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Index

Introduction

Open Broadcaster Software Studio is a free and open-source software for live streaming and recording.

High FPS recording

A lot of us configure the output encoder to record as high FPS as we get in-game(1) to then frame blend with Smoothie.

  1. If you get about 600FPS it's recommended to record around 480FPS to accommodate for the variations and eventual drops

Installing OBS

You can find the installer / a portable zip in the official downloads page

  • WinGet: winget install -e --id OBSProject.OBSStudio
  • Scoop: scoop bucket add extras; scoop install extras/obs-studio
  • Chocolatey: choco install obs-studio
  • Flathub (recommended): flatpak install flathub com.obsproject.Studio
  • Arch-based distros: pacman -S obs-studio
  • Ubuntu-based distros (copied from OBS download page): 
    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:obsproject/obs-studio
sudo apt update
sudo apt install ffmpeg obs-studio

Unsupported

At the moment, OBS settings for macOS aren't considered in the documentation.

  • Homebrew: brew install --cask obs

Other documentation sources

See OBS' knowledgebase: https://obsproject.com/kb

Initial configuration

Video Walkthrough

  1. Click Cancel on the Auto-Configuration Wizard to skip it
  2. Open Settings Video
  3. Change the Output (Scaled) Resolution to exactly match your Base (Canvas) Resolution
  4. Switch Common FPS Values Fractional FPS Value and modify the numerator to change your desired output FPS
  5. Go to the Output tab, and change the Output Mode to Advanced
    • Recording Format: Use MPEG-4 (.mp4) for compatibility or Matroska Video (.mkv).
  6. Go to the Audio tab, and under Global Audio Devices, configure your audio devices
  7. Click OK on the Settings window
  8. Adjust the Audio Mixer to your liking
  9. Add a Display Capture source (unless you're on Linux)
  10. At the top, go to Docks Stats, then drag it to the side of the preview to dock it, then adjust the sizing how you'd like

Stats dock

The stats dock is used for monitoring if your OBS settings can keep up with your computer, as well as other statistics shown.

The main two statistics to indicate lag are encoding lag and rendering lag. If one of these statistics are increasing when recording your game in movement, then you should adjust your OBS settings.

Replay Buffer

Replay buffer is a feature in OBS that allows users to save only the last specified seconds of a recording to a video file on the press of a button or hotkey. It uses RAM as a temporary storage, similar to NVIDIA's Shadowplay.

It's very useful for testing encoder settings (with lots of movement in the test) without making lots of useless video files, as well as easily clipping moments in gameplay or whatever else.

You can configure it in the Replay Buffer tab in Output, and you can set hotkeys for it in Hotkeys after it has been enabled.