New system for new Austin Stone Church campus. Same d&b fit.
Austin Stone Church (ASC) is one church offering twelve Sunday services across its six locations, indoors and out, as well as broadcasting live online. Established in 2002 it has grown from a small gathering of ten to a weekly congregation of nearly 8,000. Serving the ASC is Austin Stone Worship, a family of local worship leaders, storytellers and artists. Through their music and film publishing they equip the global church with content rich in theology and expression. Their monthly Worship Collective gatherings bring artists, musicians, songwriters, and filmmakers together to inspire and encourage one another in their craft and worship.
An existing church facility, the sixth campus was added in 2020 and serves the Austin NW area. “This campus is being outfitted to become their primary broadcast campus along with offering regular Sunday services,” explains Zach Richards, Director of Integration at Brown Note Productions. “They also plan on hosting a wide variety of other events including conferences, performances and special gatherings. ASC is set up to offer multisite simulcast of their main sermon, where the lead pastor is streamed from one campus to all other campuses live, as well as live streaming services.”
With a seating capacity of 832, the church’s contemporary worship typically has, during any given sermon, seven musicians on drums, keys, guitar, bass, and playback, as well as three lead vocalists.
“The main challenge with this install was the raked, fan shape of the space and trying to deliver a similar experience to every seat,” adds Ryan Robertson, Production Audio Manager at Austin Stone Church. “The previous system was an old, clustered point source system that really did a poor job; you could move what felt like five feet in any direction and have a very different experience.
“One of our main objectives with any of our new venues is to give each person that attends the same experience, whether in the front row or way back in the corner. No other manufacturer does as good a job of that than d&b in my opinion. Every system really does follow the ‘more art, less noise’ motto by putting sound only where it needs to go, especially when ArrayProcessing is deployed.
Working in close coordination with the ASC team, Brown Note Productions provided numerous AV updates culminating with the installation of a Y-Series line array system, running ArrayProcessing, and with E-Series for fills.
The front of house is outfitted with a DiGiCo S31console with Dante I/O and Focusrite AES interface, a Q-SYS Control system utilizing a d&b plug-in for complete AV system control and automation allowing for ‘self-serve’ AV modes for a wide variety of uses. A Panasonic laser projection system with a 24’ wide motorized projection screen is installed for multisite simulcast. An Avid Pro Tools Dante enabled broadcast package is provided for livestream and post production use.
