A Revolution in Church Filmmaking

Now that 2022’s Capture Summit filmmaking and content creation conference is complete, one thing is clear: church video production capabilities and opportunities are exploding.

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Church filmmaking isn’t playing a secondary role anymore. That point is as clear as when the director calls out “Action!” And it’s time that the church world digests that fact.

As dual professional/church filmmaker Josh Etheridge—a standout Capture Summit 2022 presenter—states, “It seems church filmmakers think it’s a handicap to work for a church, as if the church is a stepping stone to something bigger. There’s a mindset at church that people can just show up and wing it.” And he’s not afraid to say that he has a problem with that, both as a ministry moviemaker and as a seasoned pro.

“You need to push yourself as hard as you can, no matter what. It takes hours and hours to create great content. I know churches don't have extensive resources, however, in my [educational] sessions for church filmmakers, I’m more interested in showing what we do on big commercial sets than talking about making do with what you have,” Etheridge says. “I think by doing this, church film teams will create better films if they have a goal to strive for.”

Capture Summit 2022 hits the mark

On July 25-27, 2022, Etheridge taught heavily attended interactive sessions on cinematography and directing in a cyc wall studio set up specifically for Capture Summit 2022, at the broadcast campus of 12Stone Church on Sugarloaf Circle at the John C. Maxwell Leadership Center in the metro Atlanta city of Duluth. He works as a filmmaker both at Blue Ridge Community Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, and as owner of Josh Etheridge Films, a commercial film production company in Lynchburg. (It’s worth noting that the state of Georgia and its capital city, Atlanta, Capture Summit’s turf for the first time ever this year, has grown into a major player in the professional film industry since 2008, pulling in $4.4 billion from production in the state in fiscal year 2022.)

Compared to years past, Etheridge, now a veteran educational session instructor, notes that the six-year-old Capture Summit, the brainchild of the founders of Church Production Magazine, showcased a newfound validity and vitality in 2022.

Sitting at the summit between teaching sessions, in one of 12Stone’s many living room-style spaces designed for laid-back meetings, Etheridge spoke with Church Production and decidedly stated, “Capture is a bit more legit this year. It seems tighter.”

In addition, Capture’s attendees in metro Atlanta—who came from 23 states, three countries, and as far away as Doha, Qatar—brought along a bit more real-world experience with them. As one of Etheridge’s producers and creative directors at Josh Etheridge Films, Eli Perdew, noted in the joint interview, “Attendees were asking more practical questions. They seemed more heavily into their roles in production.”

And Etheridge added, “They’re asking questions on a bigger scale. You could see them playing out scenarios in their mind. And they were very direct, for example saying things like, ‘Can you show me what it looks like to do that with just one light?’ And as a presenter, I like that challenge.”

Presenters who joined Etheridge at Capture Summit 2022 include professional Christian filmmaker Phil Cooke of Cooke Media Group in Los Angeles; Dennis Choy, director of production at California’s Saddleback Church; Christian film producer Laura Tapp; James Legg, film director at 12Stone Church; Justin Firesheets, project manager at Alabama’s Church of the Highlands; Rohn Starling, content director at Oklahoma’s Transformation Church; Katie Allred of Meta; Chad Zollo from North Carolina’s Elevation Church; Andre Jones, owner of Atlanta’s Another Jones Production; keynote speakers Dave Clark of Fellowship Church and John Humphrey of I Am Second, both in Texas.

Attendees’ takes

Capture attendee Dominique King, filmmaker and digital communications manager with Atlanta’s historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, the home church of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., attended her first-ever Capture Summit in 2022 at 12Stone. An established ministry leader, King is working on her Master of Divinity (MDiv) degree at Atlanta’s Emory University Candler School of Theology.

“We can use technology to compose amazing videos that can spread the Message. We can implement some of the things we’re learning here at Capture, even if we don’t have the budget yet,” King notes of the film team at Ebenezer Baptist. “Some of the film teams at the top churches here are not afraid of pushing the envelope and allowing the technology to help move the Message and communicate the Gospel.”

As well as noting the knowledge she personally gained through Capture’s educational sessions and tabletop panel discussions, King acknowledged the invaluable opportunity of getting to network with church film peers from all around the country and the globe. “I’ve met people who are letting me see their worship services and get creative ideas we can use in our ministry,” she smiles.

