LED Video Wall Helps Turning Point Church Provide Impressive Sunday Services at Satellite Campus in School Gym
The leadership of Turning Point Church, located in McDonough, GA, wanted to extend the reach of their ministry beyond what a church might reasonably expect to accomplish with just one campus. They set their sights on Covington, GA, a town 20 miles away from the original campus, when an opportunity arose to make use of the school gymnasium at Peachtree Academy, a private K-12 Christian school, for Sunday worship.
While the gym had a stage built into one side with some audio and lighting equipment, the church would need to augment the school’s systems to keep the level of production in the ballpark with the expectations set by the original church campus. Portable Church Industries (PCI) of Troy, MI was enlisted to help design portable systems that would be easy to set up and tear down on Sunday mornings.
Matt Groves, PCI’s director of consulting, noted that, along with an audio setup that included an Allen & Heath digital mixing console to drive a d&b audiotechnik P.A. system, the technical packaging to support the new portable campus included an MA Lighting onPC lighting control system and Chauvet Professional COLORado1-Tri Tour lighting fixtures.
“The onPC controller connects to the school’s existing lighting system via DMX to control the installed stage lighting,” Groves says. “We then added the COLORado1-Tri Tour fixtures to act as house lighting, rather than using the architectural lighting in the gymnasium, to achieve better control and aesthetics.”
Each of the four Global Truss ST132 crank lifts support four of the 16 COLORado fixtures used to light the house. “We used that fixture type for that application because the beam angle allows for a wide even wash, and the optics provide even color mixing,” says Groves.
An Impressive Video Wall
The video aspect of this portable church’s AVL story, however, is what really stands out.
“Our first campus in McDonough created a standard with regards to the use of technology,” says campus pastor Ronnie Kinsey. “We wanted to keep that standard high, and we wanted to add some ‘wow’ factor for those coming to our campus for the first time. To that end, we challenged PCI in developing an LED video wall solution that would be portable and easy enough for volunteers to set up and tear down each week.”
PCI developed a truss system that would support the 16-by-nine-foot Chauvet F3 LED video wall, along with three custom cases to transport the panels. The truss system utilizes three pieces of Applied 12-inch-square 10-foot box truss supported from the stage floor via two Global Truss ST180 crank towers. Four volunteers work together to quickly install the top row of LED panels, and then the truss is raised via the tower’s crank mechanism to make room for the next row, repeating until the LED wall is complete. “We use these crank towers for this kind of application frequently because of the flexibility it provides when flying heavy equipment,” states Groves. “They’re very easy for a volunteer to use, they store really well, and are rugged — all great attributes for portability.”
“Our team can set up the video wall in 32 minutes, which is really impressive,” Kinsey says. “When people walk into our service, the video wall definitely makes an impact — people comment on it.”
To add some additional visual interest, six Chauvet Professional Colordash Batten Quad 12 fixtures are used along the upstage floor, placed under the video wall directed out towards the congregation. “That fixture is great for this kind of application because each LED (12 total per fixture) can be individually controlled, allowing for more effect possibilities,” comments Groves. “They also were selected because it allows the church to have versatility — by relocating the fixtures and uplighting the drape on the stage they are able to change up the stage look very easily. They can also purchase more at some point and create a different look by pixel mapping the fixtures. It’s just a very versatile fixture and stores really well because of its size and shape, which is great for portability.”
Renewed Vision’s ProPresenter is used for lyrics and graphics support for the service, and the message is streamed live from the McDonough campus on a two-minute time delay using a Living As One live streaming solution.
“Portable Church Industries was great to work with,” adds Kinsey. “I tell pastors who call me, ‘PCI makes it easy.’ They came in and evaluated the space we’d be using, listened to our needs, and created a system that worked with our budget and provided the technical excellence we desired. Their advice on how to utilize the high school for our ministry needs was invaluable. They spent a weekend with us prior to our launch date to train us in setup and tear down. PCI gets five stars out of five from Turning Point Church.”
For more information, visit www.portablechurch.com and www.chauvetprofessional.com.
