Our Visit to Impact Theory Studio : Tech Talk with Tom Bilyeu and the Team!

Hey everyone! This is Noah from Corporate Streams. I want to give a huge thanks to Tom and the team for letting me step into their studio and have an insightful discussion about their audio and video setup. It was amazing to meet everyone and dive into the details of their current tech stack. During our conversation, we discussed everything from gear to tech challenges and opportunities for improvement. Now, let’s dive into the discussion and take a closer look at the key points we talked about.

“Tom: The honest answer is, you know far better than I want it to be. I just want it to not suck. So I don't know all the technical reasons why, like our audio sound. Sometimes I say what! has like this awkwardly feeling the edges. I don't know how else to say so. There's something wrong there. And because I don't know the technical way to solve it, it was very encouraging when you were breaking down, like you're all the different things that you could do. So, you know, more about we do it and we want as close to perfection as we get. We're not shy to spend the money. So this is, tell us what to do, and we will do that kind of moment.

Noah: Okay, so that sounds epic. I love that. I mean, obviously most of it is in the video, which is great. And then to kind of expand that further and like break it down. So is audio kind of the biggest thing that catches your eye right now?

Tom: For me, yes, because I spent the majority of my time listening, if I'm going to interact on content, which I don't do very often, I'm going to listen to it. So I'm not as dialed in on other than sometimes especially drew likes on the for under lit. So yeah. Then any improvements that we can make I hope so, if you know that the image quality can do better, we wanna get better, and if you've been in the live audience, if, you know, here are the five things you whatever about problematic.

Noah: It's a pretty much watched everything the last three years. For sure. So for my side, I've got this new show running, and the dynamics were the thing that killed me. I mean, the quiet is the loudest, right? And we already kind of work through that a little bit with some dynamic stuff. And he can we can go a couple steps further there, which would be helpful. I think what you're hearing is the compression thing. I would have to have you point it out and be like, that's what I'm hearing. And then to try to isolate it. It might be an easy thing, but it sounds like some sort of compression thing.

Drew: And I have a hypothesis that if we could just fit everything in through a central mixer, clean up the audio that way, and then output that, audio into the software into Ecamm, that would probably be the most straightforward. We can monitor individual levels because we get common comments of like, Tom's too loud, Drew's too quiet, Eunice sounds like she's behind. So that way we can individually mix those.

Noah:  A hundred percent.

Drew: Yeah, I think that would probably be the first place I think that I can help.

Noah: In a traditional format, for video playback, you would take those elements and use it through a software like Purpose center or Q lab or something like that. Even VLC will do it. And then it's like a centralized playback machine where the audio is coming from, like obviously you're doing that from your laptop, but sometimes we get the chat in the background. It's not full screen, and you can't really see it in time. I kind of mentioned that you have two options for putting it through a traditional system like that or using it as a screen share like you're doing now. I mean, they both work with that.

Drew: Okay. Gotcha.

Tom: Okay. With that believe you guys but please make sure that we have a shopping list, we know exactly what we're plugging, where, all that and stuff. There's no mystery.

Drew: There's gonna be a bunch of receipts hitting the hidden rent tonight, so let's go about that.

Noah: Do you mind if I grab a picture with you?

Tom: Of course, I’ll be honored.

Eric: Just snapping away.

Eunice: You know, show the logo.

Eric: Yeah, open it up a bit. Do one like that.

Noah: The open ones. Right.

Drew: There it is. That's like him, man. That's how you do it.

Noah: Thanks so much. Great to meet you.

Tom: I appreciate the same. So generous. We are very grateful. Thank you guys.

Noah: Is this the original one from you guys? This has been like 3 or 4 years something. For the distance and space something that drives me nuts is people don't have any depth until. You guys have some, which is great. Obviously like to maximize the difficulty before.  I know you rotate for one-on-ones, right? The podcast mode. I was also the guy who suggested separating the microphones from the desk.

