This past weekend, I got to watch my best friend play video games for 24 hours. For kids.
This year’s Chachi Plays for Kids moved to the welcome walls of the Toonseum, where Chachi did a marathon to raise money for the Toonseum and Father Ryan Arts Center to help arts programs for kids.
While Chachi setup his gaming along with Brother Matt, I setup the command center where I’d live for the next 24 hours.
The setup should look familiar. It’s the same thing I used last month in our inaugural pro wrestling filmings. The same switcher, audio mixer, and miniDV cam interfacing this all into the laptop.
The difference is that we’re using WireCast to stream out to Justin.tv instead of recording for a DVD. The live switcher in hardware gives one less thing to go wrong, relieving the laptop of some duties. We simply setup a graphic for the website and imploring for donations and streamed. The Datavideo was great for doing the minimal picture in picture duties I did last year and we didn’t experience a single crash.
The setup was great for the shots on the Gameplay and Chachi too. As you can see in the shot to the right, there was a nice couch to the setup. Perfect for determining the mics. Once on each end of the couch to get all of the cursing when Chachi was beating Ginny at Mario Kart. Mics and cameras were pretty much out of the crowd’s way as
end caps to the players. Which is nice, since there was a good crowd for Friday night of about 25 people.
Last year, we tried to stream the event. I initially had this idea to have some content rolling as we went, but the setup was so exhausting, we were lucky to have a live camera on Chachi the entire time. This year, the setup was a breeze. And we had a plan. Chachi and I came up with some questions, and we developed a bit of an exit interview, and were presented with their shirts for participating. It was like an assembly line of awesome. The questions were pretty basic. Stuff about art, going 24 hours, and the game they played with Chachi. We had some great moments from it. Everybody had some great things to say, and it gave a great reason to still be on the feed as Chachi took his in between breaks.
It was also great to get a few volunteers in during the Tetris tournament for a little bit of play by play, including my Mayhem compatriot, DJLunchbox and Dudders.
The Surprise
It’s always something, isn’t it. While the setup was flying, I found something…interesting. I had the Wirecast going, and brought a spare laptop to check on the feed going out and the chat room. Well, the video worked fine. Then I attempted to sign into Justin.tv. And my account was suspended? Not exactly. It seems, according to the wiki I was sent to, WAY at the bottom of the page, Justin.tv doesn’t like open proxies. I didn’t inquire, but I presume it had something to do with Toonseum’s internet setup. No problem. Just pulled out the iPhone and loaded the app off wifi to make sure things were good!
So another year. Things go so much better, it was an amazing experience. We’re already looking at making it even better next year.
Keep an eye on ChachiPlays.com for videos as I cobble them together out of 24 hours, and Unsung 21 for a small feature.