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Audio. If you need a new or upgraded sound system, you’ll want to consider: 1. Your budget. Many older churches, temples and mosques were designed without audio reinforcement. The sanctuary itself acts as a sound system, with hard reflective surfaces to amplify sound. This type of structure is great for choirs, adequate for speech, but tricky when you start to add loudspeakers. Many newer buildings are designed more like theaters, acoustically much friendlier to audio engineers. Whatever your building, you have three main choices in a loudspeaker system: • Basic, with speakers only at the front of your sanctuary. This type of setup can be a disaster when the room is full of reflective surfaces. Reverb becomes an issue, music sounds bad and speech is difficult to understand. You may have seating areas where members can’t hear at all. • Distributed, with multiple loudspeakers putting audio only where people are seated. The best choice for many buildings, distributed systems require real expertise to choose and place loudspeakers. Be cautioned: a less-than-expert contractor can waste a lot of your money. • Line arrays (or speaker columns), which, because of the physics of sound, allow the systems integrator to very precisely aim the coverage to avoid reflective side and back walls. A properly designed array in an appropriate room will sound great while eliminating feedback from your chancel or stage. Two surprises with newer arrays: prices have dropped precipitously and sizes have shrunk to the point where they can blend into an older church’s decor. Video. With a worship projection system, you’ll need to consider budget and readability, flexibility and ease of use. A basic video system in a house of worship consists of a computer, projector, screen and specialized software such as MediaShout. Next you’ll want to add a VCR/DVD player and a second computer or laptop. Many congregations grow from there by adding a camera to project the speaker’s face, picture in picture, and seamless switching. Expertise is needed to choose and place projectors and screens, but certainly it’s an easier process than designing a sound system. The best integrators, however, will prove their worth optimizing component choices for a church, mosque or temple. A company like CTI will help you find ways to use your new video system to its best advantage. These include: • Projected song lyrics. A video system can be less expensive than a set of hymnals, yet work better for older members, who no longer have to switch back and forth to reading glasses. Today’s software gives you hundreds of hymns with still and motion backgrounds plus the ability to add and save new lyrics and new still and motion images. A huge question today is whether to install high-definition gear. HD is significantly more expensive, yet it will definitely be the standard in just a few years. At CTI, we hate to install a system we know will be obsolete. For that reason, we suggest you consider at least an HD infrastructure, where your screens, cabling and certain other components are HD-capable. That way, you won’t need to tear everything out when you’re ready for HD cameras and sources. Lighting. Professional stage lighting can make a huge difference in how your service looks, and is popular in many churches for use with video image-magnification systems, as well as praise bands, choirs and orchestras. Even in a very traditional sanctuary, careful placement of a spotlight or two can add focus and impact to the worship leader’s message. Lighting, too, is an area where technology has changed recently. One or two new, automated fixtures can often take the place of multiple fixed-position spots, and they eliminate the need for physical access to aim individual lights. When you’re choosing a video, audio or lighting supplier, make sure it’s someone with real expertise meeting the needs of religious organizations. CTI has specialists with many years experience working as musicians, stage engineers, lighting designers and systems integrators in worship environments. Printable version of this article. |
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But for a pastor who has put 20 hours of blood, sweat and tears into a message, it’s disconcerting to have to fumble with a remote. Especially in front of 400 people. The solution is adding a seamless switcher/scaler to your video system. It’s the logical next step for congregations who have been using a projector and computer system and now plan to move to multiple sources...a second computer or laptop, a DVD player, VCR, and perhaps a camera or two. |
In an informal business meeting, it’s no big deal to stand up with a projector remote and choose sources. If you hit the wrong button or the projector flickers when you switch, that’s generally OK.