Launched in June of last year, the world of online gaming needed a portal to livestream events and Justin.TV's secondary niche website, Twitch.TV, serves today as just that. A huge portion of major online gaming tournaments and events call Twitch.TV home, and the site receives billions of views every month.

What if you're just a guy sitting at home who wants to stream yourself playing an emulator or MMO? One thing Twitch doesn't do a good enough job of is sharing that information with their community. After getting such an urge myself, I had to find this out. Tucked away on their forums, I managed to find that information.

Today, I'm going to share how you can use a free and easy tool offered by Adobe, Flash Media Encoder, to stream video directly to your Twitch.TV channel.

Download Flash Media Encoder

Straight from the Adobe website, Flash Media Encoder is described as follows:

Adobe Flash Media Live Encoder 3.2 live audio and video capture software is a media encoder that streams audio and video in real time to Adobe Flash Media Server software or Flash Video Streaming Service (FVSS). This software can enable the broadcast of live events such as sporting events, webcasts, or concerts — around the clock.

stream video

Get Your Key & Config

On this page, there is a Show Key button. However, when using FME, that's a bit obsolete.

how to stream video

The Config button shown in the screenshot above will allow you to automatically download a configuration profile for Flash Media Encoder that populates the fields in Flash Media Encoder with the Flash Media Server URL, stream key, and optimal quality values. Save this XML file to your desktop or wherever else you'd like.

how to stream video

From there, you want to go to File and Open Profile in Flash Media Encoder. Load the XML file that you just saved.

stream video

From here, you can click the Start button and you should be able to begin your stream.

Manual Tweaking

If you'd rather configure Flash Media Encoder on your own, know that it requires a little more experience. You'll need to use one of the following Flash Media Server URLs, if you'd rather not use Justin.TV's default load-balancing address:

Justin.TV On-net Proxies

  • San Francisco, CA - rtmp://live.justin.tv/app
  • Ashburn, VA - rtmp://live-iad.justin.tv/app
  • Miami, FL - rtmp://live-mia.justin.tv/app
  • New York, NY - rtmp://live-jfk.justin.tv/app
  • Los Angeles, CA - rtmp://live-lax.justin.tv/app
  • London, GB - rtmp://live-lhr.justin.tv/app
  • Amsterdam - rtmp://live-ams.justin.tv/app
  • Frankfurt - rtmp://live-fra.justin.tv/app

Justin.TV Off-net Proxies (3rd Party Infrastructure)

  • Dallas, TX - rtmp://live-dfw.justin.tv/app
  • San Antonio, TX - rtmp://live-dfw-backup.justin.tv/app
  • Los Angeles, CA - rtmp://live-lax-backup.justin.tv/app
  • Herdon, VA - rtmp://live-iad-backup.justin.tv/app
  • London, GB - rtmp://live-lhr-backup.justin.tv/app
  • Asia - rtmp://live-sin-backup.justin.tv/app

In the Stream field, enter the key from the aforementioned Show Key button on the official Twitch.TV website.

The rest can be configured to your own liking. You're able to save your stream locally, but be advised that higher-quality streaming can create a really bloated video file.

Make sure you select the correct device to stream from. If you're trying to stream from your desktop, a tool like ManyCam would do best. We've done an article on ManyCam, which you can read up on here.

If you need any more help, just drop me a comment to ask or let me know if this article has helped you.