Four things we found out about live video streaming in public from Blast Theory’s game “I’D HIDE YOU”

With the recent interest in live mobile video streaming services like Periscope and Meerkat, I thought I’d give a brief summary of some relevant findings from our study of Blast Theory’s game I’d Hide You. (Full paper here.)

1. Learning how to simultaneously manage your body and the behaviour of the camera you are broadcasting with is critical to producing ‘good’ video (i.e., interesting, compelling, watchable video). We found a bunch of methods that are used to do this that go beyond standard shot composition and framing etc. (More in the paper…)

2. On the street all actions have a ‘double duty’ to them. So, pointing the camera at something in the street (a person, an object) is both ‘showing’ this to the online viewer, and also making that thing interesting to those physically around you. In other words, your video broadcast will always have a dual orientation: to the street and to the online audience.

3. There will be tensions between the demands of the environment you are filming in and making the broadcast interesting for online viewers. And the immediacy of things happening in the street environment will fight with the priority you have for online viewers’ attentions.

In I’d Hide You, this is something where the artistic director (and creative design) works with the video broadcasters. It’s also important for the artistic director, together with a support team that watches the stream of each broadcaster who is out on the street, to monitor this tension during the performance. This is to make sure that video broadcasters do not get ‘too involved’ with the street.

4. As with every performance, there is a load of ‘backstage work’ that is deliberately hidden from view. Video broadcasters in public need to maintain ‘backstage zones’ that are somehow hidden from the online viewer.

These are not necessarily just physical spaces, but also preparatory procedures (e.g., developing a palette of talkable topics, and establishing locations where it is okay to film). Or they might be about developing ‘backstage’ methods for doing stuff with people outside (but alongside) the live broadcast stream (e.g., checking it’s okay for someone to be filmed by you).