[Mr_Zain]

Originally Posted by wolfbomb

Thanks to everyone who's posted up and gave awesome advice on casting. To Mr_Zain and ToRBaldie I'll be contacting you guys soon enough on casting. I wanna be ready for the journey I'm about to take. INTO CASTINGGGGGG!

No worries man =] let me know when things are smooth.

[neKo]

If I can add my 2 cents, half of being a good caster is actually playing a fair amount of starcraft 2

and ready for this?
ready?

STUDYING THE PLAYERS YOU ARE CASTING, AND THE MATCH-UP


Bet you didn't expect that one.

but yeah no casters in this region really study up on players and to some extent, a match-up. Most of it is pre-known facts about it.

So go study son.

Quick Comments

	NDG.Stitch:	True, but it's hard to fetch data about anyone in SEA except for Moonglade :)
	FSwolfbomb:	Never expected that one. But I'll give my hand at it.

[Baldie]

Originally Posted by cRneko

If I can add my 2 cents, half of being a good caster is actually playing a fair amount of starcraft 2

and ready for this?
ready?

STUDYING THE PLAYERS YOU ARE CASTING, AND THE MATCH-UP


Bet you didn't expect that one.

but yeah no casters in this region really study up on players and to some extent, a match-up. Most of it is pre-known facts about it.

So go study son.

I definitely agree with this. This is what my focus is on primarily now. I think it is fundamentally important to get those "pre-known facts" down packed before you should even consider analyzing players and how they play match ups though.

Definitely knowing your players and their play styles helps not only in accurately forseeing what is likely to occur but also gives some nice filler information during those less eventful early parts - as well as gives viewers valuable insight into the players who don't know.

I definitely look forward to spending some time studying this and bringing it to casting!

[Baldie]

Originally Posted by wolfbomb

Thanks to everyone who's posted up and gave awesome advice on casting. To Mr_Zain and ToRBaldie I'll be contacting you guys soon enough on casting. I wanna be ready for the journey I'm about to take. INTO CASTINGGGGGG!

No worries mate. Either message me on here or skype me (bradley_baldwin). GLHF mate ♥

[eniram]

I've heard some not so knowledgeable casters who were fun to listen to. If you don't too much about the game yet try not to make any predictions or act like your know what's going on. It can get annoying. Just have fun with it. If you're enjoying what you're doing that will come through in your work and the listener will appreciate that.

[NDG.Stitch]

Wow new casters! YAY!

There's already so much richness in this thread that I feel like I have stuff to learn from here too!

But yeah, here are my short lil' tips to get you started!

1) Find out what you really love with a passion in this game - Surely, I think most, if not all, casters in SC2 have a huge passion for this game. They love it, they speak it, and they live it! When I cast myself, I am really in sync with the game, whether it be the plays that the players are doing or the sight of StarCraft, I feel like I'm completely absorbed into this game. I always believed that if you're not interested or if you don't find interest in something, you will never do it well - so I always think you should know what you like best about what you do!

2) Know the Game - I can speak on this for myself, I don't know the game perfectly - but as always, the audience will expect you to. You've started the game for two months, there's still lots of things to learn and many things to memorize. I feel that once you have those nitty-gritty background knowledge behind your brain, things just get smoother and smoother and you'll feel that the audience is learning from what you say as well - which is always important!

3) Find your Style - I believe that each caster has their style of casting. It's really important to develop your own character, and not be a shadow of another caster. I'm not saying that you can't aim to be an Artosis, but to people that have just heard you the first time, you want to leave them a unique impression of who you are. Do what your heart wants and say it out loud on stream when you're casting, and take the opportunity to express yourself as you shoutcast StarCraft!

4) Be Adaptive - (This mainly applies to casting with a co-caster) From your location, I see that you are from Malaysia (correct me if I'm wrong). As a caster from Hong Kong, I learned that being adaptive to other casters is very important. I cannot speak on behalf of Singapore or Australia, but numerous times I have to adapt to who I cast with. I think it's very important in a multi-regional server to have the ability to adapt to another person's style of casting, because if not, chemistry breaks and all hell comes loose! So I always go by the mindset that I'm there to work with my partner to present something great, not work by myself and do my own thing!

Personally, when I started casting, I had a huge helper. I was able to work with the legendary SEA casters back then haha, and fortunately, I also got a lot of help with HDPhoenix helping me back then when I just started. I was ridiculously lucky even getting to cast a huge tournament like the SEASL #1 qualifiers when I started for 3 months. I think it's always great to find a caster who is more experienced to give you advice and feedback on your casting man.

These aren't a lot of tips, and I tried to not repeat anybody else's points so please forgive me if these tips sound a bit awkward.

