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Better sound isn’t the only thing the church gained from this upgrade. Lead Technical Director Josh Hancock (above) says that, as a result of this project, the church has improved its planning and inter-department communications—keys to maintaining systems critical for contemporary worship.
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The church had put off upgrading the 12-year-old loudspeaker system, but even though failing drivers started to affect audio coverage in the room, timing was bad for either a major overhaul of the speakers or their complete replacement. “We were approaching Easter,” Hancock notes. “It is our biggest weekend of the year.” Together, the technical team and church leaders made the decision that something needed to be done to repair the now noticeably deficient system before Easter weekend.
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While technical advantages of completely replacing the loudspeaker system represented the best decision at Hope's campus, Hancock believes that every situation needs to be carefully evaluated. “In some cases,” he says, “it’s designing a system from scratch, but in others replacing components piece by piece can be effective.” He reminds church leaders who are looking at an upgrade that cost and effectiveness are key considerations, but it’s not always a clear-cut decision.
For churches of all sizes, setting the stage for contemporary worship requires a commitment to a strong vision, the hard work of a devoted technical team and, of course, the gear itself. With so much going into each contemporary service, it can be easy to lose track of the fact that the equipment we rely so heavily upon has a finite lifespan. For many reasons, even much needed upgrades are too frequently pushed off.
“We didn’t want to continue with ‘bandaid’ fixes and find ourselves continually chasing repairs.” - Josh Hancock, Lead Technical Director, Hope Community Church, Raleigh, NC.
So, when Josh Hancock, lead technical director at Hope Community Church in Raleigh, N.C., started seeing the signs that the loudspeakers servicing the 1,500-seat auditorium at the church’s main campus were failing, he was concerned. “We were seeing all the signs,” he recalls. The church had put off upgrading the 12-year-old system, but when failing drivers started to affect audio coverage in the room, Hancock was able to enlist the support of church leaders. Unfortunately, as with many postponed upgrades, timing was bad for either a major overhaul of the speakers or their complete replacement. “We were approaching Easter,” Hancock notes. “It is our biggest weekend of the year.” Together, the technical team and church leaders made the decision that something needed to be done to repair the now noticeably deficient system before Easter weekend.
Technical Direction
Responsible for all technical direction for Hope Community’s four busy campuses in the Raleigh area, including the main campus in Raleigh, nearby Morrisville and Apex campuses, and a partnership, gospel-influenced campus located in downtown Raleigh, Hancock has experience in large-format church productions, as well as in multiple technical and artistic areas. Just out of high school, he volunteered in the worship band at a megachurch in his native Western Kentucky.
With exposure to a wide array of production techniques and equipment, Hancock developed audio as a specialty and took on additional challenges of technical direction and media, including filmmaking. Hancock’s move to Raleigh and his introduction to Hope Community Church in 2011 was as a filmmaker. Yet over the next five years, he helped technical teams in various capacities, including filling a key role of mixing at FOH. Early in 2015, he was tapped to be the technical director for Hope’s new Apex facility that had grown from a thriving mobile campus. High energy celebration services in the Apex 1,500-seat auditorium feature a live band with integrated music video and multimedia presentations similar to Hope’s Raleigh and Morrisville campuses. In mid-2016, Hancock accepted the position of lead technical director, supporting the technical and video directors on staff at each campus who, in turn, support a large cast of avid and talented volunteers.
Decision to Upgrade
Hancock’s experience indicated that the audio system at Hope’s main campus was at the end of its life and that continuing to make spot repairs or overhauling the system would be expensive. “We didn’t want to continue with ‘bandaid’ fixes and find ourselves continually chasing repairs,” he said. Hancock knew that the project would likely require a complete redesign given that the church had grown significantly and worship styles had changed since the old system was installed in 2004. While technical advantages of completely replacing the loudspeakers represented the best decision at his main campus, Hancock believes that every situation needs to be carefully evaluated.
“In some cases,” he says, “it’s designing a system from scratch, but in others replacing components piece by piece can be effective.” He reminds church leaders who are looking at an upgrade that cost and effectiveness are key considerations, but it’s not always a clear-cut decision. While an older sound system could be generations behind current technology, the state of technology is only part of the picture.The human element also played a part in Hancock’s decision to upgrade. “Since our old system was installed, our church and technical staff have grown,” he says. “Everyone has become more aware of available technology and that sets expectations for great audio.” He has also observed that the technical team’s functions with audio, media, and lighting have become more critical to the success of contemporary worship over the years. “As our worship style has grown and changed, so have people’s expectations of what we will deliver on weekends,” he notes, “and that’s something we needed to consider.”Another important factor to consider when upgrading is system quality. “Your productions are only as good as the tools you have,” notes Hancock. He points out that part of any equipment buying decision should be looking toward the future. “Investing in a system,” he says, “is like buying a car; something well-made will last longer. It’s just a better value and good stewardship.”
A New Loudspeaker Design
With Easter services approaching, Hancock and Technical Team Lead Andres Rivera reached out to David Price, principal of DP Design of Milwaukee, to help with the design and acquisition of a new system. Rivera, who had worked for DP Design as a production designer and installer, presented the technical issues along with the tight timeframe.
