CPM: How long have you been in your role at Flatirons, and what drew you to technical arts ministry and to the audio aspect of it in particular?
Boynton: I have been a part of the team at Flatirons for almost five years now. As a musician, I was initially drawn to Flatirons because of its high caliber of music and production. But then I was really struck how people at Flatirons seemed to wear their feelings on their sleeve. It is a remarkably authentic place—we’re all living real lives, trying to chase after what it means to do life with Jesus.
CPM: How did you go about setting up the audio regimen at the Lafayette campus? Were guidelines for audio standards already set at the other multi-sites, or do they have to be somewhat different at each site to accommodate the architectural design of the space?
Boynton: I joined Flatirons right before the launch of our second campus. There were very few audio guidelines in place in the beginning, but Flatirons definitely had a reputation for sound and music quality. Today, our broadcast campus has standards in place to execute almost any style production. “It takes a village” to run all of the technical and production elements at Lafayette. The other campuses are built with very robust and scalable systems. There is a consistency in equipment and approach so that engineers may be able to train at one campus and serve at another. This also facilitates maintenance and remote operation of equipment from offsite staff for additional support when needed. All of the campuses have completely different buildings and “vibes.” The Lafayette campus is large, modern and industrial. The other campuses vary from an old A-frame-style church with a steeple, to a “load in-load out” workflow at a local high school. While different people might gravitate to a campus for its “size and feel,” the bottom line truths shared in the messages and music are always constant.
CPM: How do you train and mentor your technical team members?
Boynton: One of the most important factors of effective team members here is leveraging their gifts. A lot of volunteers will start out saying, “I just want to help out wherever you need some help.” While this is a nice sentiment, not all people can serve in all capacities. We ask all new team members to spend a few weekends shadowing different positions to see what really “makes their heart tick.” Once we can identify together what skills and talents someone has, we’ll train specifically to their strengths.
CPM: What does the future look like for Flatirons’ live production team—for either audio or overall if you want to speak to that?
Boynton: I am very excited that Flatirons is now live streaming services to the web. This has been a large undertaking because we have always “post-produced” services for the web. We have spent a lot of time contemplating how to maintain quality, but now in a live setting. The ultimate goal in this is to have a post-produced quality service by the time the last chord is played.