Good luck with your endeavors broski!

Quick Comments

	Baldie:
	FSwolfbomb:	Yeah, I'm from Malaysia. And thanks for all the advice. and no thats a ton of advice man.

[Mr_Zain]

After 13 hours of straight casting (APL Qualifiers and Masters Cup #16) I must say it's as much an endurance sport as it is a skill based one so stock up on water and snacks!

Quick Comments

	Baldie:	I want to rep you multiple times for this. I'm still learning the fine art that is endurance casting ♥
	FSwolfbomb:	So true even for LAN parties. :D

[mGGMueX]

Try to play at the highest level you possibly can (i.e. go for masters league) and watch player streams heavily as well as casts, preferably ones where the player explains their logic. Player point-of-view streams are a great way to get insight into players' thought processes and build orders.

[iMSystem]

My number 1 advice would be don't stop, and listen to feedback!

Everything else has been covered, I would have posted a longer write up, if I had time yesterday haha

13hours streaming session with Zain was pretty crazy .

Actually, what I will write is that if you want to get real deep into casting, you need to promote yourself / actually do work outside of casting hours.

Stuff I do outside of casting (Hopefully to give you an idea):
- Promote myself via other websites (TL, CG, Reddit, SC2casts.com, etc)
- Work on elements for the stream. (Overlays, videos, animated gifs, and so on)
- Learn the streaming software inside and out (I have XSplit almost under wraps, and learning Wirecast as we speak)
- After a stream (Usually the next day) cut up the hours long VOD into each individual game so that they can be uploaded onto Youtube for people who missed them.
- Watch other tournament streams for ideas to adopt onto my own. (Stream elements, Observer work, Filling downtime)
- Watch Starcraft 2 (To lean the meta-game of current match-ups)
- Play Starcraft 2

Generally speaking though you don't need to do this at this time, just focus on your casting as a whole and then when you knuckle down on that, then you work on everything else

GLHF!

Quick Comments

	Mayo:
	LGShaft:	Great ideas! Just curious what program you use to edit FLV files that come out of XSplit?

[LGShaft]

GameReplays.org is looking for new casters right now. That's a good way to get your name out there, once you've got some skill at it. Like everyone here said, I'd recommend just doing it XSplit is one of the better programs to use. If you PM me or add me on skype (r4nd0m1os3r) I can work with you and your system to help you configure everything. You're also going to need to play a lot and begin to understand the game. You can skip ahead in that process somewhat by hiring a coach. Depends on your dedication I suppose And finances of course!

[iMSystem]

Originally Posted by vVvShaft

Great ideas! Just curious what program you use to edit FLV files that come out of XSplit?

Not sure what you would have to use for FLV, I know you can do it in Premier Pro with an external plugin, but I can't help you there sorry.

[Flamga]

Originally Posted by System

Not sure what you would have to use for FLV, I know you can do it in Premier Pro with an external plugin, but I can't help you there sorry.

With xsplit, change the file output to MP4, however just look around to see what programs there are and fiddle with them. This way you get a bit of understanding as well. However youtube accepts FLV files as standard so you can just reduce the recording quality on xsplit as another option.

[LGShaft]

Originally Posted by FlashFlamga

With xsplit, change the file output to MP4, however just look around to see what programs there are and fiddle with them. This way you get a bit of understanding as well. However youtube accepts FLV files as standard so you can just reduce the recording quality on xsplit as another option.

How do I do change it to MP4? I'm used to converting stuff with TMPGEnc and stuff, but there's a lot of quality loss in that method

[Flamga]

Originally Posted by vVvShaft

How do I do change it to MP4? I'm used to converting stuff with TMPGEnc and stuff, but there's a lot of quality loss in that method

In your local recording there should be a dropdown box at the bottom of the settings area where you set quality etc, it can record to FLV or MP4. However this may be a premium feature :/

Also depending on how much you reduce the filesize you will lose a fair bit of quality, but this is trial and error.

[Xeen]

Originally Posted by wolfbomb

So what I want to know now, is how do I actually become a caster? A good one at that.

Just act excited and make people like you outside of the game. Being articulate and good at the game are optional.

Alternatively, if you don't want to follow the trend of SC2 casters, be good at the game, be able to explain the game, be clear in your talking (try to avoid strong accents, slurring words, stumbling over words, overuse of phrases, etc). Have background knowledge on the players and leagues so you can give some context to each match. Be interesting.

The easiest way to start is just latch on to someone as a co-caster, and then slowly consume their spotlight, like a lamprey eel.

[FSGauL]

it really depends if you want to be heavily analysis, i always prefer just watching a caster who is funny.. just preference though

examples:
PsyStarcraft