Choose, use your church’s lighting system wisely

If the church secretary can’t be taught in five minutes or less to have the lights up and running, your system is too difficult,” said Michael Thompson, president of Thompson Sound Inc.
   
Choosing an overly complicated lighting system can be disastrous should those few people trained to operate it leave or fall ill, he explained.
   
“Suddenly, they’re gone, and you’re left with a monster that no one knows how to operate properly,” Thompson said.
   
And it’s a monster that costs a monstrous amount of money.
“Keep it simple, then as you practice and train more people, add to what you can do,” Thompson said.
   
He noted that one Alabama Baptist church bought a $32,000 video system, then waited until a few weeks after it was installed to even introduce it into their worship services. This was a wise move, he noted.
   
“Doing too much too quick can lose congregation interest, as well as intimidate volunteers,” Thompson said. “Practice with it, and crosstrain several people to know how to do one person’s job.”
   
How do you get safely from blueprints of a lighting booth to being set up for success in implementation?
   
By choosing a lighting company that will meet your church’s unique needs — and early on in the church design process, said Doug Rogers, communications coordinator for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions (SBOM).
   
“All churches have unique needs, but the common thread is that you need to find a company that is interested in helping you assess your needs and helping you meet those needs,” Rogers said. “You need someone who will help you find the right tools for the job.”
   
A resource Alabama Baptists churches have at their fingertips to help them in the process is the communications office at the SBOM.
   
“If you want a neutral party — someone who’s not interested in selling you something — to read your proposals or give references, that’s what we’re here for,” Rogers said.
It’s a valuable tool to use in planning each church’s unique video and lighting ministry needs, he noted.
   
“The printing press was claimed for God’s purposes, and as a result we have a Bible we can physically hold in our hands,” Rogers said. “We have a responsibility to claim today’s technology for God’s use as well.”
   
Using lighting professionals is worth the money, said Gary Swafford, director of new work and church building services at the SBOM. 
   
“Hiring a consultant to come in and assess an existing building commonly done now, and new buildings should be designed with the qualities in mind to start with,” Swafford said. Lighting professionals can give the guidance needed early on to save churches money and problems later.
   
Before actually contacting the company, however, your church’s media ministry or lighting committee will already want to have in hand the specifications of what the church’s ministry needs are — and will be in the future.
   
“Your media ministry would need to sit down and analyze, ‘On a Sunday to Sunday basis, what areas would we light?’ — for example, the pulpit, the piano, the baptismal and the choir,” said Mike Evans, vice president and chief audio engineer for Alpha Sound in Mobile.
   
“Figuring that out would set up your basic lighting package for you,” Evans said. “Then you would need to do a little dreaming.”
   
Imagine where your future Christmas drama presentations, choir productions and skits might take place on stage and what they  might look like, then decide what sort of lights you would need to fill the area, he explained.
   
“Dream big. Think of the future. You can put in unused circuits for future lights,” Evans said.
   
One existing church called wanting to replace their existing lights — rigged with homemade riggings of boards and cables, he said. But their budget couldn’t afford it.
   
“But it’s a matter of thinking through your means and your future,” Evans said. “He bought the dimming controls and used them for a year on his current homemade lights. Then the next year he budgeted for the lights, and when he got them the dimmers were already in place.”
   
If possible, churches should visit other churches and see what they like and don’t like about their lighting systems, Thompson said.
    
“Find out who put their systems in, then see what works and what doesn’t work for them. Decide what you would do differently,” he said. “Soak up a lot of good information. Research and planning is crucial to the lighting process.”