Many people want to record and upload footage for any number of reasons. Here’s a guide to help you to get started with it.
Photo credit: Jacob Hancox
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Many people want to record gameplay footage for a number of reasons, including one or two less obvious ones. For instance, most league racers on F1 2020 will want to record their footage so that they have evidence to submit to the race stewards in case of incidents. If you’re looking to get into league racing, then you should be looking to record your footage too. Sadly, it’s not as easy as it really should be. Thankfully, that’s exactly why we’ve made this guide for you! So, without further ado, here are some useful tips on how to record your gameplay on PC.
Finding the right software
There are a number of different recording software options out there to choose from. Some such as Fraps require you to pay to receive the full version of their tools. While there are often free trials for these premium programs, they are usually heavily limited in their capacity.
Instead of worrying about all that, we recommend opting for Open Broadcaster Software. It’s got a wide range of functionalities and settings so that you can get what you want out of it, it’s easy to use and most importantly – it’s free. Here is a link to their website, where you can download OBS Studio yourself.
Setting the scene in OBS
If you want to get the most out of OBS, you will need to configure it to suit your setup and preferences. Some of these will be necessary to actually record your footage, while others will help to ensure that the process is as easy as it can be.
First and foremost, you will need to create a source. This tells OBS what application you want to be recorded. Let’s say you’re trying to record F1 2020 gameplay. Press the plus symbol beneath the box entitled ‘sources’ at the bottom left of the OBS window. Then, select ‘game capture’ from the list, and name it whatever you like before pressing OK.
On the next screen, you can do one of two things. Either you can leave the ‘mode’ setting as ‘Capture any fullscreen application’ or you can open up the game you want to record, and change the mode setting to ‘Capture specific window’. If you take the latter option, which we would recommend, you will then see another drop-down list called ‘window’. Select the game you want to record, in our example F1 2020, and then press OK. It is important that you have the F1 2020 game open while doing this, otherwise it will not show up in the ‘window’ list.
Finding your setup
Once you’ve sorted out the basics, it’s time to get everything just the way you like it. OBS comes with a good deal of customizability, and it’s best to take advantage of this. For instance, you can edit your audio levels of both your microphone input and of your computer’s output, which can be found in the ‘mixer’ section next to the sources.
When recording F1 2020 gameplay, it’s worth remembering that you will generally want your in-game sounds to be lower in the footage than they are in-game, as otherwise you risk drowning out your own voice. You can also select which microphone and speakers you want OBS to recognize and use by clicking on the cogs on the right-hand-side of the same panel.
More configuration options can be found in the settings menu. To reach this menu, press the ‘settings’ button under the ‘controls’ tab in the bottom right of the OBS interface. If you want to livestream your gameplay, you will need to select the tab entitled ‘stream’. Once you’re there, input your streaming platform of choice and then your stream key, which you can find on the website to which you will be streaming.
You may also want to edit the bitrate in the streaming section of the ‘output’ tab. A lower bitrate will yield a worse quality video, but a high bitrate will lead to choppy footage if you don’t have the upload speed to support it. We would always recommend erring on the side of caution with racing games such as F1 2020, as a medium or low resolution stream will be a better viewing experience than a choppy one.
If you do not want to stream, go to the ‘output’ tab and make sure your recording path is set to a file location that you will remember. It can be very frustrating digging through your folders trying to find the right one, so taking a moment to confirm your footage’s final destination is worth it. We would also recommend ensuring that the recording format is set to mp4, as this is the most common file type. Don’t worry about the warning that pops up when you select this. If you want to explore the settings more yourself, feel free – the ‘hotkeys’ function can be very useful, but there isn’t anything else of the utmost importance to change.
Finally, you are ready to record your racing, or whatever other games you may wish to play. Make sure the correct ‘scene’ with the source you set up is selected, and then press ‘start recording’ in the bottom-right side. If you are streaming instead, then press ‘start streaming’.
Did this guide help you to get started with recording? Tell us on Twitter at @overtake_gg!
