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March 2010

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Shure’s Doug Gould teaches at the inaugural Worship Arts Technology Summit at Maranatha Bible and Missionary Conference in Muskegon, Mich., in September 2008.  

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Sound Made Simple's SMS iCD teaches the fundamentals of audio and acoustics in bite-sized nuggets, without requiring a connection to the Internet.  

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At the semi-annual Worship Facilities Conference and Expo (WFX), hands-on training in various technical disciplines is administered by church technical directors and industry experts.  

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Meyer Sound recently conducted a seminar in the 57-seat Pearson Theatre at its company headquarters in Berkeley, Calif.  

Budgets for technological gear are nice, but no box or board is worth its price tag unless your church has a committed staff member or volunteer with the skills to put that piece of technology to good use. After all, a car needs a driver, and in this country a driver needs a driver's license. How to get that piece of photo ID? Take driver's ed. For churches that want to adopt new audiovisual, production or lighting technologies, investing time and resources in technical education is thus a no-brainer.

Fortunately, today there's a wide range of educational resources out there that cover every technological task possible, from miking a band or choir to running a lighting console. Many of these educational programs are tailored for churches, be they online, on a DVD or administered in person.

There are a few main sources for technical education. First, there are the obvious institutions that are dedicated to education: colleges, universities and technical training institutes. Many of these bodies now offer online courses, even for highly technical disciplines such as mixing music. Discrete educational products such as training DVDs would also fall under this first rubric.

Second, the tradeshows that we attend throughout the year attract both experts in various technological disciplines and those who want to become proficient in them. Not surprisingly, many of these annual conferences feature full-day class tracks and one-off seminars that bring together the experts and the knowledge seekers. Some classes are taught by employees of companies that manufacture audiovisual, lighting and production hardware and software. That brings us to the final, related category: Manufacturers of the gear that your team wants to learn how to use will of course sell you that gear, and many will also actively help you learn how to use it.

Strictly Training
Some educators in the field of audiovisual, lighting and production will come to a town near you; to learn from others, you'll need to visit them on a college campus. Other technical educators teach via online courses, computer programs and DVDs.

Ex'pression College in Emeryville, Calif., serves those who can make it to the Bay Area for a bachelor's program. Courses of study are centered mostly around animation, production and postproduction, but there's also a Sound Arts program for those who wish to study live sound. New at Ex'pression are evening-only bachelor's degree programs for folks who work during the day. The next term of classes starts June 26, 2009.

Syn-Aud-Con, on the other hand, takes its in-depth two-day seminars on the road in order to teach the principles of audio and acoustics. A Syn-Aud-Con audio seminar's average price is $275 per day. "What people get from Syn-Aud-Con is a shortened learning curve on the things they need to know to work in the audio field," according to the Syn-Aud-Con website. "We know that you must divide your time between audio and other technical fields, and we strive to provide the audio part in a way that complements the other technologies that you must work with." Upcoming seminars this summer are in San Francisco and near Newark, N.J., both places playing host to Core Principles of Audio and Sound Reinforcement for Technicians.

How-To Sound Workshops tailors its hands-on training sessions for churches. How-To claims its programs will aid anyone involved in the audio portion of church sevices, from youth pastors and music leaders who need a better understanding of sound systems to volunteers who run the systems every week. Prices range from $99 to $149 for their eight-hour live sound workshops. How-To Sound's website lists four Live Sound for Worship workshops in May at four churches across California, then one in Maryland in June and another in New Jersey in September. Visit www.howtosound.com for the updated seminar schedule and to download a PDF on “10 Secrets to Better Church Sound.”

Full Sail University in Winter Park, Fla., offers associate's degrees in recording arts and show production and touring. So far its online degree options do not include technical training.

One school that has embraced the concept of online technical education is Berklee College of Music, based in Boston. Its Berkleemusic online-education division offers courses on Pro Tools 8, Vocal Techniques 101, and producing music with Logic Pro. The course author of the new “Live Sound: Mixing and Recording” course is Bill Gibson, who was the music director at a large church for 12 years, and he defends online education as a viable concept. "In the online format, I'm able to get the sound operators to listen deeply into some excellent music and wonderful mixes—we're able to build a frame of reference for building new mixes," he says. "As we work through the standard instruments I'm able to show them what a good sound is and then say, 'Hey, here's how you do that' through the print, graphics, audio examples and Flash demos." Berkleemusic's next term begins June 29, 2009.

