Recently, Teen Challenge Arizona completely leveled the previous Men’s Center campus in Tucson in order to start from scratch and build a beautiful new complex that will serve their ministry to men for decades to come.
While the new center was already under construction, Teen Challenge was introduced to Whole Hearted Pro AV LLC at a conference. They chose WHPAV to design and install the AV in their new Chapel.
Lighting: A significant feature of the Chapel is the large window that backs the entire stage area. We knew immediately that we would need to provide some professional Fresnel Lights that were both capable of competing with sunlight coming in from behind through the windows, and also changing color, providing a cool white during the daytime to complement the light coming in through the windows, and a warm white light to complement the house lighting when it is darker outside. To do this, we installed eight ADJ Encore FR Pro Color 400W RGBACL fixtures in 4 zones of two lights each.
To enable spots anywhere on the stage, we provided two ADJ Focus Flex L7 fixtures. The Lime chip in these fixtures enables the 5-50 degree Flex L7s to match and complement the Fresnels.
To provide some back lighting and a little eye candy, we installed a total of four Eliminator Stryker Washes and two ADJ Focus Spot 5z’s. To support these, we needed to create a significant support structure above the acoustic clouds to prevent the fixtures from vibrating when moving, because traditional methods were not available due to the clouds and automated window curtains.
Audio: To hear what’s happening, we installed a Martin Audio system comprised of three CDD12 speakers for the mains, and one CDD6 speaker to fill in audio for the tech booth that is buried in a cubby hole.
Its all about the Bass. Because there was nowhere under the stage (or in front of it) for subwoofers, we opted to fly a subwoofer behind the front main speaker. Because Subwoofers are generally omnidirectional, a normal subwoofer would create as much sound behind it as in front of it. In this room, that sound would have bounced off the glass at the back of the room and cancelled the low frequency waves coming from the front of the subwoofer. To mitigate this effect, we installed an SXC115 Cardioid subwoofer. While there is still plenty of low end on most of the stage, The resulting low end at the back window is pretty subdued–there is nothing to reflect from the wall. The effect is good solid low end everywhere throughout the room. Finally, the Sub is hard-mounted to a support beam in the middle of the room resulting in a very solid, clean low end.
Everything is powered and controlled by an iK81 8-channel amplifier with enough DSP to completely tune the entire system outside of the soundboard, preventing anyone from accidentally erasing the tuning of the room. The CDD12s on the outside of the room are EQ’d very differently than the CDD12 at the center of the room, but the end result is that the sound is almost exactly the same at the front of the room, back of the room and anywhere from one side of the room to the other.
Soundboard: While some might look down their noses at our choice for a soundboard, we believe that for the money, the Behringer Wing is by far the most capable console anywhere close to its price range just for sheer processing power.
Because locations for stage boxes were in the concrete of the stage before we were ever involved, we ran into a challenge, especially since we were originally told each stage box area only had one conduit. To solve this, we used a Midas HUB4 Pro in a rack near the tech booth. The HUB4 Pro provided power over PoE and signal to four Midas DL8 8×8 digital stage boxes on the stage via one CAT5E cable per stage box.
To connect to the Sennheiser EW-D Microphones and IEM Transmitters to the console, we used a Midas DN4888 StageConnect box that was wired directly to the Wing. The end result is that there is still room for way more inputs and outputs on the soundboard than they will ever use.
The Sennheiser microphones receive power and signal from an RF Venue Antenna Distributor, and the IEM transmitters are connected to an RF Venue Combiner. Both the distributor and combiner are connected to an RF Venue Architecture (ARC) antenna mounted to the back wall. Not one even notices that the antennas are there unless you point them out, but they make rock solid wireless connections with absolutely no dropouts.
Everyone that has heard the sound in the room has been very impressed.
