Screencast Video Stream

To live stream your desktop, you will want to get two pieces of software:

Software to capture your desktop as a stream and redirect:

1) CamTwist - http://camtwiststudio.com/download/ - does desktop live capture and turns it into a video stream that is compatible for "webcam" input applications. I've used this to live stream my desktop to ustream.tv, Google Hangout, etc. (free)

AND

2) SoundFlower - https://code.google.com/p/soundflower/ - Allows you to redirect the system sound output so that it can be routed as an input for your stream (free)

Software to publish from your desktop:

1) EvoCam - http://www.evological.com/evocam.html - does a local http streaming server to serve your "webcam" stream out to the local area network. ( $30 )

OR

2) VLC - http://www.videolan.org/vlc/streaming.html - VideoLAN streaming component of VLC to livestream your "webcam" produced from your camtwist/soundflower combo. (free)

Can post more details, if this solution path works for you.

Edit: Note, a few test runs of VLC to export a stream crashes on my Mac. Looks like recent VLC builds support streaming the desktop, which is cool. With soundflower, you can also redirect the system output as well as the mic so that output from the apps and programs are livestreamed as well... provided your copy of VLC is running stably. :)

EDIT:

CamTwist is 32bit. So you will need to download the 32bit version of VLC for Mac OS X:

http://get.videolan.org/vlc/2.0.6/macosx/vlc-2.0.6-intel32.dmg

  1. Fire up CamTwist
  2. Select Desktop (not Desktop+) by double clicking it. This will add it to the list.
  3. Select "Save Setup", and give it a name.
  4. Go to [tools]->[Studio], which will pop up a new window showing a list of "sources", a preview pane, and a program pane. Your new stream probably shows up in "Program", which is the "live webcam" indicator. You can select another source via the buttons and it will show up in the "green preview" window. Hitting "cut" will cut over from preview to program.
  5. Fire up your 32bit VLC
  6. [file]->[open capture device]
  7. Under Capture Device, choose CamTwist.
  8. check the [streaming] radio box
  9. Choose the streaming settings
  10. Choose the [stream] radio button
  11. Leave most of the options as default
  12. Hit OK
  13. Hit Open
  14. This should start the stream.

On my box, my copy of VLC happens to crash at this point, but then again, my version of VLC (2.06 and 2.10) both seem to crash when I try to stream anything. So it might be a problem on my system.

But the above is how I get CamTwist setup and VLC to see CamTwist.


When I understand correctly you just want to broadcast the Mac's screen.

Maybe Wirecast would be an option: It allows broadcasting a local or remote screen to the a streaming server, such as QT Streaming Server or any flash based like Wowza, Red5,..

Additionally external video sources could be added and mixed at will.

A free alternative would be Flash Media Live Encoder in combination with CamTwist to capture the screen. Here is a tutorial: http://www.mikechambers.com/blog/2011/05/29/setting-up-desktop-streaming-on-mac-os-x/