Hello Hello, a mad place called Virtual!
As you know, the last 18 months have been a weird one for the DJ world, and many of us have turned to livestreaming from often quite improvised rigs in our own homes to entertain the crowds that we miss in the live world. DJs also stream and mix because it is in our blood, there always a small part of me that is nagging my brain that I've not done any mixing after a few days so going cold turkey for 18 months whilst club land awaits was never going to be an option. I was born to entertain, I always have from when I was a small child, putting on comedy shows for the family at Christmas for example. Always the class clown.
I also wanted to ensure that I remained relevant and in the spotlight for when the clubs open up again, I wanted promoters to go 'hey, that James Black has been streaming every Sunday for the past 77 weeks!' hopefully giving me a better standing for gigs in the real world. And this thinking has lead me to some success - guest appearing on other livestreams and potentially landing me a few gigs which could materialise towards the end of the year.
My Sunday flagship show - The Sunday Twitch'n Kitch'n Techno Disco' has been an amazing success with the support of the self-proclaimed 'Techo-fam'. A wonderful bunch of loyal regular followers who come and attend my livestream weekly. We have become such a collective, that if one of our regulars are missing - they go and try to wrangle them in to the stream, or find out where they are. They have supported me too, being extremely generous with tips and subscriptions to my channel. I feel obliged therefore to give them the content they have paid to support.
I can only offer 'X' amount of hours to livestreaming per week due to life commitments - I have a 30 hour per week job, a girlfriend who'm I vouch to spend time with and not get absorbed into the music machine as well as a social life - friends, meals, family - all that jazz. So each show has to be the highest quality content possible, they paid and supported me so I feel I owe them that, and I have added to my livestreaming since the early days to make it a rewarding experience.
First off, upgrade your camera! I was using what I used to call 'potato-cam' which essentially referred to the fact that I thought my first few livestreams were filmed through a potato - or at least has that level of quality! See below for comparison;
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The quality speaks for itself. Make your page interesting! Load it up with bells and whistles! There are loads of add-ons you can find on Twitch to make your page stand out - I use floating emotes on my screen, as well as stickers and soundalerts - These are all controllable by the viewer giving them more control and this makes for a more interactive experience, see below for example.
When they type an emote, it floats across the screen!
I have also set up a second camera in the top right hand corner, offering an alternative view of my DJ set up, something I lovingly call 'David Deck-Cam' - a nice play on words, if I do say so myself.
I have my follwer bar showing my latest followers. I have also gotten involved in sticker party - where viewers can buy a sticker which will be stuck on my screen for a length of time, see below - the fiery flame head!
Ive also been welcome to join an online twitch team called Vibes for the Tribes - so thats also an inhouse Twitch community who support each other and I proudly display there banner.
And just for a little fun, I have a gif of a rave rabbit set up on the bottom corner of the screen which dances with glowsticks.
All together, this makes for, what I feel, is an interesting watch.
The kitchen is also fitted out with disco lights, which bathe the broadcast area in multichanging colour schemes,
There is even a feature on the disco lights to turn it into 'Strobe Mode' and again, this is a viewer activated reward - but only one which can be redeemed once its dark. With winter approaching, more and more of the streams will occur during the hours of darkness.
The rewards are set up in your 'viewer rewards' section within your Twitch creator dashboard once you have attained affiliate status. The other extensions can be added onto your OBS - which is what I use to stream - and then you can just overlay the browser they give you for that particular extension over your main broadcast window. There are plenty of helps and tips online. 18 months ago, I hadnt even heard of Twitch, I did my first Twitch stream last July and I like to think I'm well versed in 'Twitching' now after a very successful year, furthermore I have met (virtually) a whole world of wonderful people and incredible DJs which would never have happened any other way. It sounds odd. A global pandemic, and I'm seeking the positive in that? Obviously, there are huge tragedies in the COVID story, deaths, losses of jobs and a huge social fracturing with vaccinations, but for DJs to survive in a world where their homes of bars and clubs are closed, shows resilience and the need to entertain. We are human, we need distraction, we need to laugh and dance, even if we don't feel like it, there is something very therapeutic about immersing yourself in music and escaping the reality. Even if you are standing in the flashiest kitchen on the south coast!
Until next time, take care x