Set Up OBS for Recording

Prerequisites

• OBS Studio installed (download from obsproject.com, free and open-source)
• Microphone and optionally a webcam connected

Steps

1. Install OBS. On macOS: brew install --cask obs. On Linux: sudo apt install obs-studio. On Windows: download the installer from obsproject.com.

2. Configure recording settings. Edit the OBS profile config or use the --profile flag. Set recording output:

   • Format: MKV (crash-safe, can be remuxed to MP4 later)
   • Encoder: x264 (CPU) or NVENC (NVIDIA GPU)
   • Quality: CRF 18-23 for high quality with reasonable file size
   • Resolution: 1920x1080 (1080p)

3. Set up scenes and sources. Create a scene configuration with sources:

   • Display Capture or Window Capture for screen recording
   • Video Capture Device for webcam overlay
   • Audio Input Capture for microphone Configure via OBS scene collection JSON or the obs-websocket API for programmatic control.

4. Configure audio. Add your microphone as an audio input source. Apply noise suppression filter (RNNoise recommended) and gain filter if needed. Set audio bitrate to 160kbps for clear speech.

5. Set up hotkeys. Configure Start/Stop Recording hotkeys in the OBS settings so recording can be controlled without switching windows. Alternatively, use the obs-websocket API for programmatic recording control:

   ws://localhost:4455 -> {"op": 6, "d": {"requestType": "StartRecord"}}
   

6. Test recording. Record 1 minute, play it back, and verify video quality, audio levels, and webcam positioning. Remux MKV to MP4 after recording: ffmpeg -i recording.mkv -c copy recording.mp4.