Using Open Source BlackHole Project For Multiple Audio Streams via OBS & Other Streaming Software.
This is a small write-up of my experience setting up and using BlackHole, a free open-source project, to process all of my audio needs while streaming. I tried BlackHole after I lost support for my paid solution, LoopBack, after updating to macOS 12 beta. Since the OS was too new, there were no versions of LoopBack that supported it. I still love LoopBack, but for now I’m loving BlackHole better because it works lmfao ;)
ON WITH THE SHOW!
INITIAL INSTALLATION
I was initially directed to BlackHole’s github page at https://github.com/ExistentialAudio/BlackHole. I was getting ready to do the whole git clone, install from source routine when I noticed they were all set to go inside of the brew project — hell yeah!
While this project is open-source and free, I highly recommend donating to them because not a lot of people do. If it worked for you, throw em a few $$ — every cent counts!
https://github.com/sponsors/ExistentialAudio
The install went flawlessly:
$ brew install blackhole-16ch
Two channel exists as well, and is reflected as such with: blackhole-2ch
After the brew installation, you need to setup the BlackHole driver by opening your Audio MIDI Setup, right clicking BlackHole, and clicking “Use This Device For Sound Output”.
I personally also created another “Multi-Output Device” to try and tackle some latency issues I was having between some old USB devices (totally unrelated to BlackHole). You don’t need to necessarily do this, everything works fine without it (at least I’m 99% sure it does).
NORMAL SETTINGS BELOW
CUSTOM CONFIG I USE BELOW:
DOING A MIC CHECK WITH SPOTIFY ALSO PLAYING
Will this work in native OBS? I don’t know but I don’t see why not — as long as you can get OBS to work at all. I have not fared well here, sadly. But Streamlabs’ version worked. It’s available for free here:
https://streamlabs.com/content-hub/post/streamlabs-is-live-on-mac
To wrap up, you can essentially use this tool, BlackHole, as an internal mixer for ANY software that accepts microphone input — Including DAWs and whateva!
SIGNING OFF
Let me know what you think, if I missed anything, or if you think there’s other good solutions out there to test! Message me on twitter at https://twitter.com/notdan
PEACE!
Your Best Fiend,
-notdan