The Society of Audio Engineers (SAE) has 50 global locations around the globe (six here in the States), and it's also set to extend its reach to anyone with an Internet connection. SAE Institute's regular course offerings include programs in audio, filmmaking and Web design. For online education, SAE has started pre-registering students for online courses at www.saeonline.com.

A training DVD might be the way to go if your church's budget isn't going to allow anyone to take a full course of study, whether at a college or online. Tim Ranson, a lighting professional with Delta Stage Lighting, has put together a training DVD—a primer course on lighting, as he puts it—that’s designed to teach a church staff basic information about good lighting positioning. His partner, Jayme Braun, has created a similar DVD that covers audio training. Again, it focuses on the fundamentals of audio, such as the basics of signal flow, gain structure, etc., as well as anticipating and eliminating feedback. The cost is $99 per DVD or $189 for both—a lot for a DVD, perhaps, but very little for basic training for your whole volunteer staff.

One of the most attractive aspects of training from the comfort of your own PC is that technical education can work around your existing work and family schedule. Chuck Walthall of Sound Made Simple recognized this advantage as he devised a computer-based audio learning program. "Training opportunities need to be tailored and offered in such a manner that they could fit into the day-to-day appointments of life," he says. SMS iCD teaches the fundamentals of audio and acoustics that apply to both analog and digital systems; the program works even without an Internet connection and presents information in "bite-sized nuggets," according to Walthall.

Conferences & Tradeshows
Worship Facilities Conference and Expo (WFX), held twice a year in spring and fall, is the only facilities-and technology-oriented tradeshow aimed specifically at houses of worship. (WFX is presented by Production Media Inc., which owns Church Production Magazine and sister publication Worship Facilities Magazine.) Alongside the show's manufacturers' exhibition is a complete hands-on training program for audiovisual, lighting and production topics, taught by church technical directors and others within the A/V industry. "The conference classes are presented by a range of experts from the industry, including peers," says Church Production's Editor and WFX Conference Chairman Brian Blackmore. The hands-on classes within the Tech Essentials course track cover audio mixing, video editing and light design. Other tracks, such as Professional Development & Team Building, also include sessions that would benefit technical directors—for example, "How to Keep a Tech Volunteer for Life." This year's spring WFX Expo is in Long Beach, Calif., May 13-15; the October 28-30 conference is in Charlotte, N.C.

Willow Creek Community Church's Willow Arts conference is June 10-12 this year at the church's South Barrington, Ill., campus. The conference is designed to equip artists with practical tools to help them be more effective at crafting worship experiences. Breakout sessions are where most of the conference's technical training takes place, in hands-on classes such as Lighting for a Video Shoot, Tapeless HD Workflow and Digital Audio.

Live Design International (LDI) will be held this year in Orlando, Fla. LDInstitute, the show's educational component, runs from November 16-21. The courses of study focus on lighting and live design topics such as lighting console training and electrical and rigging training. Past sessions have also included dedicated audio training—for example, Advanced Microphone Technique from Shure and Fundamentals of System Design, a session taught by Steve Bush of Meyer Sound.

The InfoComm 2009 conference runs June 14-19 in Orlando, Fla. Manufacturers offer training, and the show offers many certification tracks especially for systems integrators. Pat Brown of Syn-Aud-Con will be there with a Sound Reinforcement for Designers seminar, held all day June 14-17. Aimed at churches specifically, the concurrent Technologies for Worship Conference hosts all-day hands-on workshops on audio, HD video production and Internet streaming. There are also basic how-to seminars covering topics such as lowering stage volumes, troubleshooting live sound, and creative uses of projection and lighting on a budget. Advanced seminar topics include wireless microphones and preparing your facility for multi-site. See www.tfwm.com/conferences-infocomm2009 for details.

NAB 2009 has come and gone, but the National Association of Broadcasters show, held annually in April in Las Vegas, regularly hosts a Post Production World conference, which includes certification tracks in Apple and Adobe editing and effects software packages.

