Wirecast Mac OS X and Live Score

Last Updated:

In this tutorial, you will learn how to use Live Score with Wirecast running on an Apple MAC OS X computer.
We do this by starting a virtual windows that hosts Live Score and using the Telestream Desktop Presenter to transfer our scoreboard to Wirecast. This is a perfect solution if you use a MAC for streaming and want to run Live Score directly on your MAC computer.

Using the Remote Desktop Presenter is a basic way when running the Standard Edition of Live Score.

We use an Apple with macOS Sierra.
Live Score requires running a Windows OS, and therefore it's actually not possible to run it on that computer.

The great thing is, that you can still run a (virtual) Windows on your MAC.
This is done by using a so called VM (virtual machine).
In that virtual machine you can install any operating system you'd like - in our case Windows 10.

The only thing you need for that, is a software that creates and runs your virtual machine. We are going to use Parallels, but there are a lot of others too. Here is a list of well known applications:

• Parallels, (commercial), https://www.parallels.com
• VMware, (commercial), https://www.vmware.com
• VirtualBox (free), https://www.virtualbox.org

After installing your Windows as described in the Parallels documentation, you can finally run Windows inside your Parallels software.
You can even switch to full screen to get a native Windows feeling on your MAC.

Now download and install Live Score in your virtual Windows.
After successfully installing it, it's finally time to start Live Score.

We start by opening Live Score and selecting our sport.
Live Score will now start the main application with the sport you have selected.

Now it's time to add and prepare our scoreboard.

Let's add a new scoreboard by using the + button in the right scoreboard panel of the main window. This will open the layout gallery, where you can choose one or more of your available layouts.

After clicking on Add your scoreboard should appear in the center area of Live Score.
Now you can move it around by dragging the scoreboard with your mouse, zoom it or customize it.

We're done in Live Score.
The last thing we need to do is to start the Live Score engine.
Do this by pressing the blue start button in the top right corner of the main window.

This will start all timers and controllers that are necessary to update your scoreboard data properly, and to enable incoming iOS connections from your remote apps.

The Desktop Presenter is a special program to capture and broadcast your desktop screen to your local network. It's available as a free download on the Telestream website and directly integrated in Wirecast.

Install and open it on the computer that runs Live Score.
You should see a small window with a few settings and options.
Disable Capture Audio and enable 3D Compatibility for best results.

Now it's time to prepare what should be sent to your network.
Choose Select Screen Region in the Selection listbox and click on the Change Region button below. This sets your screen into a region selection mode. Move the anchor points around your scoreboard and press enter.

That part of your screen will now be broadcasted to your network - so keep Live Score displayed and don't minimize it.

We're done on the Live Score computer.
One last thing you need to remember, is the TCP/IP address in the small Desktop Presenter window.

It's now time to start your native MAC Wirecast application.
So just keep your Windows VM in the background and switch back to your MAC.

Wirecast should now display an empty project - no input source or anything else.

Let's add a video layer or camera source.

Click on a + button in the second row of the layers section and select your camera input, which should already be connected to your computer.

Add a new Remote Desktop Presenter in the layers row above your camera feed.

In the dialog window add the TCP/IP address from the Desktop Presenter of your Windows VM, disable Audio and apply your settings.

You should now see your Live Score scoreboard appear in the small preview.
Close the dialog window.

We are actually done right now. The scoreboard is already on top of your camera, but it still looks a bit wrong. So our final step is the editing of the scoreboard layer.

In this section we have to do 2 things. First we're going to apply chroma keying to remove the blue background from our layer. After that we scale and move the scoreboard to make it appear as a small graphic in the bottom right corner.

Select your scoreboard layer and take a look at the editing area of Wirecast (screenshot 1 - red rectangle). Click on the small silhouette icon to open the chroma keying settings. In this step we want to remove our blue background color.

Enable chroma keying and activate Pick key color with mouse. Then simply click on the blue background in the preview. The background should now be removed from your layer.
You can apply finer adjustments by using the threshold and clip settings of the chroma keying.

Please note that you want to use a Live Score background color which is not used in your scoreboard too.

Now click on any other tab, like the properties icon (2nd tab).
Drag your scoreboard to the bottom right corner in the preview, by clicking on it with your mouse and dragging it around.
You can also use the scaling slider to adjust the size of your scoreboard.

That's it.

Everything is set up correctly.
It's time to actually learn how to bring our new scoreboard layer on top of our camera source.

Just select the camera layer and the scoreboard layer by clicking on each of them. This stacks both layers on top of each other.
If you want to put it live, don't forget to click on the arrow in the middle of Wirecast, if you have the preview mode enabled.

If you want to remove the scoreboard, just click on the Clear Layer instead of the scoreboard layer and repeat the process.

You can now go on with finer adjustments, like positioning the scoreboard, scaling it, and proceeding with your usual broadcasting workflow.