BeLive.tv introduces the Talk Show format for Facebook Live streams

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If you have been wanting to host multi-person live streams on Facebook Live with multiple people on screen, there have been a number of options available to do this including BlueJeans onSocial. Zoom webinars, Crowdcast and then using platforms such as vMiz or Wirecast.

This week another product joined the multi-person live stream market – though they already have the ability to have two people on camera at the same time – with the option of having others waiting in a green room to be brought on camera, BeLive.tv – read my introduction to using Belive.tv for Facebook Live in this article and learn how you can schedule your live streams with BeLive.tv in this article.

It should be noted that BeLive.tv is in Beta and has not yet released pricing – the new Talk Show feature is available to some beta testers by invitation. Also, note that as this feature is in development so when it is finally made available some features may operate differently from thought outlined in this tutorial so ensure you check the details with BeLive.tv first or schedule a private training session with me to discuss how to best use the app for your organisations live streams to Facebook Live.

I invited some live streaming friends to join me on camera to test out the new feature earlier this week. In this article I share with you a tutorial about how to use the new Talk Show feature – for the basics of getting started with BeLive.tv you should read this article in conjunction with the tutorial below.

When you set up your live stream using the BeLive.tv Talk Show feature, remember to check your camera and microphone settings and tell your participants to do the same – BeLive.tv works best on desktop using the Chrome browser.

An active video stream is required before you start BeLive Show for Facebook Live using the Talk Show feature so you need to bring your own camera or a guests camera onto the broadcast before you can stream.

In the screenshot below you can see how I have enabled my camera and brought it into the broadcast section and now I can go-live on Facebook Live.

You can have three people on screen using the Talk Show feature and you will have access to a link that you can share privately or publically to those you want to invite to join you on camera – other guests can wait in the green room.

One thing to note is that you as the producer of the show does not need to be on camera and you can use the different screen layouts to enable one, two or three people on camera in the live stream at the same time.

As the host you can also communicate with your guests privately so, for example, give them some prompts about how they are appearing on camera, telling them to address a specific question from the audience chat or giving them an update on who will be next on camera.

With the agenda feature prepared in advance for the show, when you are in the green room as the producer of the show you can bring topic headlines onto the screen and of course bring comments from the audience on camera – use these features with care dependent on how you plan to repurpose the content for other channels after the live stream.

When the feature was first released to have guests in the lobby area they did not get a prompt about being brought into the live stream – they do get a countdown times to advise them they will be live which helps them get camera ready.

Here is an example of what the side by side feature looks like for two people on screen at the same time – I have also enabled in this example the names of the people on screen to appear. This can be turned on and off at any time.

In this example you can see one of the options for three people to be on camera at the same time – unfortunately, you can not decide who appears in the three cameras – it would be good to make this determined by the producer of the show.

Another alternative layout for three people on camera at the same time is one where a guest is in a larger video – again, at this time you can not determine who appears in each camera position and it would be good to have this enabled in the future especially if you have a main speaker for part of your live stream or want to make more prominent the person speaking.

This is an alternative view for three people on screen at the same time on BeLive.tv Talk Show.

And the mirror image of that layout can also be enabled on Talk Show.

Another layout for three people on camera in the live stream is to have them all in equal sized cameras side by side.

Pro Live Video Tip – this tip works for all multi-person live streams and few people usually consider this in my experience. I would recommend that you remind your guests to check their own positioning against the others – or you can give them instructions in the private chat. You will see on my test of the new feature my guests avatars all appear a different size and that could be better positioned for a more professional stream.

This animation shows you what is like to be switching through the different layouts using the Talk show feature.

And in this example, you can see the lower third appear enabled using the Agenda feature which you can prepare in advance of a live stream being broadcast.

A couple of other features that are available with BeLive.tv – firstly there are sometimes specific overlays available which you can use when live streaming – as my live stream took place on the 17 March there were overlays I could use for St Patricks Day that you will see in the image below. These are usually available for all versions of live streams using BeLive.tv

In the top right of the screenshot you will also see a logo – this is only available to those with the Talk Show before on BeLive.tv.