“Igniting a passion to follow Jesus” is the purpose behind all of College Park Church's ministries. With its services running at 110% capacity, the church needed to expand to reach more people for Christ in the Indianapolis area, and recently celebrated the opening of a new auditorium. The new space more than doubles the seating capacity, enabling the church to host up to 1,850 people at each service.
The facilities expansion was designed and constructed by Aspen Group, a church-focused design-build firm based in Frankfort, Ill.. Partnering with Aspen Group was Dallas-area Acoustic Dimensions (AD), providing interior room, acoustical, audio, video and lighting design. Clair Brothers, based in Mannheim, Pa., with offices in Dallas, handled the installation of the AVL systems.
While the AVL systems are impressive and well executed, the real jewel of the new space is the room itself, with an attention to acoustical detail that many churches overlook when building a new worship space—and then regret after the room opens.
“We knew what we didn't know going into this project, and that was a lot,” states the church's production director, Andrew Cecil. “I set out on a process of researching churches that had recently built similar spaces. Many churches put most, if not all, of their programming, time and resource ‘eggs' into the AVL equipment basket, and leave the room design and acoustics solely up to the architect,” with the assumption that the architect will design a room with appropriate layout and acoustics.
“These assumptions almost always proved to be very costly,” continues Cecil. “Either the church was forced to live with something that didn't sound good or had to spend a tremendous amount of money trying to fix the acoustics problem after the fact. I realized for this to be a successful project for all parties involved, the room acoustician, architect and AVL designer all needed to be involved together right from the start.”
After considering the options, Acoustic Dimensions was chosen because they had in-house expertise in not only AVL but room layout and acoustical design, as well. “This breadth of expertise made for a streamlined process with considerably less conflict of interest between parties,” adds Cecil. “Aspen Group and Acoustic Dimensions made for a fantastic design partnership with each company freed up to focus on its strengths.”
ROOM DESIGN
“College Park has a diverse music style that varies from orchestral, to choral, to contemporary with congregational singing that all needed to be supported,” states Senior Consultant Steve Reed of Acoustic Dimensions. “Finding a balance between those styles can be challenging, and our experience with designing performing arts facilities and entertainment venues helps us understand and blend the right components to create an engaging worship space.”
Reed explains, “We designed acoustical absorption treatment on wall surfaces that [originally] had the potential to create unwanted echoes, and angled the walls around the room to direct the sound energy away from areas that would have a negative impact.” AD incorporated acoustical clouds into the ceiling design to further absorb sound from the loudspeaker system.
While reducing these reflections was a key aspect of the design, College Park Church's active congregational participation during times of worship caused AD to also create an acoustical design that would facilitate the experience of corporate worship.
“To help reduce the size and volume of the space,” Reed continues, “we incorporated ceiling elements that also help with congregational singing because they provide an early reflection of the singing back to the congregation to create a lively singing environment.”
When asked how the room design and acoustics impact the ministry of the church, Reed turned the question around. “We would view it more from the other side: the ministry of the church is what should affect the room design and acoustics,” he says. “They have a high value for a sense of community and a high value for worship. Because of this, we designed a seating layout that allows people to see others all around the room.”
The platform has a center thrust that extends deep into the seating area, with the seating flowing far more than 180 degrees around the pulpit. This enables the congregation to see each other's faces, instead of merely the backs of heads. “While there is a central focus on the platform area with great connectivity to the leaders, there is also a sense of connectivity to others in the congregation around the room,” Reed adds.
AUDIO SYSTEM CONSIDERATIONS
“As with most churches, we had dually important priorities in that we wanted both the worship music as well as the preaching to be at a high sonic quality,” Cecil says. “We also required a flexible and future-proofed infrastructure that would allow for a lot of different stage plots and instrumentation setups. Lastly, we desired a system that would easily accommodate outside concerts and fully meet the PA requirements without the need to rent additional equipment.”
With volunteers used heavily in running the services, equipment choice would need to accommodate the team without sacrificing functionality or quality. “Our three full-time technical staff are here to unleash our volunteers' talents and passions,” states Cecil. “Our goal is to enable them to execute their positions at a high level.”
How this affected the audio system design is in console selection. “We have a great group of front of house (FOH) audio engineers,” Cecil says, “but they had no meaningful experience using a digital console. Therefore, we needed a board that was specifically engineered to help analog-minded audio guys transition easily to the digital world while at the same time maintaining high quality. We found these requirements matched up very well to the Digico SD8, and have not been disappointed. The audio team was proficient on the console in a few months and have really enjoyed the benefits that digital offers.”
AD implemented a split-mono line array system to support the speech and music needs of the church. EAW KF740 cabinets implement the arrays, with EAW AX364 used for side fills. A delay ring of EAW MK2394 boxes help round out the sound at the back of the room, and subwoofers are placed both under the stage and flown over the platform.
