As one of the fastest growing churches in the United States, Elevation Church serves over 25,000 members through fourteen campuses located mainly throughout the southeast with the exception of one campus in Toronto. Because of the size, technical abilities and vision of Elevation Church they have quickly established themselves as the technical benchmark of what many other churches strive to be. In order to continue being on the cutting-edge Elevation recently partnered with SES Integration of Concord, NC to integrate the audio, video, and lighting technologies at Elevation’s new Ballantyne location which serves as the broadcast hub for all of Elevation’s campuses.
Elevation’s Director of Live Production Technologies Brian Poole and Technical Director Zach Kimrey provided SES Integration with the concept of where Elevation was heading and what needed to happen in order to accomplish these goals. Trey Blair (Director) and Tim Owens (Director of Operations) of SES Integration developed an audio, video, and lighting package that would transform this vision into reality. Not only was the goal of this facility to create an unparalleled worship experience on site, but also to provide technology integration and bi-directional broadcast connectivity between all of the campuses. In order for the technology staff to effectively communicate between the campuses during the highly-choreographed worship experiences, a Clearcom Eclipse Digital Intercom system was implemented.
The broadcast video system was anchored by Panasonic AK-HC3500 HD cameras and the switching and routing capabilities of a Ross 3M/E Acuity Switcher and Evertz audio and video router/multiviewer system. This combination of quality and flexibility brings Elevation’s worship experiences to life.
This project relied on L’Acoustics for an audio package that would ultimately become one of the highest SPL producing system in a church anywhere in the nation. In order to accomplish this the L’Acoustics package was made up of a K2 system accompanied by clusters of ARCS II in addition to K1-SB and KS28 subwoofers which were fed by a DiGiCo SD10 console at Front of House. On stage, Shure UHFR wireless mics and PSM1000 wireless IEM made up the RF systems with a DiGiCo SD8 mixing monitor.
Working with Elevation’s Lighting Designer Andy Bentley, SES Integration designed the lighting control and data distribution system centered around a GrandMA2 Lite console and an ETC Paradigm Control System. ETC Sensor IQ panels were used for power management. The lighting fixtures were highlighted by Philips Vari-Lite VL4000s and Showline SL Bars, ETC LED Lekos, and Martin VDO Sceptron being added to the Light Source RGBW LED house lights.
From the beginning this was truly a unique project. From the bidirectional broadcast to simultaneously providing Elevation with an advanced technological system, offering extreme flexibility, Elevation Church is able to incorporate any creative element into their worship experiences. SES Integration was able to overcome major time constraints and successfully completed the project under an extremely accelerated timeline. This ensured that the project would stay on schedule, all while helping Elevation with one of the most technically advanced church installs in the country.