Another Capture Summit 2022 first-time attendee, Doha Fellowship’s head of media, Mladen Erjavec, traveled to Atlanta from Qatar with his wife, coordinating his Capture visit during a summertime trip to Jamaica to visit in-laws. “I spend my summers on this side of planet Earth, and I will definitely come back to Capture,” Erjavec says. “I have made some incredible contacts and had some really incredible experiences.”

Croatian-born Erjavec, the only full-time staff filmmaker on his church’s team, relishes the opportunity for Doha Fellowship to bring worship to foreigners and to be good hosts to those visiting Qatar. The videos that Doha Fellowship creates are designed to support church plants in the broader surrounding regions—in Pakistan, South Africa, Cyprus, Greece, and others. “We see that as our mission. And we live stream our sermons that are also accessible in a library on our website (https://www.dohafellowship.com).” He adds, “We can be seen in churches in India, streaming all over Asia and Africa. It’s our mission to spread the Word for all nations.”

Erjavec says that of all the educational sessions and workshops he attended at Capture Summit 2022, one of his favorites was Christian filmmaker Bryce McNabb’s “Film, the Spiritual Weapon.” In this session, McNabb, the owner of Atlanta-based McNabb Storytelling, reinforced the importance of being a media missionary, which resonated with Erjavec, who says, “He talked about what worship teams can learn from the Elevation and Bethel [worship teams], and how we can implement that into our creative filmmaking groups. His whole session was about our current culture, and Christians influencing culture more [deeply].”

The Doha Fellowship film team leader adds that McNabb encouraged church filmmakers to do their best work, despite the fact that their message is oftentimes up against movies made with millions of dollars. “He told us that, even so, we can influence culture.”

Capture Summit’s one-of-a-kind Church Filmcraft Festival

As it turns out, Erjavec and his team at Doha Fellowship had the opportunity to do some influencing when they won the award for “Best Editing” at Capture Summit’s Church Filmcraft Festival, the only church-specific film festival of its kind.

For the film, “10,000 Reasons,” Erjavec and his film team joined forces with Doha Fellowship’s various plants to produce an especially moving music video. The project gave the church’s widespread membership a chance to worship altogether, each individual household and family filming themselves from their respective living rooms, singing to worship songwriter Matt Redman’s 2013 hit, “10,000 Reasons.”

Of Doha Fellowship’s Church Filmcraft Festival winning entry, Erjavec says, “We filmed it during the height of the pandemic. Qatar had a total lockdown. The church was shut down. Everything was very tough. We were looking for every possible way to help people remember what it’s like being in a church. So we thought about creating a worship experience, and having everybody log onto Zoom ‘live’ at the same time.”

He continues, “We asked our worship team to make an MP3, then we told our member churches to have people download it, sing it, and send in [their] videos. We got 75 videos all together. We had to sync, match, and create subgroups … about two weeks of work. Then we had to explore the sound, and the sound guys had to make it right.”

Erjavec almost forgot about the “10,000 Reasons” video project until he stumbled upon the 2022 Capture Summit registration information online and saw that churches in attendance had the opportunity to submit their videos to the Church Filmcraft Festival.

“We didn’t set out to create a YouTube hit,” he says in wonder of Doha Fellowship’s special win at Capture. “We set out to connect and worship together the best we could.”

As part of the Doha Fellowship team’s “Best Editing” award, Erjavec got to sit on a panel discussion at the Church Filmcraft Festival’s Monday night screening, in front of his attendee peers, and explain the project’s production process to a seasoned panel of filmmakers and content creators. The panelists were Eric Bramlett of Community Christian Church in Illinois, North Carolina-based film producer Laura Tapp, Andre Jones of Another Jones Production in Atlanta, Phil Cooke of LA’s Cooke Media Group, and Ellis Maryland of Peace Baptist Church in metro Atlanta’s Decatur.

The Best Editing category was one of seven overall categories, which included Best Cinematography, Best Direction, Best Audio, Best Script, Best Overall Video For a Church Under 500 (attendees), and Best Overall.

A listing of the 2022 Church Filmcraft Festival winners, as well as links to the winning videos, can be found on the Capture Summit website at https://www.capturesummit.com/filmcraft-2/.

