From its early days of raising congregants’ eyes from hymnals and lyric sheets to a common screen, video has made it easier for all to participate in church. Video has made it possible to reach worshippers in larger spaces with IMAG and provided the ability to project graphics that have made our worship spaces more interesting places. Like nothing else, video has the ability to capture the attention and the imagination of its viewers with the power to reinforce teachings. Today, video systems empower pastors to share video clips in a service, including popular media and social media that speaks to a common culture.
Video walls are heavy to mount or hang, so rigging must be carefully engineered and safely supported by the structure.
Plus, video turns out to be the perfect medium for creatives to offer moving original content that can touch worshippers beyond words. While great video solutions for worship can be found in churches at all price points, decisions about just which video technologies to employ have traditionally not been easy to make. A popular question facing many church technology leaders today is whether to invest in a video projection system or an LED wall. Since each path offers the important benefits of high-quality images and good cost/benefit ratio, it might appear that either decision would be a good one. However, there are many aspects to consider that could make one option better for your church than the other. Brock Stapper, CTS, is a veteran systems designer for All Pro Integrated Systems in Pensacola, Fla., one of the country’s largest commercial installers of audio and video equipment for schools, stadiums, and houses of worship. According to Stapper, “Both video methods have their applications and both will remain viable for some time. Knowing the basics about each approach can help church leaders understand which technology is right in their particular case.”
Your Worship Space
Studying the unique architectural and environmental attributes of a worship space can point to one video solution as being more favorable than the other. For example, where ambient light is an issue, the extreme brightness offered by LED panels would favor a video wall installation. “A majority of video walls don’t have to run at full brightness,” notes Stapper, “and video walls can more easily compensate for ambient light.” But Stapper can point to many situations where high-quality projection offers the perfect solution. One such situation is in a theatrical space where the installation of permanent video walls might not be desirable or appropriate. “In many cases a projection system with a retractable screen can preserve valuable space on stage,” he notes, “and doesn’t play into the visual context of the space.”
"... a projection system with a retractable screen can preserve valuable space on stage, and doesn’t play into the visual context of the space.”
Where seats are close to the image, projectors tend to offer a better, more natural image. The proximity of viewers needs to be carefully considered for video walls to avoid the apparent pixelization of the image. This is because the closer the individual LEDs are to each other, the better the image looks to audiences that are close to the panel. The further LEDs are spread out, the better it looks to audiences farther away. For example, the 3mm product would look fine to an audience 15 feet to 20 feet from the panel, but a 9mm product would not. Conversely, a 9mm panel would look fine to an audience that is 40 feet to 50 feet away from the panel. As the size of a worship space increases, video walls can offer benefits over multiple large, edge-blended projectors, since LED panels can be added to create walls of any size. Where projection is most often designed to be in concert with the aspect of a screen, the modular nature of video walls means that they can be assembled to support atypical aspect ratios. “They can be very wide for a cinematic look,” notes Stapper, “or designed to make best use of an existing space.”
Physical considerations of the worship space must also be a part the decision. Video walls are heavy to mount or hang, so rigging must be carefully engineered and safely supported by the structure. Video walls are also more demanding of the building’s infrastructure. “Where two or three edge-blended projectors would require three 20-amp circuits, a comparable LED installation might need 10 or more,” notes Stapper. “It can be significant.” A common challenge for projection is when ceiling heights are low. Without proper elevation, any potential hang points for projection can put sets and the people on stage between the projector and the screen. Video walls totally eliminate the challenge of finding or creating appropriate hang points for projectors, since the trajectory of a projected image is no longer an issue. But even if projection won’t work for the main screens, projection offers clear benefits for use on side walls where additional video panels would not be visually appealing or cost effective. As Stapper points out, knowing how a video wall or projection system matches your worship space will help you to determine which is the best choice for your church.
Worship style
Two years ago, Jerry Newman, executive pastor of worship and media, and church leaders at Southcrest Church in Lubbock, Texas, made the decision to replace the worship center’s aging projectors with two 9-foot by11-foot LED video walls to effectively cover 650 floor seats and 950 upper theater seats. This year, Southcrest also replaced the projectors in the church’s modern worship space, The Venue, with an additional 9-foot by 11-foot LED wall to support performance of a praise band, as well as a video feed of Southcrest’s pastor, Dr. David Wilson, preaching every Sunday.