For monitoring, the church chose an Aviom personal monitor mixing system for its reliability and affordability.
LIGHTING WITHOUT DISTRACTION
“It is our desire that lighting never dominate the attendees' experiences during a worship service,” Cecil says. “Lighting, in particular, has the ability to both be very good technically and yet distracting from a worship service's goal. In contrast, great audio and video are rarely distracting. With that as the framework we asked Acoustic Dimensions and Clair Brothers to design a lighting package that first would complement image magnification (IMAG) and other video distribution channels well and give us different ‘looks' without the need for intensive programming or lengthy weekly setups.”
For easier access to flown components of the AVL system, the church invested in a catwalk system. This enables access without the need for ladders or lifts, greatly improving volunteer and staff effectiveness.
“The catwalks were coordinated to work with the ceiling structure and acoustic panels,” says Jason Foster, lighting designer with AD. “Because the catwalk elevation was above the bottom of the structural steel, it needed to be run parallel to the steel beams. Therefore, we kept the catwalks perpendicular to the building structure to simplify the design and provide ease of access.”
Foster adds, “The theatrical lighting system in the main room was designed to provide a solid base infrastructure that would allow for growth. The infrastructure (electrical and structural) was designed to give the church options for expansion so they can build on the system over time.”
An ETC theatrical dimming and fixture package was installed to accomplish much of the lighting goals. ETC Source Four ellipsoidal and PAR fixtures provide a three-point lighting plot, with two ETC Sensor dimming racks installed to provide power for conventional fixtures. ETC Selador Vivid-R LED fixtures were installed to provide cyclorama (“cyc”) lighting and a color wash over the band and vocalist positions. Control over the lighting system is provided by a Jands Vista console, with additional architectural control through an ETC Paradigm system with control stations around the room.
“The ETC Seladors have been a fantastic purchase for us,” states Cecil. “They are best-in-class when it comes to uplighting, providing a well-defined edge and very consistent coloring across the spread of the beam and between the lights themselves.”
Cecil continues, “The second piece of equipment that has been a great purchase is the Jands Vista console. It has been stunningly fast to learn—both for us and our volunteers. We can program very quickly and efficiently, and the relatively low cost of the PC-based option made it a no-brainer.”
The only regret the church has is that budget didn't allow for more channels of dimming. However, their focus on building in infrastructure will easily allow this to be added at a later date. Catwalks need to be specified at the time the steel goes in—they can't be an add-on. And lighting circuits are also best planned for up front.
“There are dimming circuits,” Foster describes, “network control, and utility circuits distributed in the catwalks, as well as at the platform level, the orchestra pit, and in the choir loft to support special productions and give the church the ability to add fixtures and devices for effects.”
VIDEO AND IMAG
“Our use of video in worship services was going to be the most visible and substantial change from our previous room,” Cecil. reports “The size and layout of the new space required the use of full-time IMAG as the primary option for most of the service attendees to be engaged.”
The entire video system runs at 1080i HD resolution. Three JVC GY-HM790 cameras and a Panasonic AW-HE100N PTZ camera (remotely controlled) form the camera compliment, and a Ross Vision 2 switcher provides control over the shots. “The Ross Video switcher was chosen because it is a true broadcast switcher with a re-designed control surface and an economical price point,” states Jason McKelvey, video system designer for AD. Barco FLM HD14 projectors power the screens for the venue, and Renewed Vision's ProPresenter is used for graphics.
“Since culturally, IMAG was something rarely used in our previous room, we wanted to move slowly,” Cecil says. “We started using IMAG only for the speaking portions of the service and used full-screen lyrics for worship songs. Over the course of several months, we have added more and more song IMAG with [lyrics displayed on the lower-third portions of the screens], and the reception has been overall positive. The most impactful use of IMAG in our new facility has come with baptism services. Allowing every person in this large space to see the emotion of a dad baptizing his child or a mentor baptizing a young college student has been priceless.”
THE RESULTS OF GOOD DESIGN
College Park Church is thoroughly pleased with the work of Aspen Group, Acoustic Dimensions and Clair Brothers. As Cecil describes, “Going from a room where acoustics was completely an afterthought to a room where acoustics was the first priority in room design, the impact was huge. Congregants told us they were able to worship in a way they hadn't before and that the music impacted them in a whole different way. Part of this was due to the cloud and panel design above the seats, which allowed them to hear each other sing in a way the old space never allowed.”
He continues, “The number of positive comments about the sound even after just the first Sunday was incredible, and they continue to be at a ratio of 20:1 to negative comments. This was achieved without changing anyone in the worship or audio teams, but rather taking already talented people and providing them with the right equipment in the right room.”
This focus on acoustics did cost additional money up front. However, Cecil points out that it likely saved them money overall.
“The additional money that needed to be spent was never really an obstacle,” Cecil says, “since the churches [we researched] served as warnings to us, and so many of them ended up having such negative (and expensive) results.”