“We were presented with a unique problem of having to design and implement a quality system in just a few weeks,” recalls Price. Having had excellent experience with Martin Audio, Price was hopeful. He had worked closely with Martin designers before and hoped that they could meet the challenges of system design, but all knew that the design would need to be done in record time to have enough leeway to deliver and install the system. Some unique challenges were presented by the performance space in Hope’s main auditorium. The new system design would need to sculpt the sound to effectively cover a raked floor, stadium seating and balcony areas while keeping sound from spilling onto the walls and screens. A structural issue further complicated the design.
The design would have to consider catwalks and a structural beam that drops nine feet down from the ceiling, which could impede coverage by blocking audio from the top of the array. To provide even and precisely directed coverage for the room, Martin engineers responded to Price’s room specifications with a design for left-right plus center system that called for flying two systems of eight Martin Audio MLA (Multi-Cellular Line Array) Compact loudspeakers. This loudspeaker design provides a cellular array format with five dedicated Class D amplifier channels and highly accurate onboard DSP control. Price’s plan would use MLA features and Martin’s “Fly-by-wire” software to compensate for the structural constraints of the room and dodge trouble areas for audio. “The software is very effective, easy to use, and does a lot of the heavy lifting to meet a client’s needs. I’ve never worked with a system as flexible as the MLAs,” he says.
The system design called for two Martin Audio MLX subs to be flown inside the left and right systems, and a Martin Audio MLA Mini Array was flown at the proscenium to provide coverage for the remaining center section. A Martin Audio MSX rackmount kit and Martin Audio MSX amp module would provide power for center array and a Martin Audio fill/delay system would handle signals for four Martin CCD8 (8-inch Coaxial Differential Dispersion) loudspeakers installed for front fill and four Martin CCD12 (12-inch Coaxial Differential Dispersion) loudspeakers installed to cover the balcony. A Merlin digital loudspeaker and network management system with VU-NET software was included to route audio signals and provide system control via an intuitive graphical interface running on a wired PC or wireless tablet.
Demanding Installation
With a design in hand and with components ordered and enroute to the site, the team faced a seemingly impossible challenge: to install the system before Easter services.
“Unfortunately, we waited too long between arranging financing, shipping times, and scheduling the install. That left only a three-day window between Sunday services and a critical Thursday rehearsal for the Good Friday service for installing and tuning the new system.”With no other options, Rivera, who was both an experienced installer and knew the Martin systems, enlisted six of the church’s experienced technical directors to rig and wire three main arrays and four subwoofers, along with balcony and front fills.
The team also ran dedicated electrical power circuits to the new array locations and new wiring to stage racks that were moved to a better location away from the action on stage. The upgrade was commissioned by Rivera and Martin’s product support engineer, Jim Jorgensen, just in time for Easter services. While the installation was successful, Hancock cautions that such a tight time frame for design and installation was clearly risky—and not something that he would want to repeat or recommend for other churches.
Lessons Learned
An important factor in the success of the installation at Hope Community Church’s main campus was that the audio console and related equipment had been recently upgraded. That isolated the installation work to the loudspeaker system, making the last-minute installation possible. Hancock recognizes that some good fortune was involved and that a clear take away from the project was for his team to have better planning.
“We made the mistake of not planning well for this new installation,” he says, “and we paid the price. Mainly, it was the result of being in the middle of a dry season financially. The easy response to that is always ‘can it wait until next year?’” Hancock advises being aware of end-of-life schedules on major equipment and shifting end-of-life gear replacement and maintenance toward a rotating maintenance system. “In short,” he says, “space things out. When you install a new piece of gear, document it and immediately plan on the end-of-life replacement for that gear down the road.”
In addition, he likes the idea of developing revolving replacement/maintenance cycles: doing audio one year, lighting the next, and video the next, etc., finding the cycles that work best for your church. Hancock also suggests partnering with your accounting department to generate a master equipment list that will keep track of the install date, yearly maintenance costs, life expectancy and replacement cost of critical equipment. In this way, you can have a technology budget for large capital equipment replacement cost over several years. He likens this to financing a home, car or home improvement project. “Having a budget,” he says, “also ‘softens the blow’ because costs don’t hit you all at once. You know that equipment will break and things will wear out. Why not plan ahead?” Once a plan is in place for gear maintenance, Hancock suggests putting work items on a calendar to help organize the tasks so you can build in time for redesign and installation activities that will keep all your gear in top shape.
Better-than-ever Audio
The new speakers at Hope Community Church’s Raleigh campus are making the contemporary worship sound better than ever. According to Hancock, the combination of the highly adjustable MLA arrays and flying the Martin subs provide very even coverage and reach worshippers in every seat.
“It’s very impressive technology that keeps sound off the walls and screens and puts it where it’s needed,” he says. “You can easily hear where the cutoff happens in the room.” Hancock and Price agree that meeting the tight timeline of the upgrade would not have been possible without the outstanding response of Martin engineers who expedited the design and delivery that made hurried installation possible. Better sound isn’t the only thing that Hancock and the church gained from this upgrade. They’ve learned that better planning and better communication are key to maintaining systems critical to contemporary worship. “We were talking about getting a new system for some time,” says Hancock. “We were seeing all the signs and we still allowed the upgrade to be put off.”
He encourages church technical leaders to have a plan, persevere in getting the resources they need, and partner with church leadership so that critical upgrades don’t continually get put off. “It’s not worth losing people,” he says. “When people can’t hear the message, that’s the final wake-up call—or, maybe it’s too late.”
