Is Zoom the best they could come up with?

With the discontinuation of the Church's webcasting servers, we have been directed to use Zoom. I am sorry, but as someone that prides myself on my broadcast quality, albeit just Sacrament meeting, and our bi-annual Stake Conference, I can't possibly think that Zoom is the best option. I am not, nor will I ever use Zoom as my encoder and I will not send out my broadcasts over a Zoom webinar. My case in point. This weekend, I was fortunate enough to be able to participate in a Temple Dedication. They used Zoom Webinar as the delivery method. I could tell that whoever was producing the broadcast had a few tools at their disposal, the Church has plenty of money to produce professional style broadcasts, but they were using Zoom as their encoding. The audio was all over the place. The noise cancellation was going crazy and the music sound was subpar. Zoom is good for speaking style meetings. Not so good for music. Even the video they played for prelude had glitchy sound and the video stream was jumpy. Every time during the meeting that they panned the camera, the video stuttered. It wasn't just my connection either. I ran a speed test prior, during, and post meeting and my speed was well over 150mbps download. I had all WIFI shut off to the building as well to prevent any bandwidth issues. I am having a hard time believing that Zoom is going to be the church standard from now going forward. Really looking forward to joining a Zoom Webinar for General Conference only to have the magnificent sound of the Tabernacle Choir sound like a sixth grade choir. As well as have the noise cancellation popping on and off in the middle of a speaker. Any one else seeing this as a problem or am I overthinking what is happening.

I agree with some of your points, although with more experience you can optimise the zoom experience a fair bit. Audio is greatly enhanced by checking the box to "enable original audio" in the settings, you can also enable HD video if not already done.

When I questioned this move further up the chain, the general answer is that it is less about the absolute quality of the broadcast and more about consolidation.

One platform for Sacrament meeting and other one way broadcasts, but also for leadership meetings like ward council and for interactive classes like Sunday School and others. Zoom can do it all, whereas other platforms can't. There's also the financial cost of all of this as well.

There is also no compulsion to move to zoom if you feel strongly against it. For most of us, it's much easier to move to YouTube and the quality is of course excellent there.
The choice is yours, as long as your local leaders don't mandate a solution that must be followed.

I agree that there are optimizations in place in Zoom. I have been using the enable original audio every time I have been forced to use Zoom and have directed the Ward Specialists in my stake to do the same. It seemed like they kept turning it on and off during the Temple dedication, which, probably to an untrained ear didn't distract. For me, it was mind numbing. I figured that the end game was a result of not spending money to reinvent the wheel where the Church had already made it's partnership with Zoom. I just hope that the more professional broadcasts from the conference center and church wide events, we aren't relegated to being forced to have subpar audio and video quality. They were paying Zoom for use of their servers, why pay to maintain security and upkeep on in house servers as well. I fully understand it. Luckily in my situation, I am the local leader that is setting the standard. My Stake President has given me carte blanche to create policy. As I am no dictator, I have presented options of using Zoom and YouTube as viable options, depending on the ability and skill of the individual Ward people and trained them accordingly. I was just really surprised that something as important as a Temple dedication was left to the folks at Zoom to run.

I'm surprised that they'd use Zoom for a temple dedication, unless they needed remote speakers. Usually such high profile events gets the pros at Church Headquarters involved.

The results suggest that something else was going on (perhaps limited bandwidth from the event site), or some poor STS got handed the task without a lot of support.

I'd agree with that.
As we all seem to be concluding, Zoom gets used when people don't know better or have limited experience with other things so have more confidence in a product that they have personally tried and tested.
For many, Zoom is their comfort zone and gets the job done in accordance with church policy and guiding principles.

Just over a week ago there was a UK wide conference which originated from London with 3 Apostles and their wives speaking. It was broadcast on YouTube. The sound quality was excellent but the video was low resolution. At least it was consistent and reliable I guess.

I think there's no chance that you'll see general conference broadcast using zoom.
There's a big difference between 500-1000 people and then 10's of millions.

russellhltn wrote: Mon Nov 08, 2021 1:59 pm I'm surprised that they'd use Zoom for a temple dedication, unless they needed remote speakers. Usually such high profile events gets the pros at Church Headquarters involved.

The results suggest that something else was going on (perhaps limited bandwidth from the event site), or some poor STS got handed the task without a lot of support.

I think most of the broadcasts for temple dedications are now being done over Zoom. With more and more temples being dedicated, it would be a major expense to have the broadcast team from Church Headquarters travel everywhere with all of their equipment.

sbradshaw wrote: Tue Nov 09, 2021 10:45 am I think most of the broadcasts for temple dedications are now being done over Zoom. With more and more temples being dedicated, it would be a major expense to have the broadcast team from Church Headquarters travel everywhere with all of their equipment.

There's quite a range of options in between.

Not too far into the pandemic, we had our stake conference. We couldn't meet in person, and we were to have a "visiting" authority. We ended up using Zoom from the chapel (just the participants in attendance) and the GA from the church office building. In this case, Zoom was used to produce the produce, but it was distributed via the Church's own system (Brightcove?)

While it did fall to this STS to pull this off, I did have help from the church team, including a dry run prior to this. While the results were OK, I did notice that the stream from the chapel were noticeably less sharp than the results from the church office building. I'm not sure why, if it was the camera, the HDMI to USB converter, or some Zoom setting.

For something like a temple dedication, I'd expect at least the same level of support. In fact, (at least in the US) I'd be surprised if they didn't send at least one team member with some equipment as part of the entourage and he/she would round out the local team and equipment with local resources.

