How to Present Videos like a Pro for Free

Ever want to show videos without that awkward pause while someone clicks on the play button in front of the whole church? Maybe you just want to get started showing videos. This tutorial will cover how to setup VLC (and Windows) so that you get a seamless look when playing videos. This means that when there is no video playing, the screen is black (almost off). When you are ready to play, you can quickly play the video, eliminating the awkward pause in the service.

The Hardware

If you already have a computer setup, you can skip this section, but if you are just figuring out how to present videos, this is the equipment that you will need.

• A projector Screen – A dedicated screen or just a big white wall
• A Projector – I avoid DLP projectors, as color contrast is horrible. I’ve started using Epson projectors only, as they use 3LCD, which provides equal brightness between colors. A 4000 lumen Epson PowerLite can outperform a 7000 lumen DLP projector with the lights on.
• A dedicated computer. Doesn’t need to be beefy. An 8th-gen i3 CPU or better is fine.
• Two monitors – being able to see what you are presenting without the projector is best. The second screen is needed for controlling the presentation.
• Video splitter. Split the video signal so it goes to the projector and one of your screens. If you have enough outputs on your computer, you can omit this step.

Windows 10 User Setup

It is suggested that you have a dedicated computer. either use an auto-login user or use a domain and do separate users. If you use a domain, you will need to do this setup for every new user on the computer. If you are on a Mac, there should be similar settings.

1. Open Settings App
2. Go to Personalization
3. Set background to solid color and then black
4. To to Task bar page
5. Scroll down to Multiple displays section and turn off Show taskbar on all displays
6. You can also hide the task bar if you want. I find it useful to keep it up on the main display.

VLC Setup

The first time you open VLC, you will get asked if you want VLC to lookup media or check for updates. I usually turn these two off to avoid any issues during production time. To get rid of the cone and all the other on-screen stuff, follow these steps:

1. Open Preferences – Tools Menu -> Preferences
2. In the bottom left, click Show all settings radio button
3. Go to Interfaces -> Main Interfaces
4. Select Qt as the Interface Module
5. Go to Interfaces -> Main Interfaces -> Qt
6. Change the following settings:
   • Show notification popup on track change = Never
   • Show a controller in fullscreen mode = Unchecked
   • Show unimportant error and warnings dialogs – Unchecked
   • Display background cone or art = Unchecked
7. Go to Video -> Subtitles/OSD
8. Disable On Screen Display

Prepare Your Playlist

Now that VLC and Windows is configured, make sure you queue up your videos before the service starts and make sure that you test at least once so you know how loud the video is and it is ready to go. If you need someone to turn off the lights, make sure they are know when the video will happen. Preparation is key to getting rid of that pesky pause. Once you are ready, you can drag VLC to the screen you plan on using and press F11 to go fullscreen and then Ctrl-H to hide the control bar

If you have multiple videos and you need to put a pause in between, add a “network stream” and use the URL vlc://pause:9999. The number at the end determines how many seconds Alternatively, you can go into settings and enable “Play and Pause”, which will pause after each playlist item. Just make sure everyone knows about it. If you play audio normally using VLC or you have videos back-to-back, don’t use this option.

If someone gives you a link to an online video, download it to avoid any internet issues during the service, especially if you provide Wi-Fi for the congregation. I’ve seen too many services or business meetings where the dreaded spinner shows up. There are plenty of online downloaders. I’ve seen many people use “4K Video Downloader” to fetch videos. I personally use ‘youtube-dl’ in a Linux environment. Just make sure you vet whatever you use, as this is a particular software area that is prone to malware.

Play

Since there is no interface, you will need to control VLC using alternative methods. The first way is to use the keyboard. The downside to this, is that you have to make sure VLC is the selected program. If you were doing something else, you should be able to just click on the taskbar icon (where there are also some controls that work too).

• Space = Pause/Play
• S = Stop
• P = Previous (Will start immediately)
• N = Next (Will start immediately)
• Dedicated play/pause button on your keyboard. There should be no other media player open, including in your browser (like YouTube).

You can also remote control VLC from other devices using an app or a browser. For more info on the browser, you can follow the directions on VLC’s Wiki. You will need to make sure that all firewalls are open for this to work.

If you are using Windows 10 or newer and you have a second screen, you can hover over VLC in the taskbar and click on play or pause.

Going beyond

Free VLC is great until you want to do more – like include slides. This is when you need to start looking into getting actual presentation software, like ProPresenter. There are many other options for presentation software, but ProPresenter has been around for years.

If you need help with setting up your audio or video systems, I would be glad to help. Just send an email to [email protected] and we can setup a meeting.