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A.C. Lighting Supply Jands Vista Lighting Console to Leading US House of Worship

A.C. Lighting Supply Jands Vista Lighting Console to Leading US House of Worship

July 14, 2005 05:21

A.C. Lighting has supplied a Jands Vista T2 lighting console to the Mandarin Christian Church in Florida as part of an upgrade of the house of worship’s service production rig.

Mandarin Christian Church is a leading independent house of worship in Jacksonville, Florida with a congregation of over 4,000 people. The church’s Worship Department strives to create a high-quality atmosphere during the weekend services held in their 2,250 seat Worship Center through the use of inspiring music, moving dramas and first class production. This is made possible by a team of volunteers who take turns to control the lighting and other production requirements for these services.

Tom Hembree, Head of Worship, Programming & Communications, joined the Church last year and was brought in to help oversee their move to a more contemporary style of service utilizing modern entertainment production values.

Tom had taken a Church of 10,000 people through a 2.2 million dollar install of audio, video & lighting only last year, so had first hand experience of the complexities of using full gear production rigs in a church environment.

Starting with the lighting, he upgraded the rig to include the first automated fixtures. As a result the existing control console, which had been adequate for driving the old rig, was now struggling to provide the necessary speed and performance needed to create lighting designs with the new moving fixtures.

Tom heard about the Jands Vista and was interested by its totally visually based user interface. Unlike existing consoles, which forced users to convert their mental picture into a complex series of numbers, the Vista allowed users to work visually by controlling all design parameters with a pen and a large color screen. This made programming and operating the desk extremely fast, simple and intuitive.

Tom contacted North American distributor A.C. Lighting Inc. and arranged a demo at LDI. He was so convinced that it was the right console for the Church’s needs that he went straight to the next stage of getting A.C. console specialist Darryl Ross to install a Vista T2 in the Church and train him on it.

Several months and many services later using the console, Tom Hembree commented: “The Vista has enabled us to make the leap to a much more sophisticated lighting rig very smoothly. Its ease of use means we can focus on designing better shows, rather than getting distracted by the actual process of programming the shows themselves. With such an attractive approach to lighting it will take away much of the fear of going into automated lights for the large churches in America, who are all moving into full scale production gear set ups. I’m also very impressed with the quality of service I received from A.C. Lighting. They have provided excellent support throughout each stage of the sale.”

The current Church lighting rig controlled by the Vista consists of 12 Vari-Lite VL1000, 6 Clay Paky Alpha Spot HPE automated fixtures, 12 M-faders and 70 conventional fixtures.

As leader of a large group of Technical Directors employed in Churches across the USA, Tom’s recommendation of the console has already resulted in his former Church requesting a trial of a Vista T4. Tom is also producing a major concert event collaboration with the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra in the summer which will feature the Vista. A volunteer from the Church will be operating the console.