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Gateway Church, Austin, Texas, courtesy of Acoustic Dimensions.
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Jason Foster, senior consultant at Acoustic Dimensions in Addison, Texas;
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John Weygandt, scenic and lighting designer at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Ill.
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Photo courtesy of Willow Creek Community Church, South Barrington, Ill.
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Greg Persinger, owner of Vivid Illumination in Nashville, Tenn.
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Indian Hills Community Church, Lincoln, Neb., courtesy of Greg Persinger.
As the worship styles and demographics change, so does the use of technical production. Lighting, perhaps even more than video, is the most striking visual evidence of these shifting demographics.
So how are churches changing their lighting for worship services? The types of cutting-edge lighting designs found in only the largest, most sophisticated churches 5-10 years ago can now be found in churches in nearly any town in America.
Considering the rapid advances in lighting technology over the past decade, and the equally brisk decline in prices of many types of lighting fixtures and consoles, what advice do the experts have for churches that are considering an upgrade to their lighting systems? Even more daunting, what about those churches that are just now approaching the difficult task of installing their first theatrical- or broadcast-style lighting system? What are the most important things for a church to make sure they get right?
THE GOOD
CPM: What do you see churches doing well with regard to lighting their services.
Foster:
The majority of churches, no matter what the size, are using their spaces well to support their ministry. Every church has a different style. I'm amazed when I walk into churches and they are doing so much more than you might expect given their lighting rig. These churches are finding a need and a niche in their community, and making what they have work well for them.
Persinger:
There's a lot more lighting awareness as video streaming is coming of age. Contemporary churches are doing more scenic backgrounds, and lighting them well, for their video product. This makes the video much easier and more interesting to watch.
Weygandt:
Over the past 15-20 years, churches have woken up to the possibility of visual impact in our services. More churches are now striving to make their services and worship beautiful visually. In the past, visual impact did not matter. People and churches everywhere are now caring about that visual impact—that beauty should be a part of the worship experience and church environment.
THE BAD
CPM: What sort of things are you seeing churches doing rather poorly?
Foster:
The transitions. My background is theater, so I pay close attention to how things transition between segments of the service, and I see a lot of rough transitions. It looks fine in the middle, but at each end it is rough and pulls you out of the moment. I get dragged out of the emotion that's been built during worship and lose it before the message starts due to long or poorly executed transitions. At the end of the sermon, while we should be reflecting on the message and focusing on prayer, I'm distracted by band members coming up and plugging in their guitars, and generally pulling us out of that moment.
There's also a lot of incorrect use of equipment. The wrong lights are in the wrong place. A church may extend [its] platform, but doesn't move the hang positions or redo the lighting plot to light the platform shape properly, resulting in lighting angles that are too steep.
Persinger:
“Don’t start out with a whole bunch of fixtures— instead, invest in infrastructure.”
Jason Foster, Senior Consultant, Acoustic Dimensions, Addison, TX
Senior Consultant, Acoustic Dimensions, Addison, TX
I think one of the big things I see is they look at lighting equipment as a liability instead of a long-term investment. That tends to taint everything they do. Instead of buying good quality gear that will last them a while, they have a mindset of wanting a whole lot now with little money, so they buy the cheapest stuff out there, and a year later they have a pile of broken gear. Ultimately they end up spending a lot more than if they did it right the first time.
Moving lights have come down to where they are accessible, and lots of churches are using them, but they are not using them well in ways that support the service. And once they have them, they have the lights moving randomly just to have them move. It's not adding anything to the music or mood. It's just a ‘Hey, we have lights and we're going to move them' thing. But what they are doing doesn't match what is happening on stage, and people find that very distracting.
Weygandt:
This might be a pet peeve, but it has to do with the word ‘cool.' So much of what the church is doing seems to be about the word ‘cool,' and I'm as guilty as the next person. Cool has become the dominating value. But I have a deeper desire that not just lighting, but scenic design as well, can be so much more than cool. It should speak to vision and mission. I wish the church would talk about the effectiveness of our lighting in terms of mission. But these days ‘cool' is the No. 1 value, and that's disappointing. The technical artists in the church need to understand their place in serving the congregation and ministry goals of the church—to be the means to the end, not the end itself.
THE NECESSARY
CPM: As a church pursues installing a new lighting system, what should the priority be?
