug in additional webcams
and run multiples for different angles
and switching between different things,
but you can also plug in your DSLRs
or your video cameras as well.
And I do have a video which will link up in the cards
showing you a couple of different ways that you can do that.
And just like most other live-streaming software,
you also have the ability
to share your computer screen as well.
So if you're doing a presentation or a walkthrough,
then you can easily bring that up for your viewers to watch
but what's really cool about the way Ecamm Live does it
is you can actually pinch to zoom
and move in and pan around your live stream
while you're live really, really easily.
You can also easily add in any text or graphics
or animations, and even things like countdown timers,
all with a click of a button.
And again, while you're live,
you can still pick these things up,
move them around, pinch to zoom, so, so easily.
So, there's no other live streaming software
that actually gives you that level of control
while you're actually live.
One of my favorite features of Ecamm Live
is that you can monitor all your comments
and interactions and things live inside of Ecamm.
So you don't need to have a YouTube window open,
a Facebook window open, to be able to see the comments
and interact with everyone.
That way, you can see it all from within Ecamm Live.
And what it also lets you do
is select and feature those comments
on your actual live stream.
So, you can highlight a comment
and bring it into your actual live stream.
And again, like all the other overlays and graphics
and things, you can pinch to zoom, you can pick it up,
you can move it around as if it was any other graphic.
So this is really awesome for building that deep connection
with your viewers and acknowledging them
and their questions in your live stream.
It also lets you easily set up and manage scenes.
So you could have a scene
where it's full screen, your webcam.
Another scene
could be where it's a Picture-in-Picture style,
so it could be you're sharing your computer screen,
full screen, and you're a little picture down the bottom.
Or another scene could be a video that you've got queued up
to playback somewhere in your live stream.
So you set all of these things up ahead of time
and then you can switch between them
while you're actually live.
Another thing that I did just mention in there
is that you can also playback pre-recorded videos.
So if you've got a video
that you wanna play back in your live stream,
you can either drag and drop it
into your live stream while you're live
or again, create a scene and queue it up
and then switch to that scene
when you want that video to play.
Now, just before we get
into some of the more advanced features
and tools inside of Ecamm Live,
I would say probably the biggest standout feature for me
and my most favorite feature inside of Ecamm Live
is that you have the ability to bring in Skype calls.
So, there is direct integration
with Ecamm Live and Microsoft Skype.
So you can start an interview
and bring in guests into your live stream live
directly from Skype.
And Ecamm Live will actually let you bring in
up to five guests all at once into your live stream
and switching between the different guests
and you can bring them up and feature them in different ways
either as an individual speaker or as a full grid view
with everyone there.
And again, it's so easy to switch and customize
while you're actually live,
to switch between the different people
or to switch between some of your preset scenes as well.
Now this is actually something that we use all the time
and there is really no other live streaming software around
that makes it so easy to get your guests in
or to bring someone into your live stream
and then be able to push it out
to Facebook, YouTube, wherever.
You can do it in other software like Wirecast, vMix,
XSplit, OBS, but it is a lot more complicated
than how easy Ecamm have made it.
Now, for some of the more advanced features
inside of Ecamm Live, they've recently added NDI support,
which is something that you'd normally only find
in top-level, really, really expensive
live streaming software.
You've also got the ability
to change the size or the format of your live stream.
So if you don't wanna broadcast in widescreen, 16:9,
as most desktop live streaming software will let you do,
you can now broadcast in a square format
or even in portrait if you're gonna go live
to places like Facebook Live.
There's also direct integration and support now
for Restream and for Switchboard Live,
which both of those platforms let you restream
or rebroadcast your live streams out to multiple places.
Meaning that you could go live to Facebook,
to YouTube, to Twitch, all at the one time.
So, having that integration built in
without needing to go off
to those other websites or other platforms
and integrate it that way is just awesome.
They've also got support for 360 Live Streaming.
So if you've got a 360 camera
that will support live streaming through a computer,
you can do that in Ecamm.
There's also live audio monitoring now,
which is a big feature
that I think was missing for quite a while.
And in their latest release at the time of filming this,
they've just added support for green screen.
So if you're gonna be doing live streaming
with green screen,
then Ecamm Live has now got you covered as well.
Now, if you're interested in finding out more
about live streaming on the green screen,
check out the video linked up in the cards.
So as you can see, this thing is an absolute powerhouse.
There is a heap of features in there,
but not just features added
for the sake of adding features.
These are things that you would actually use
and will help you take your live streams to the next level
and to make everything so seamless and easy to do
while you're actually live.
A lot of other live streaming software out there
and stuff that we've used for years
is just way too complicated for most people,
even to do just simple stuff.
With Ecamm, it just makes everything easy.
What's also really crazy
is how cheaper they're currently selling this for.