There is no one right answer. The best choice for your church is theone that best fits your situation.
The Southcrest church leaders worked with church volunteer David Benson, who is also owner and general manager of Media Support Group in Lubbock, Texas, on all the video upgrades. Benson and Media Support Group, having had good experience and a close relationship with the manufacturer, specified Vanguard P5 (5mm pitch) panels to build out the 9-foot by 11-foot LED video walls. The decision to use LED technology was made after a careful comparison of costs for a new projector system and LED walls. Benson recommended LED walls for their technical advantages and overall reliability, but Newman and other church leaders also saw a strong connection between LED video components and the church’s mission and worship style that employs video feeds to Wirecast, Southcrestlive.tv, and Facebook Live. “Our video walls have definitely enhanced the worship experience,” notes Newman. “Everything is larger, cleaner, and easier to read. It’s better across the board. Even our seniors loved it when we moved to the LED walls, and [they] told us so.”
While Newman agrees that great results could have been achieved with new laser projectors—at a price point that would not have been too different from the cost of video walls—he feels that the look of video has been a better fit for Southcrest. Newman notes that prior to the upgrade, the church’s technical teams would put together media content that looked great streaming and online, but didn’t look as good when projected in the worship center. “For us and our mission,” he says, “it was important to opt for the look of video.”An interesting aspect of the video wall installation in Southcrest’s worship center is that video wall units are suspended with hoists so they can be lowered from their typical position above the action on stage to stage level. This option allows for both easy maintenance and the possibility of using the video walls as design elements on stage. In contrast, projection systems usually must remain fixed once installed.
More pros and cons
To be good stewards, church technology leaders must look closely at investments in both projection systems and LED video walls. Laser projectors are still priced higher than bulb-based alternatives, but the cost of laser projectors continues to drop, making them a more attractive investment. So while laser projectors do initially cost more, over their longer lifetime they offer a more consistent and reliable technology and considerable savings over bulbed projectors. For example, a laser projector rated to last for 20,000 hours of use, can run for 12.5 years if used eight hours a day—something most churches don’t come close to. Without even taking into account the lower maintenance costs and power savings a laser projector provides, over its projected lifetime, a laser projector can save churches money over their bulbed counterparts in bulb replacements alone. Perhaps more important for worship is that laser brightness doesn’t fade over time as bulbs do.Jerry Newman is hopeful that video wall installations at Southcrest will be supporting worship for even longer than a laser projection system. “Our investigations into LED walls have led us to expect that a typical lifespan is 15 years with no maintenance,” he notes. “Since we are only running the panels at 35%-40% for short periods of time, we expect that to be even longer.”
… while laser projectors do initially cost more, over their longer lifetime they offer a more consistent and reliable technology and considerable savings over bulbed projectors.
Something many consider when comparing projectors to LED walls is that projectors represent a single point of failure. When it breaks, there is no image. LED wall failures, by contrast, are usually isolated to an LED or module that doesn’t down the system and is typically easy to replace. Designers of LED walls typically order extra panels so they can be immediately replaced. This is an example of the expertise a good integrator can bring to the project. “We typically add 6% to 10% to the panel count of a wall to keep on hand as spares,” notes Stapper. “Sometimes these parts come from overseas and can take time to acquire in the event of trouble.” All Pro also does all the assembly and testing of video walls at its warehouse space in Florida prior to delivery to the customer. “While it is work to unpack, assemble, and repack all the wall elements,” Stapper says, “we find it saves time by avoiding any troubleshooting or surprises onsite.”
Which is right for you?
There is no one right answer. The best choice for your church is the one that best fits your situation. A good rule of thumb may be this: If the space requires multiple projectors, blending, odd screen sizes, space is tight or needs to be really bright, you should be considering an LED wall. When the viewers are close, common screen sizes are favored, there are restrictions for placement or rigging or minimal knowledge of mapping and color matching, projection systems could be the better fit. Whether from a projector or lighting up an LED wall, high-quality video, combined with modern audio and lighting, creates an unrivaled immersive experience worthy of worship. It can transform a black box of a room into a vital and dynamic space and make our services relevant—not just to a younger generation, but to all.
