AV for worship has become increasingly sophisticated and widespread, experiencing an unexpected boom during the pandemic when billions of Paycheck Protection Program dollars helped churches build infrastructure to sustain through online worship. Trends in worship music have driven audio advancements, and video is seen in churches of all sizes. So like any form of communication, AV for worship evolves and is used in more technically ambitious ways. In addition to the AV that supports communities and congregations in their regular gatherings, large format worshipthemed attractions bring an elevated drama to time-honored stories.
Two blocks south of Washington, D.C.’s National Mall, home to the capital city’s many historic monuments and institutions, stands the six-story, 430,000-square-foot Museum of the Bible. Since 2017, the museum has welcomed millions of visitors through its 40-foot bronze doors to explore an extensive collection of biblical artifacts in a gallery that documents the collection of books’ narrative, history, and impact.
But not everything in the building is “ancient history.” Recently, the museum opened All Creation Sings, a high-tech interactive exhibit that brings scripture to life through immersive technology, as ancient words meet immersive sound.
All Creation Sings offers a 45-minute immersive worship experience inspired by Psalm 148. Featuring content by CREATR of Costa Mesa, California, the 100-by-60-foot space surrounds visitors with interactive biblical storytelling. Atlanta-based Meptik designed the visual spectacle, using 360-degree projection mapping and LiDAR sensors for interactive, generative effects.
Central to the exhibit’s surround experience is L-Acoustics L-ISA immersive sound technology, bringing a new dimension to audio storytelling. Oklahoma City’s Skylark AV handled the installation of all the projectors, LiDAR cameras, and other technical gear, including a panoramic audio system comprising 16 of L-Acoustics’ new X8i coaxial loudspeakers, four KS21 subs, and seven LA2Xi amplified controllers.
New X8i loudspeakers blend seamlessly while delivering impact. “X8i is a fantastic installation speaker with a beautiful, low-profile design,” says Zach Kimrey, design engineer at Skylark AV. “Its compact size enabled us to invisibly hide them in a thin 12-inch black band running around the upper perimeter of the room without visually interfering with the projection surfaces. And despite their small format, they produce a surprisingly robust low frequency response with plenty of impact, which was ideal for this exhibit.”
Kimrey notes that the LA2Xi amplified controllers each drive four loudspeakers, with a unique feed sent to each speaker to supply the immersive effect. “Signals are routed from the Disguise D3 media servers via Dante, converted to AES with Q-SYS, and then everything is one-to-one per speaker. So it’s 17 channels of drive: 16 X8i and one channel to feed the four KS21 subs, which are centrally located adjacent to the large columns in the middle of the room.”
L-ISA’s immersive audio mixing capabilities shine in this installation, offering creators unprecedented tools to craft captivating soundscapes. Notably, the project also demonstrates the flexibility of L-ISA technology. James Rudder, L-ISA Application Engineer at L-Acoustics, used an L-ISA Processor II for onsite spatial mixing, creating a fully immersive sound experience with spatial objects carefully placed to complement the visuals. “Once James had the perfect mix, he ‘printed’ those tracks for us, and we imported them into the D3 servers,” explains Kimrey.
All Creation Sings is a showcase for how L-ISA can be implemented efficiently in fixed installations. “I didn’t realize you could have an L-ISA mix without having a processor permanently onsite,” explains Kimrey. “The immersive playback option is great for a fixed environment where the audio content doesn’t change. The application of L-ISA here is fantastic and absolutely brings the whole experience together.”
“This project illustrates how L-ISA technology can enhance creativity and deliver exceptional audience experiences, even in scenarios with technical or budgetary considerations,” Kimrey adds. “It opens up new possibilities for immersive audio in a wide range of venues and applications. It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever experienced.” “I’ve heard L-Acoustics loudspeakers in other venues, particularly worship environments, and I have always been impressed with their sound,” says Museum of the Bible IT Interactive Systems Manager Joel Conrad. “Initially, when Skylark recommended the brand for All Creation Sings, I figured that an L-Acoustics solution might be too expensive seeing that it’s a premium-quality product. But Skylark AV showed us that it wouldn’t add a significant cost, so we went for it, and their implementation turned out just beautiful. Skylark AV and L-Acoustics did the final mix in-room, so everything perfectly matches the visuals. The fidelity throughout the entire exhibit space feels warm, moving, and engaging. And you can tell by watching the crowds that our visitors are truly enveloped in the experience, which was exactly what we were hoping for.”
Moment Factory Does Worship
There are churches that reach to the heavens and then there’s the Dôme des Invalides, the tallest church building in Paris, standing an amazing 107 meters. As the final resting place of some of France’s leading military figures, most notably Napoleon, the church was built during the reign of Louis XIV in the 17th century and features a half-dozen chapels.
The building’s architecture is highlighted nightly with an attraction for visitors, Aura Invalides, which covers the walls with dynamic video projections and lighting effects to create a three-part journey exploring the design and construction of the building, its history, and its role in the present day. The ambitious project is all soundtracked with orchestral music heard through a discretely placed P.A. by France-based pro-audio manufacturer Nexo.
Designed by Moment Factory, it echoes an earlier spectacular the company designed for the Notre-Dame Basilica in Montreal. Aura Invalides was produced through a partnership with Musée de l’Armée, the country’s national military museum. A designated French heritage site, the Dôme des Invalides presented Moment Factory with a major challenge: to create a fully immersive environment across a 3,500-square-meter projection area while preserving the architectural and historical integrity of the site.
As night falls, the Dôme des Invalides comes alive with the magic of light, an original orchestral score, and video mapping. Over a span of 50 minutes, visitors explore the monument and its six chapels to the rhythm of three movements recalling its construction long ago, its living memory, and its power to inspire.