Foster:
The most important thing is not spending your money in the wrong place. Don't start out with a whole bunch of fixtures—instead, invest in infrastructure. Getting enough power, pipe positions, and control (data) cabling in place is the most important thing. These things are very hard and expensive to add later, so doing that up front makes for very good stewardship. It used to be that four universes of DMX would be great for a large facility; now, with LED fixtures and moving lights, it gets used up pretty quickly. So, understand what you need for the future, and get that infrastructure in place. After that, think about fixtures.
Persinger:
Infrastructure, infrastructure, infrastructure. If you're going to be there long-term, infrastructure so you are prepared for the future. Hang positions, adequate power and dimming, and data distribution should be well thought-out and invested in. This will cost the most of your money. Lighting fixtures are relatively cheap, and you do have to make sure you get enough to get your minimum lighting needs, but infrastructure is the most important thing to let you expand inexpensively as time goes on. It's significantly cheaper to do your entire infrastructure up front rather than in steps over time.
And if you have the infrastructure in place, it's easy to rent [fixtures] for special events. If you don't have the infrastructure, you can't easily rent, because you won't have the power, dimming or control to operate rental fixtures.
Weygandt:
It's an almost too-easy pat answer—infrastructure. For example, it might mean going up on conduit sizes, or adding extra unused conduit. There are places in our church where you see the history of error, where you see conduit that's been added on the walls to accommodate growth that wasn't planned for.
And beyond just lighting, get with a really good space planner that asks questions about traffic patterns and other things that the church staff might not think of as they look at their proposed building through the tunnel-vision of their specific ministry needs. In our original auditorium, the only way to get from a loading dock to the stage was through the atrium (which also serves as a dining room), down an aisle of the seating area, and then lifting four feet onto the stage. It was crazy.
… and Words of Advice on Consoles
CPM: What consoles do you feel are the best options for the house-of-worship market?
Foster:
Jands Vista is my console of choice for the church market. It has a short learning curve, it is volunteer friendly, and has a line of models that will scale to any sized room and budget, so you can support a whole campus with one console line.
In larger churches [we] are doing we see quite a bit of the ETC EOS line and MA Lighting's GrandMA 2. These are both great consoles for those who are familiar with them, but, as in the case of the GrandMA can be, they are much harder to learn and intimidating for volunteers.
The LSC Clarity line is also a product worth watching.
Persinger:
Console choice is really personal. There are a lot of good options, and it depends on what meshes well with the personality of those using it.
On the smaller end for just conventional fixtures, Leprecon makes some great consoles. ETC SmartFade is a good option, and Elation and Chauvet make some budget line consoles.
For a smaller church looking at LEDs and some moving lights, Cognito by Pathway is a new option well worth looking at. The Jands Vista line is good for a church of any size. And the Jands CL is a great option for a rig with a lot of LED fixtures. The LSC Clarity is also worth checking out.
For larger churches, a Jands Vista console or an MA Lighting GrandMA 2 are very popular. The GrandMA is the current industry standard, but you need to have an expert on hand to work well with it.
An important thing to consider is the service and support reputation from the manufacturer or distributor, and how well they tend to work with volunteers.
Weygandt:
We really love our GrandMA for a larger lighting system. Our regional campuses use the Jands Vista line and that has worked very well for them.
[ LED vs. Incandescent vs. Power—in Retrofit Applications ] a cpm sidebar article / By Jim Kumorek
When renovating a facility into a house of worship auditorium, one of the challenges can be having adequate power to run a lighting rig. Incandescent lighting uses a lot of power, and a former warehouse space or even an older church facility may not have adequate capacity from the electrical service to run the desired lighting rig.
LED lighting is more far efficient but much more expensive. So is it better to pay to increase the power service to the building, or to spend more on your fixtures and go LED?
“If you have limited power,” states Greg Persinger, owner of Vivid Illumination in Nashville, Tenn., “I generally look at a small complement of conventional fixtures for front lighting. Unless you get the really expensive fixtures (on the order of $2,500 per fixture), LED doesn't do well lighting faces for skin tones. And white LED lighting does not have the same light output as incandescent lighting—you have to use more LED fixtures for open white light.
“What you find is for really nice looking LED white light, there's a return-on-investment tipping point based on the cost to update your electrical service, stage size, and fixture cost. I've found that, generally, the best compromise between these factors and basic aesthetics is to use a small set of incandescent for front lighting, and go LED for stage wash, back lighting and scenic lighting. On one project I worked on it was going to cost $25,000 just to get the electrical service upgraded. Using LED in this way made sense between not having to upgrade the electrical and the future energy savings. And good color LED lighting can be purchased for a lot less then good LED white light fixtures.”