Manufacturer-Offered Training
The discount clothing chain SYMS has a slogan that also seems to apply especially to manufacturers within the pro audio industry: "An educated consumer is our best customer." Manufacturers of microphones, audio consoles and loudspeakers all seem to want their customers to understand the proper way to operate the equipment they've purchased or that they're planning to buy.

Rane, for instance, posts technical reference material on its website in the form of a Pro Audio Reference (PAR, at www.rane.com/digi-dic.html) and RaneNotes (www.rane.com/library.html), as well as magazine and AES Journal articles, PowerPoint presentations and tutorials. "We provide all these educational materials for several reasons, all based on our belief that the more our customers know, the easier our job is," says Dennis Bohn, CTO of Rane Corp. "Anyone who designs, installs or runs audio systems must completely understand what they are doing in order for the system to work and satisfy their customer and/or audience." For those designers, installers and operators to keep getting work and therefore keep buying Rane's compressors, mic preamps, etc., they need to know what they're doing.

Meyer Sound recognizes the importance of technical education. "We believe that education is especially important to church technical folks as they often face the challenge of supporting several different production types (spoken word, music, audience participation, etc.) all in one service while, at the same time, often needing to deliver production values that rival those of full-scale professional productions,” says Gavin Canaan, Meyer Sound education manager. The company has hosted science-based professional seminars since 1984 and built a 57-seat theater in its headquarters for hosting seminars. Last year Meyer Sound conducted well over 100 seminars in dozens of countries. Course offerings cover line-array technology, the use of acoustical prediction, sound system design and more. Visit www.meyersound.com/education for details.

Microphone manufacturer Shure also offers free training materials on its website in the form of two how-to guides directed at houses of worship. There's also the Shure Notes online newsletter, which has a version dedicated to worship. Thirty-one editions are in the archive at this point, covering topics such as wireless mics, podcasting and how to mike a theatrical production. Also, educational booklets are available at www.shure.com/proaudio/training/education, with subjects like personal monitors and wireless mic systems for churches. "We also have field support staff and in-house technical support staff who are well-versed in typical worship audio applications," says Chris Lyons, manager of technical and educational communications for Shure. "Shure's field support staff presents seminars on audio topics at regional worship events around the country." For information about live events, visit www.shure.com/proaduio/training/houseofworship.

Another microphone manufacturer, Sennheiser, has held its popular Sound Academy in various locations since 2006. This year it expands with additional courses to become the Installed Sound Academy. The first day of the full-day seminar is for consultants and designers, and the second is geared toward operators and technicians. Remaining locations this year include Duluth, Ga.; Plano, Texas; San Francisco; and Lake Forest, Calif. According to Sennheiser, Day Two of the seminars has been adapted from the company's traditional RF wireless course to benefit worship leaders and church technical directors. Attendees learn how to plan for trouble-free operation of multi-channel wireless mics and personal monitoring systems in tough environments. The registration fee is $149, with an early-bird discount available (www.sennheiserusa.com/SECEvents).

Yamaha Commercial Audio Systems provides CA training seminars for their digital mixing consoles in a room set up specifically for training at their Buena Park facility. Seminars include basic and advanced operation. All the equipment used for training is in road cases for holding seminars at various locations across the country.

Along with Yamaha, Martin Professional and Media Shout, Shure is also co-sponsoring three three-day training events this summer. At the Worship Arts Technology Summits (WATS) trainers from each company host a variety of sessions on live audio and recording. “The best experience is a hands-on event,” says Jim Weiveris of Yamaha. “You can't hear the difference when you cut 1K EQ from a book, nor can you learn the real-life effect of the functions of a mixer from a webpage.”

The Audio Track at WATS comprises five sessions: Digital Sound Reinforcement 101, Audio Fundamentals, Art and Science of Mixing, Microphones Part 1 and 2, and Wireless Mic Systems. WATS conferences are held June 10-12 at Biola University in La Mirada, Calif.; August 3-5 at Maranatha Bible and Missionary Conference in Muskegon, Mich.; and September 14-16 at Kingdom Bound in Buffalo, N.Y. Prices vary.

Trevor Boyer is a freelance writer living in Brooklyn, New York. He likes to write professional A/V and video production stories (like this one) that can be reported via subway travel.