PowerPoint, Easy Worship, SundayPlus, and MediaShout are all programs that churches can use to project announcements, scripture, or your pastor’s sermon notes. It is easy to set up but as is the theme for our site, “Keep it Simple.” While there are millions of colors to choose from and so many different fun fonts available, that doesn’t mean they should be used.

Colors, “If I can’t use all of them, what should I use?” It depends on the effect you want to have. A white background and contrasting font color is appropriate for well lit areas so that the text stands out. Also, white backgrounds allow for some light spill to occur on the screen without any noticeable difference. Your choice of font color would be best kept to classic colors. Black, blue, green, red, or even brown are good colors to stick with for clean images and good intelligibility. Darker backgrounds such as black or blue are better for places where heads might edge in front of the projector image. The darker background blends with the “shadow” of the person or item obstructing the view. It makes it less noticeable. Also, the use of a white or yellow font color succeeds in making the text “pop” off the screen.

Allow me to say a short word on video and photographic backgrounds. While they often are very pleasing to the eye without text overlaid on them, you very rarely have a video that is always dark or always bright. It is difficult to determine what font color to choose to contrast the background. If you plan to use pictures, use them sparingly or during transitions where text does not need to be on screen.

One last word of advice, video has a “rule of thirds.” This divides the picture screen into thirds and how to frame a video shot. When creating slides for praise choruses or sermon notes, use the top two thirds of the screen for your text and leave the bottom third open.

How many times have you sat in church and seen a short clip of a movie as the pastor’s illustration? Or, sang along with a nice Powerpoint presentation of a praise song? Or, sang the printed words of a praise song from the bulletin? Did you ever see the letters CCLI and a number printed on the slides, or the handout? If not, there is a good chance you were watching an infringement of copyright that could cost the church up to $30,000 per incident. The CCLI was created to enable churches to be able to use copyrighted material in worship without having to contact he copyright holders individually EVERYTIME they need permission to use the song, words and the CVLI was created for protecting the copyright of videos and dvd’s.

Both these organizations are very important to the way you are able to use media in your services. But there is good news, both are annual licenses and are priced according to average Sunday attendance. The CVLI license gives you over 100 movie production companies including most of the major studios and the CCLI license gives you access to over 150,000 songs.

The major third party worship software applications integrate the CCLI license number into the presentations and also are able to download lyrics directly from the CCLI website.

We need to remember copyright infringement is a serious issue in the digital age and it is the Church’s responsibility to make sure it respects all copyright laws.

This post is going to build on DC’s last post as well as touch back on the very first post on Churchnology.com

Pull out your answers to the following questions:

Average Age?
Average Education level?
Level of Employment?
Number of families with small children?
Involvement with Church Activities/ Groups?
Do they go to the Movies?
Do they listen to the radio?
Do they follow the local sport teams?
Do they give topical suggestions of what they’d like to see in the service?
Are you a rapidly growing church?
What is the largest demographic growing in your church? (youth, young Adults, young married couples, new families, baby boomers,seniors)

The answers to these questions should shape the answers to these five new questions:

What?

Why?

When?

How?

and maybe the most important in this sense:

If?

Let me explain:

and go back to the title of this post: How much is enough? or maybe, How much is TOO much?

The demographics of your church directly impact and focus how you use technology in your services.  Most people that work with media and ministry would suggest different approaches to integrating technology into a worship service depending on the median age of the participants.  I have a 4 year old son and I am learning day by day what methods work and don’t work when it comes to enacting change in his life.  This is a great analogy in regards to integrating technology into a worship service.  Remember: NOT EVERYTHING YOU TRY IS GOING TO WORK FOR EVERYBODY.

The path DC and I are suggesting can be summed up in two words: baby steps.

Let me give you an example:

Average Age?    40 years old
Average Education level?   some college
Level of Employment?    business professionals, doctors, lawyers
Number of families with small children? 10
Involvement with Church Activities/ Groups?    about 45% are involved with at least 1 church activity or group
Do they go to the Movies?  the younger congregants more than the older congregants
Do they listen to the radio?     mostly classic rock, christian, or country; some talk or sports
Do they follow the local sport teams?  yes
Do they give topical suggestions of what they’d like to see in the service?  some but it usually is divided-younger want more contemporary; older want more traditional hymns
Are you a rapidly growing church?  growing steady but would say rapidly
What is the largest demographic growing in your church? (youth, young Adults, young married couples, new families, baby boomers,seniors) empty nest and seniors

Which now causes us to plan our integration based on the answers to these questions:

What? How? When?

Based on the age, education level and involvement with Church activities this could be as little as taking the Church Annoucements out of the bulletin and creating a powerpoint slide presentation that is played via projector before church starts; after a couple of weeks use the projector for Annoucements and maybe the scripture readings or responsive readings during the service;  4-6 weeks since using the projector for announcements you involve your music minister or choir director and integrate a couple of praise songs into the service and ONLY the praise songs are projected; the traditional hymns are still sung from the hymnals; 8-10 weeks you transition the traditional hymns over to the projector and add the Pastors “talking points” or scripture references to be displayed while he’s speaking.

Why?