You can pick up Ecamm Live for US$79 as a one-off payment
with lifetime upgrades, which is just insane.
Now, they do also have a trial version available,
so if you're still on the fence
and you're not sure if this is a fit for you yet,
then I will suggest grabbing the trial version.
There's a link in the description below to take you to that,
try it out, but for $79, you really can't go wrong.
So I've covered off all the good stuff
and all the features and everything,
but what about the things that aren't quite there yet
or the things that they're missing?
Well, I'll say the biggest thing
that you really need to be aware of
is that this is resource-hungry.
Meaning that if you're gonna be using it
on a lower spec computer or an older Mac,
then you might have some issues
if you're looking to bring in multiple cameras,
multiple webcams, if you're looking to bring in
a couple of Skype guests.
I think Skype is the most resource-hungry piece
of this whole puzzle here.
When you're bringing guests,
it does chew your CPU up or slows your computer down.
So if you do have a lower spec computer,
a low-power computer,
be aware that you might run into some issues
with maybe poor performance or dropping frames
or a bad-looking livestream
if your computer isn't powerful enough.
Now, this doesn't mean you need to go
and have the latest and greatest Mac.
We've had it running fine on a 2014 MacBook Pro,
bringing in multiple Skype guests
with multiple webcams with no issue,
but we have heard of people having issues
on lower spec systems,
specifically things like MacBook Airs.
You can do basic streams
but I wouldn't say that you're able to push it
to its max and get the most out of Ecamm Live
on a lower spec system.
I also think that some things that they could implement
or some things on the wish list will be to add 4K support.
I know that's not something that a lot of people want yet
but just having that feature in there
even if it was only to record locally to your computer
would have more control
over what's actually recorded to your computer
in regards to the quality of those files
that would be awesome to have maybe a high quality option,
a medium quality and a low quality option
instead of just whatever
they're actually pushing out at the moment.
It's good, looks okay, but it will be good
to be able to push that quality up a little bit.
But again, I totally get where they're coming from here.
Their whole thing is to try
and make all of this super intuitive and so easy to use
and they've really nailed that.
So, my wish list or my changes or features or things,
they're really nothing in comparison
to what you actually do in there.
And for all of those extra things,
there's other pieces of software that could fill that void.
But it's just crazy what you're actually getting
for that US$79.
Now, there's one other thing that I wanna add to this video
that I think is another massive plus with Ecamm Live,
is their Beta Group or their Beta Program.
They have a Facebook Group where you can go and sign up
after you've purchased Ecamm Live.
Request to join the group and you get early access
to their new features as they roll them out,
which is really, really cool.
But even if you're not interested in running
the latest version, the potentially unstable
or untested version, which I probably wouldn't recommend
for most people out there,
but it's really cool to be a member of that community there
because you get access and inside information
as to what's coming, but it's also the easiest way
if you've got any trouble or you need any help
with anything, then the community in there is just awesome.
But also, if you've actually got any ideas
or feature requests, that's the place to put them.
But what it also shows you is that the developers of this
are actually actively listening to their users
and really trying to help and solve their pains and problems
when it comes to live streaming,
and that's what we're a big fan of with this.
There is no other live streaming software
that comes close to Ecamm Live
and these guys are actually in there
listening and working with the people like us
that are creating live streams.
They're listening and they're implementing these things
to make it easy, and yeah, they're doing a great job.
So, with all of that in mind, who is Ecamm Live good for
and who should avoid it altogether?
Well, I'd really say that if someone is so advanced
on their live streaming, if you're someone
that really needs to plug in a heap of cameras,
heap of different scenes set up,
if you're someone that needs to dial in specific bit rates
or really have full control
and full level of monitoring over everything,
Ecamm Live probably isn't for you.
If you're someone who doesn't care about all of that stuff,
you just wanna create awesome-looking live streams,
you wanna be able to broadcast to Facebook, to YouTube,
into your Facebook Group even,
to be able to interact and bring up comments
without having to install a heap of extra software
and have a team of people helping you
produce your live streams, then Ecamm Live,
there's really nothing else that compares to it.
Even if you're not interested in going live,
just using those tools and the interface and everything
just to create videos of yourself on camera
and sharing your screen and tutorial videos
or course content,
then Ecamm Live will be perfect for that as well.
It's actually how we create a lot of our course content
for our membership site, Primal Video Accelerator, as well.
We literally just record it using Ecamm Live.
I can bring in Mike as a Skype guest
and have two of us on the screen.
So it's such an easy way to create course content,
as well as live streams.
Now, if you are broadcasting live to Facebook Live,
then check out the video linked on the screen now
for seven tips to help your broadcasts run better,
to get better results with your broadcasts.
The other video is from YouTube, see what it is,
they've recommended it, hope it's good.
See you soon.