Drew: We put the new camera budget into the LED wall  budget.  That's literally the famous too. We're gonna ride these things off. We're not even tuned to the highest that's on here. The camera’s the one thing I keep losing out on. So we're going to continue.

Noah: You know, it's tough. Tough thing to purchase for sure.

Drew:  I know lighting wise this might suck. I could flip something over here so you can kind of,

Noah: Yeah, we can just rotate this catching one or whatever you want.

Eric: So we're going to get this image to get that from here into the switcher. We come out HDMI into a mini switcher.

Noah: The sub switch. Nice. Oh, you also have the double countdown still. So like you have ten minutes and then you have 10s. So you can trim the last 10s of the first cut down. So it's like at the 11:10 it switches to the second count. Does that make sense?

Eric: I think that's what we're doing now. I mean, you might have saw the video that you showed yesterday.

Noah: Because we do a 450 second.

Noah:  this switcher has one Multiview. The bigger switcher can do two, and the even bigger one can do four unique multi view. So you can do a quad split like you just asked for.  and so the short answer is yes, is just a hardware upgrade.

Eunice: Because I think that would solve a lot of problems that way it's like, talk about like what are we looking at? You know, he says that like 17 times a day.

Drew: So the title know that he'll be able to see the title one. But and then.

Eunice: Yeah. And then you'll be able to see exactly what chat is watching and you'll be like, oh, I left the thing pinned on there.

Drew: I'm assuming then we can split what the Multiview would be then because he would you still need to see everything.

Noah:  This would be Multiview one, this would be Multiview two. So you can be set up a whole completely separate Multiview. This switcher only  allows one Multiview.

Drew: And then with that upgraded switcher  with the second one, we will then be able to toggle between the quad view, the unified view.

Noah: Yeah. And you should be able to control it if you have ATEM access from your computer. I would just show you on the software how to change the windows card.

Drew: And then you can remotely control the ATEM.  

Noah: Yeah, and Multiview. And I think I could set up stream deck controls for that too. So if you wanted to see a four box, like, quad split or, you know, something else here and you want to switch that out, like, it'd be cool if we could program it for you so you don't have to think.

Drew: I'm  gonna be  hundred percent honest with you. I think the final goal that we've been struggling with is like, if you can stream deck, I have stream deck, Eunice have a stream deck and now we can actually do our respective things that we need to do, signify people. You'll be able to take Super Chat button and switch it to a different view or something like that, and that will be more of that.

Noah: That programing  a hundred percent is the toughest part, but it's also when you have it it's like, oh, this is great. Yeah, yeah.

Eunice: Because right now it's all in Eric.

Noah: That's another advantage of splitting the system. So like you have it in into my computer and somebody else too. And like maybe there's an Ecamm computer and you guys all have like remote access to it or something. You know, like something like that. You use like TeamViewer. That's we've done that for shows specifically, obviously with Tom this morning, he had a power like that you let him borrow, which is cool. I mean you might have a built in since you have a stationary desk you might build something. And so he doesn't think about cables. You just have USBC ready for you and him. I don't know how you're set up for it.

Drew: Yeah, I'm as is. I have an extension cable, but that is something that I think long term we could run.

Noah: I was going to say one more thought is like right now everything is like put together, like it's piecemeal. But I think specifically monitors, I guess is what I'm thinking. Like, if you're here permanently and it feels like you guys are going to continue in the show, like long term, you might consider some sort of, rack system,  higher system for your monitors. So, yeah, that way it feels more open in here or even stacking. When specific questions come up, feel free to reach out and then I'll, I'll put some more thoughts into what we've just talked about and send you some sort of writeup of, of some sort.

Drew: That'd be awesome.

“

It was a great experience to sit down with Tom and the team to explore the ins and outs of their audio and video setup. I hope you found this discussion insightful! Thanks for tuning in, and be sure to check out our next blog for more tech insights and behind-the-scenes details.