I am not a fan of Zoom. I intend to throw all of my broadcast support duties to the other tech in our stake, who considers himself to be a Zoom expert, on the day that Zoom is enforced as THE way forward.
If the church does not want to allow us to continue using the Azure streaming servers that we have been using for the last several years, then I will build my own streaming broadcast server rather than use Zoom.
OBS (Open Broadcast Server) is open source and free to use. It is also easy to install and set up on a PC. Alternatively, a Teradek unit can be used as we have done for years.
The stake clerk and ward clerks count on remote connection information provided by the current Azure church broadcast system that we have been using to augment in-person attendance information with remote attendance information for taking roll.
I keep getting questions regarding this change to Zoom. This issue has caused confusion among the Bishops in our stake, who are unsure whether we are to stop broadcasting altogether, move to Zoom immediately, or continue to use the Azure streaming server.
I would add that if this is about the church saving money by paying nothing or substantially less for the use of Zoom servers, "If you are not paying for the product, then YOU ARE THE PRODUCT."

Compass88 wrote: Sat Nov 13, 2021 7:31 pmI intend to throw all of my broadcast support duties to the other tech in our stake...on the day that Zoom is enforced as THE way forward.

No one is forcing any unit to use Zoom. It's merely suggested as an alternative for when they retire Meetinghouse Webcast next year. Our stake is happily using YouTube Live and I know other stakes that have chosen even a different webcast platform. Work and pray with your stake presidency and come up with a good plan that works for you.

Compass88 wrote: Sat Nov 13, 2021 7:31 pm I keep getting questions regarding this change to Zoom. This issue has caused confusion among the Bishops in our stake, who are unsure whether we are to stop broadcasting altogether, move to Zoom immediately, or continue to use the Azure streaming server.

Instructions regarding webcasting during the pandemic will come from the area authorities to the stake president. Once the pandemic is sufficiently over, then Handbook 29.7 will determine if any kind of webcasts for shut-ins continue.

Compass88 wrote: Sat Nov 13, 2021 7:31 pmI would add that if this is about the church saving money by paying nothing or substantially less for the use of Zoom servers, "If you are not paying for the product, then YOU ARE THE PRODUCT."

Unless the ward is not using the zoom account for any other meeting (Sunday School, RS, PH, leadership), then the Zoom webcast isn't any additional cost. The Azure servers encounter a charge for each use.

splayer7 wrote: Mon Nov 08, 2021 8:47 am I am sorry, but as someone that prides myself on my broadcast quality, albeit just Sacrament meeting, and our bi-annual Stake Conference, I can't possibly think that Zoom is the best option.

I can think of one top reason why Zoom is the best option: Ease of broadcasting. This is by far Zoom's best feature. This is very significant.

I'd wager that most tech specialists don't know how to set up a proper broadcast outside of Zoom. Many small wards and branches have someone who at best is just comfortable with a laptop. With Zoom, you just use a device with 1 camera, 1 mic, utilize a recurring meeting, distribute that recurring meeting link, and you're good to go. Each week you just use a phone/tablet/laptop/mevo camera/whatever, open up Zoom, and start the non-interactive broadcast on the preset recurring meeting. Zoom itself is excellent for clean delivery to multiple end points.

Those few of us who can outdo Zoom usually end up on the #2 option: YouTube for broadcasting, and teredek or OBS for mixing. This approach gives us all the whistles and bells and options we desire. Our stake does this, and the end result is a crisp broadcast with audio and video, and easiest delivery for the end user. The cost is that the tech assistants have more work, and the stake technology assistant has much more work.

the Church has plenty of money to produce professional style broadcasts, but they were using Zoom as their encoding. The audio was all over the place. The noise cancellation was going crazy and the music sound was subpar. Zoom is good for speaking style meetings. Not so good for music. Even the video they played for prelude had glitchy sound and the video stream was jumpy. Every time during the meeting that they panned the camera, the video stuttered

That's definitely not Zoom's fault.

Zoom doesn't "fix" up the audio, it just sends it out. Good audio just needs a good mic or mics + mixer. Bad audio is likely the fault of the mic settings or hardware at some point. (I know in my stake, two of the wards have laptops where the input line feed has a Windows setting called AGC, for automatic gain control. When checked, Windows does an awful job trying to fix the audio which causes square waveforms all over the place. When we turned off AGC and adjusted the volume correctly, we got crystal clear speaker audio.)

Zoom also doesn't stutter on video, that is the fault of the hardware which is not able to encode fast enough, and Zoom is very lenient. On a prior test, I got Zoom running using emulation on Linux on a Raspberry Pi 4, and still managed to get 25 frames per second without stutter. I was floored that Zoom performed so well on such weak hardware.

As for your temple dedication meeting, yes, Zoom wasn't the right call. They should be using YouTube. Those of us operating on a small shoestring budget have found ways to produce broadcasts with HD video and crystal clear audio.

bradpeterson@gmail.com wrote: Mon Nov 15, 2021 9:34 pm Zoom doesn't "fix" up the audio, it just sends it out.

No, but it does apply a digital codec that was intended for speech, not music. The result can be like listening to music on hold while on a cell phone.

That's why there's the "original audio" option.

russellhltn wrote: Tue Nov 16, 2021 10:56 am

bradpeterson@gmail.com wrote: Mon Nov 15, 2021 9:34 pm Zoom doesn't "fix" up the audio, it just sends it out.

No, but it does apply a digital codec that was intended for speech, not music. The result can be like listening to music on hold while on a cell phone.

That's why there's the "original audio" option.

Ah, that's good to know. I'm sure I'll run into this issue in the future, and I'll be very happy I saw this post.