This method of integration allows the entire congregation to take baby steps into the deep end of the pool slowly and together.  By slowing warming up the congregation to the use of the projector, before long if the projector was down for repair, you will hear how much the congregation missed it being there.

This method also adds the technology without taking away the traditional aspects that are so important to some of the older members.  It also allows everyone to follow along with the pastor as well as be more involved with the singing because they are no longer looking down into a book but instead are looking towards the platform.

And for the pastor it gives them greater control over changing the flow or direction of the sermon as they are led.  Third party software like MediaShout or EasyWorship allow song lyrics and scriptures to be integrated with no distraction to the congragation “on the fly”  as well as integrate video clips directly into the sermon as illustrations.

and

If?

This one is the biggie….what do you do If no one likes it and everybody complains?  This is a trick question.  These two things you need to do before you ever embark on integrating technology into worship.  If you do this first, hopefully, you’ll never  have to deal with the If no likes it and everybody complains?

First, Pray.  Seriously, pray that this is the best direction for the church to go and pray what to integrate so that it doesn’t alienate but invites people to accept the idea of technology and worship. 

Second, Don’t laugh at this,   Form a committee-Involve each age group and let them tell you what they need to see specifically in the service and sculpt the use of technology to meet those needs.

More to come-

This blog is not for just churches new to the idea of integrating technology into church but at the same time some of the hints, tricks and tips we offer may sometimes be things old pros know but may have forgotten or have become so comfortable they don’t pause and take the time to do anymore.  Honestly, it happens to all of us.

Using Audio In Your Worship

Ok, you are thinking, “I know how to use audio in my worship service.” Don’t I? Well, do you really? Or are you simply making due with a microphone, maybe a Nady wireless lavaliere for your pastor? Or a Samson wireless handheld that also picks up the local classical radio station? Does your system sound like a transistor radio or more like a blown speaker where nothing is intelligible? The rule of thumb is to keep it simple.

We will go into many aspects of audio in later posts but right now here are a few tips. First, amplified sound should sound like the person or instrument it amplifies, nothing more. Second, make sure that you use quality equipment. When sound is concerned, there is a difference when it comes to microphones, amplifiers, and speakers. Third, keep the mix simple. Don’t get too many microphones and instruments into your mix until you know how to get a couple of microphones and a piano sound good.

So let’s cover the first three tips for audio in worship. Amplified sound should sound like the person or instrument it amplifies. The sound heard through your speakers should sound just like you were standing next to the person you are listening to. There are many aspects of electronic sound that can change the way a person is represented through a sound system. Try your best to listen, really listen to what is coming through your system. Use the equalizer on the channel of the mixer. Ask yourself, “Does this sound like a cheap, transistor radio or more like someone talking through a pillow?” If it sounds like a transistor radio, then add some lower range frequency on the equalizer of the channel. If it sounds muffled, like someone is talking through a pillow, then add some high frequency into the channel through the equalizer. One good way to work on your adjusting eq is to listen to a CD that you are very familiar with, preferably something with good high and low frequency. Play it through your system and then turn the high frequency knob on the eq. How does it make it sound? Make some adjustments so that the high frequencies are clear and crisp but not harsh. Next thing is to work on the low frequency. Adjust the knob so that the lows are rich and broad. Turn it one direction and then the other. Which sounds better? Lastly, work on the mid range eq. Are the vocals intelligible? Turn the knob until you can clearly understand the vocals.

The second tip is a variation on the old adage, “Garbage In, Garbage Out.” Cheap equipment, Garbage out, If you use cheap equipment, you get a cheap sound. Now, I am not saying buy the most expensive things. I am simply saying that Radio Shack is not the place to purchase your microphones, cables or amplifiers. Radio Shack is the fine to buy RCA cables, simple adaptors, battery testers, etc. The best thing to do is stay with the basics. Shure microphones, especially the industry standard, SM58 and SM57, are the workhorses of this industry. They are relatively inexpensive, about $100 each. Audio-Technica is another brand of microphone that is a little bit cheaper than the Shure microphones and will provide a comparable sound. Amplifiers and speakers are best kept to the major manufacturers. QSC, Crown, Crest, EV are a few of the solid choices in amplifiers while EAW, Meyer Sound, TurboSound are the Cadillacs of speakers,

The third tip is the KISS method. Keep it super simple. Ok, that isn’t the way it’s said but I am being polite. Keep the mix simple until your ability is able to handle a complex mix. Try mixing a pair of microphones, a piano, drums, and a guitar. Once you are able to work with that, add in another instrument, maybe a bass guitar or keyboard and a couple more vocal microphones. Keep the mix clean. Blend all the instruments as one including the voice. Keep working at it and you will improve.

Well, that’s it for today. We will cover other things like how to run a sound check or “monitors: when is it too much?” Keep sending questions that you may have regarding any use of technology.

As we expand out churchnology.com to include other contributors and more in-depth topics in the coming days, we need to apologize for the brief outage and also announce we have moved to wordpress as our choice of blogging platform. This lends itself the ability for us to show churches how to use Blogs as part of their ministry and outreach. We will touch on this topic in the future but for now please know we are still tweaking and we will continue to make changes, although hopefully we will not suffer anymore downtime. Thanks for your patience as we grow.