Sponsors share their time, subject-matter knowledge, and filmmaking tools

WorshipHouse Media, a long-running partner with the Capture Summit, served as a sponsor of the 2022 filmmaking event. In the curving courtyard just outside the entrance to 12Stone and the John C. Maxwell Leadership Center, Church Production caught up with Luke Miller, the company’s director and vice president of business development.

“We're fairly selective about the events we sponsor,” Miller stated of the company, a worship media resource provider for churches and ministries looking to creatively communicate the Gospel. “But we saw buzz around the internet about the Capture Summit and realized—these are our people. Let’s make sure we’re there.”

Of the company’s strategy in attending Capture Summit, he says, “General conferences are a shotgun approach, with all kinds of vendors, and we’re just one of many. But everybody here at Capture is a potential customer and a relationship for our business.”

Of the vibe at Capture Summit in Atlanta, Miller found, “It’s going really well. The networking piece of what we’ve done here has been better than ever. This year, we were intentional about sitting down with people and getting to know them, and the space [at 12Stone’s Sugarloaf campus] is laid out well for that.”

At 2022’s Capture Summit, in particular, Miller reports seeing an uptick in his company’s connections with church filmmakers. “We make really good initial connections here that we take beyond,” he says of his business development strategy and partnership with the Capture Summit. Adding, “We had a meeting earlier today with a filmmaker we’ve been working with. Then we’ve set another meeting in two weeks.”

The Church Filmcraft Festival, too, provides a rich opportunity for the church media resource company to help church filmmakers. “It creates an opportunity for people to show off their work from churches around the world,” Miller states. “And for us to bump elbows with those people and build relationships is really great for us.”

Another multi-year sponsor of the Capture Summit is Canon—premier partner of the 2022 event, alongside Sony and Music Matters.  

Darren Fordham, Canon USA’s vertical sales manager for house of worship, shares this about the 2022 Capture Summit and its metro Atlanta 12Stone location: “The market here is mature, due to its volume—with powerhouses like Passion City and North Point Ministries, all very strong in what they do. They’re already leaders in how they use technology, and the smaller churches tend to follow that lead.”

Showcasing products that are essential for church film teams, Fordham displayed Canon’s cinema and mirrorless cameras at Capture Summit 2022. And he led a sponsor-spotlight session highlighting the capabilities of the company’s new EOS R5 C cinema camera.

Throughout the three-day Capture Summit, sponsors showcased various products ideal for church filmmaking. Music Matters, for instance, had a full LED content creation stage set up, while Sony shared how to shoot footage from the company’s Airpeak Drone.

Other sponsors and partners at Capture Summit 2022, beyond those mentioned, include Firefly LED; Grass Valley; JVC; 76 Media Systems; BirdDog; B&H; Cinamaker; Chrosziel; Clark; DigitalGlue; EditShare; Hitachi; Lectrosonics; Netgear; Ross; SNS; U.S. Broadcast Distribution; JB&A Distribution; Exertis Broadcast; Fujinon; Sennheiser; LH Computer Services; Axel.ai; ATL Church Creatives; and Blackmagic Design.

It’s a wrap

At the close of the three-day Capture Summit 2022, attendees heard a final keynote from an Atlanta-based Christian filmmaker, Michael Mauldin, who once pastored the Upper Room Dallas in Texas.

Afterward, attendees had the chance to win fabulous door prizes from sponsors and partners and a few from the Capture Summit organization. Prizes ranged from company swag and gift cards all the way up to digital file storage and a top-of-the-line cinema camera.

King was one of the winners who picked up a door prize. But it was the Capture Summit overall that she raved about, saying, “The Capture Summit 2022 allowed me to meet, worship with (alongside 12Stone’s outstanding worship team that kicked off each full day of the Capture Summit), and be inspired by some great people who love Christ and creativity.”

In a post-conference attendee check-in, King was still beaming about Capture Summit 2022, telling Church Production, “It was beautiful to be in rooms with like-minded and God-hearted individuals who thrive in their creative gifts by being passionate about Christ. The connections I made are so valuable and so Kingdom! To have the opportunity to be an ambassador for the Gospel and [the] creative ministry tools that support that … This is a God-move. Capture Summits lay the ground for God-moves.”

To be sure, church filmmaking, with the help of the Capture Summit, is coming into its own.

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