Image by Keagan Henman, courtesy of unsplash.com
Purchasing the proper lighting for your church’s stage isn’t as easy today as it was just a few years ago. Before the pandemic, most churches did not live stream or provide any online version of their worship services. Having AVL to support the in-person experience is all that had to be considered. During the pandemic, many churches began live streaming their services. After some time, many new live stream ministries received feedback from online viewers and staff, asking for the audio quality to improve. So, church technical leaders evaluated current audio equipment and began optimizing it to achieve an improved broadcast and recording mix. Viewers responded with their appreciation and approval.
This isn’t just a lighting decision—it’s a worship experience decision.
The second round of feedback that many technical leaders received regarding their live streams is that the pastor and the worship leader appear to be in the dark when they move from downstage center. These same technical leaders mobilized their media ministry team to refocus and even rehang lights to improve the downstage center position where the worship leader and the pastor stood, giving more freedom of movement while still being properly lit. However, this change required some sacrifices to be made in other areas of the stage where band members, instrumentalists, singers, and the choir are located. The result was fewer lights to properly illuminate these other stage locations for the live stream and video recordings.
Image courtesy of Cottonwood Creek Church.
The latest communication from their church board, which many technical leaders have received, acknowledges the efforts made to improve the quality of the live stream. But they want to know how to improve the areas on the stage that are still dark in the live stream. What do you do? First, you pray.
Don’t buy a single light until you understand your power and control limitations.
Too many church technical leaders wait to pray until things are going horribly wrong. We rely first and foremost on our experience, our knowledge, our network, and our ability to research and come up with a solution. Do you see the sin here? The word “our” is our sin, our pride. We (yes, including me) are too quick to move forward to a solution without acknowledging first WHO gave us these skills and abilities, and to ask for HIS WISDOM as we advise our church leaders on this potential lighting purchase to improve dark areas on the stage. So, after praying and getting your heart and your head in the right place, you’re ready to start putting together your recommendation.
Before you start listing the lights you’d like to buy, consider the power and control requirements. Do you have sufficient space remaining on your current lighting power circuits to accommodate additional lights? Calculating your current power availability and load will save you a lot of headaches as you look to purchase new lights. Often, churches discover that adding additional lights requires more power than they currently have at their stage. This means that to add new lights, new power circuits must be added. Alternatively, you can purchase more energy-efficient lights with the same or greater brightness than your current lights to help free up power for new ones. Whatever you do, don’t proceed with a lighting purchase until you have a thorough understanding of your current power situation.
Secondly, before purchasing any new lights, ensure you have a clear understanding of your current light board and the control channels available on your DMX universes. Many a church tech has found themselves in a sticky situation when adding lights, only to discover very quickly that there aren’t enough DMX channels to control all the lights in the preferred method. Ensure you know not only how all your lights are currently being controlled, but also the remaining control capabilities and available space that you have with your current lighting console. Adding more lights may require you to redesign your lighting control system cabling and programming. Even after doing this, you may discover that new lights require a new lighting console with more control universes to accommodate their capabilities.
Lighting that looks great in the room may not translate well to video.
After thoroughly doing your homework on power and control, you’re ready to start evaluating lights for purchase. Evaluating new lights needs to be rooted not only in supporting what you need for in-person attendees, but also for those viewing online. This means proper criteria need to be considered. When our team at Cottonwood Creek Church recently purchased new lights for our stage, the top three criteria we used were CRI, adjustable color temperature, and beam quality/optics.
The Color Rendering Index (CRI) is an essential factor in evaluating lights for purchase when you’re live streaming services. CRI measures how accurately a light renders colors in relation to the human eye. A rating of 90 or higher means that the color of the light “makes sense” to how your eye sees it. A rating lower than 90 initiates a progressive effect of eye strain and fatigue, as well as difficulty distinguishing similar colors. A rating below 90 can also negatively impact a person’s mood and aesthetic perception because what the brain knows and what the eyes see don’t match.
A similar rating to CRI is the Television Lighting Consistency Index (TLCI). This index measures how well the colors of the light correlate with video. A rating of 85 or higher indicates that colors in person will translate well to video, whether live-streamed or recorded. Just like with CRI, higher TLCI values ensure that skin tones and clothing colors appear natural on video.
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Image by Nathan Mullet, courtesy of unsplash.com
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Image by Keagan Henman, courtesy of unsplash.com
The next criterion our team used in evaluating lights for purchase was adjustable color temperature. This corresponds to the color of “white light” in your room. A video-friendly color temperature range is 3200 degrees Kelvin (or “K”), which is a warm/tungsten colored light associated with indoor lighting, to 5600K, which is the color temperature of outside daylight. Our team prefers a color temperature of approximately 4000K on our stage, which suits today’s LED-based theatrical lighting fixtures and video cameras well. It’s essential to evaluate the color temperature of both your current lights and the ones you’re planning to purchase. You don’t want these temperatures to be off, or else your cameras will display different colors of white depending on the light hitting a person on stage. So, ensure that you purchase lights with variable color temperature settings ranging at least from 3200K to 5600K.
The last of the three top criteria we used at Cottonwood Creek in purchasing our new lights was beam quality/optics. This criterion refers to evenness of the light spot and/or wash, where minimal or no hot spots are visible. This allows for consistent exposure on video.
Another optic quality factor to inspect in a new light is ensuring that wash lights have soft edges, while sharper edges are reserved for spots and profiles. Soft edges on the light beam of washes allow for the smooth blending of color across the entire stage, eliminating distracting edges. Having sharp edges on spots and profiles allows for their use as accent lights, backlights, and/or key lights on a subject, where the edges help draw attention to the subject on stage.
The final factor in beam quality/optics to consider in purchasing a light is its zoom and focus capabilities. These capabilities help you adapt the lighting to fit wherever your subject might be on stage. This allows cameras at different angles and framings to ensure a consistent look on video. It also helps a person, regardless of their seating position in the congregation, to see someone evenly and adequately lit.
God gave you the skills. Now ask Him for the wisdom to use them well.
These three criteria weren’t the only ones we used at Cottonwood Creek, but they were our top ones. We also examined purchasing and operating costs, estimated end of life, availability of spare parts, installation height and angle to the stage, thermal management/fan noise, color mixing capabilities, control capabilities, power requirements, video flicker-free dimming, dimming curves, form factors and mounting options, consistency across fixtures, and the required lights for specific roles (key, backlight, accent, wash, etc.). Our top three criteria may not be your top three. However, it’s essential to prayerfully consider how you prioritize your criteria to best fit your church’s needs. For us, we wanted even, smooth lighting for video that also could enhance the in-person experience. We achieved that look prayerfully and thankfully.
Finally, when purchasing new lights, don’t be ashamed to reach out to a community of experienced lighting designers and engineers to ask questions. You are not alone. Our tribe is willing and able to help you figure out what’s the best use of your available budget money on a lighting purchase. As you pray, learn, and evaluate, be expectant and watch for how the Lord will provide a way to help you, and don’t be surprised if the Lord grows you in your dependence and trust in Him during the process. The wise technical leader will be mindful of this.