For audio, Aura Invalides has an all-Nexo sound system finished in a custom RAL color to match the stone walls; the system was designed and installed by French AV technology and events production specialists Novelty Group, with assistance from the Engineering Support team at Nexo.
The P.A. consists of eight clusters of four Nexo Geo M6 compact line array elements, each wall-mounted close to the pillars at the entrances of the four corner chapels, with each cluster facing the opposing pillar. L18 subs are mounted above each of the four corner arches, with a single Geo M620 at each corner firing into the dome to create a virtual source.
Compact Nexo ID24s above each arch face the floor, with additional pairs of ID24s mounted above the Turenne and Vauban monuments in the two side chapels, and pairs of ID24s supplemented by an IDS110 sub in each of the four corner chapels.
Lighting + Projection Mapping
The ancient temple of San Miguel in the city of Cuenca in the mountains of east-central Spain provides a stunning backdrop for ‘Luz Cuenca’, a fully immersive sensory experience offering an artistic expression of the cultural wealth of the city.
Drawing on the city’s history which is closely linked to art–and especially abstract art–Luz Cuenca is a multimedia exhibition that combines artistic lighting techniques and a dramatic orchestral music score with 2D and 3D projection mapping. Digital immersive experience specialists Ibercover Studio were in charge of production and content design for Luz Cuenca. They turned to leading AV experts Fluge to design and supply a high-quality sound system for the project.
AV project engineer at Fluge, Jesús Catá explains: “Ibercover Studio asked us to design an immersive, robust and high-quality audio system as a key element of the overall immersive experience combining sound, light and projection mapping. The main objective was to effectively and uniformly reproduce sound in space at low volumes. The required SPL levels were not particularly high since the acoustics of the church play an important role in the sound environment, giving more importance to quality rather than pressure. We selected KV2 systems because they are outstanding when it comes to delivering highquality, detailed, transparent sound at low SPLs, and that’s not easy to do.”
Designed by sound engineer Poti Martín, the system comprises twelve EX26 2-way active loudspeaker systems evenly distributed along the walls of the nave. With its 100 x 100-degree horn, the EX26 provides wide, even coverage, superb vocal intelligibility and high-quality musical reproduction. A further two EX26s reinforce the upper gallery level. Low-end reinforcement is provided by eight EX1.5 subwoofers distributed in pairs either side of the altar, plus a further pair left and right slightly further down the nave.
Due to the immersive character of the room, each loudspeaker receives independent audio signals which are sent via Dante, track by track, from the Watchout 6 video playback system and then processed and distributed to the loudspeakers via NST Audio DSP matrices. Finally, custom white housings were designed for all the loudspeakers to minimize any interference with the video mapping.
“The synergy between the EX26 and the compact EX1.5 subwoofer for the reproduction of the entire sound spectrum in a completely flat manner, with no drop-off at any frequency, is unique,” remarks Catá. “You can hear absolutely every detail of the music exactly as it’s meant to sound, even at low SPLs. However, this doesn’t mean that it won’t reproduce higher SPLs with the same degree of success – indeed, in addition to Luz Cuenca, the system will be used for many other events with more demanding level requirements, and we know it will sound just as good.”
The Luminiscence Vision
In the heart of Bordeaux, France, stands a monument to centuries of history and architectural grandeur: Bordeaux Cathedral. Recently, this majestic edifice welcomed the Luminiscence spectacle reimagining Bordeaux Cathedral as a digital marvel. Powered by Barco projection, the temporary immersive 3D mapping show offers visitors a mesmerizing journey through time and space.
The selection of Bordeaux Cathedral for this transformative installation was not arbitrary. Spanning the size of a soccer pitch, the cathedral provided a canvas of unparalleled magnitude to realize the Luminiscence vision. The objective was clear: to invite the public into this emblematic space, steeped in history, and unveil its secrets in a modern, digital guise.
Combining 360° video mapping and 3D spatialized sound, Luminiscence offers an immersive journey into the heart of the history of Saint-André Cathedral highlighting its sublime architecture, enchanting play of lights in the stained-glass windows and extraordinary acoustics.
The installation comprised 33 Barco G100 projectors, strategically positioned within the cathedral’s passageways on custom-built supports to transform the cathedral into a captivating canvas of light. The compact G-series projectors give the flexibility to shoot from long/ and or short distances, and to play with 360° orientation possibilities. So, amidst the aweinspiring visuals, the projection units remained discreet, seamlessly integrated into the cathedral’s timeless architecture.
After the overwhelming success of the experience at the Saint-André Cathedral in Bordeaux, drawing over 96,000 visitors, Luminiscence embarked on a tour of cathedrals across France and Europe.
Contextual Light & Sound
Aura by Pablo Valbuena at St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, translates the sounds of the cathedral’s rituals into pulsating light. It listens to the sounds, voices, organ, choir, and music generated in each ritual and transforms their frequency spectrum into a spectral aura of light projected at an architectural scale.
A vertical beam suspended from the Cathedral’s cupola listens to the sounds generated across St Paul’s, manifesting them as a light that responds to their intensity and pitch, bouncing that across the golden mosaics ringing the cathedrals upper levels in an expression and scale that is visible from everywhere in the cathedral. Aura refocuses attention on what makes this space a temple: its rituals. The artists says that the main quality of a ritual, of a temple, is its temporality. “A temple is a space that slows down time, enabling introspection and a deeper experience of reality.
Aura seeks to perceptually intensify the ritual and symbolic dimension of this space, enhancing its temporal qualities,” Valbuena writes. Aura is a contextual commission for the London Design Festival in collaboration with Artichoke for St Paul’s Cathedral, generously supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies, to celebrate the 300th anniversary of Christopher Wren.
