Case Study: Heavenly Solutions

Mark Postma, president of Reinforcement, a digital integrator in Farmington Hills, Mich., says new church construction and remodeling is all geared to sound, lights and video (SLV). "There's no money for stained glass," he says. "Instead, churches are spending money on technology to make presentations."

As a result, open-truss ceilings, movable chairs instead of pews, and unadorned walls are style trends in modern churches. None of this is lost on Postma, who over the past several years has seen his SLV business evolve from one catering primarily to concerts and events to one that serves the burgeoning market for houses of worship. Today, close to 80 percent of his business comes from transforming the once-staid Sunday morning service into a theatrical event.

And that's translated into big business for Postma. "A small church with a basic SLV system will run about $50,000," he says. "But I've had some projects that are close to $1 million and a number that are in the $200,000 range."

One of Postma's more ambitious projects is the NorthRidge Church in Plymouth, Mich., a spiritual center for more than 7,500 people with a 3,100-seat auditorium. Its annual Glory concerts attract about 14,000 participants on Easter to more than 24,000 during the Christmas holidays. More than 200,000 people have attended its major holiday concerts in the past year.

Scott Storteboom, media director of NorthRidge Church, says the church relies heavily on A/V capabilities to convey its biblical message. A few years back, however, the limits of that visual message were severely strained. NorthRidge Church was using two 14-foot screens, a switcher to change images, a router and a couple of computers, all used mainly for Microsoft PowerPoint presentations."But what we wanted to start doing is using screens as stage design elements," Storteboom explains. "With our switcher, we basically had one output and we wanted multiple outputs."

Storteboom says he and his technicians started using the router to get around the limitations of the switcher and incorporated low-tech workarounds, such as using a piece of paper to block off projector lenses when they wanted to black out video. But he soon realized the church needed a more comprehensive solution to its problems: It needed to make the leap from an analog to a digital video system.

That's when his team composed a wish list of what they needed to bring a more elaborate A/V message to parishioners. And that's when they called in Postma to help them architect a solution. "Mark does a lot of quality work and is top-notch," says Storteboom. "We work very closely with him. We had a list of [equipment] and we wanted these things to work nicely together. But it wasn't a one-way discussion. It was a dialogue."

The wish list included creating a stage design atmosphere that allowed for simultaneous video feeds. And Storteboom wanted cameras that technicians could unplug and replug at different locations during the program. "We also wanted to put more energy into our program by putting handheld cameras on stage," he says.

Postma says the original project to transform NorthRidge Church into a state-of-the-art audiovisual house of worship took about eight months from conception to installation. Reinforcement did the complete installation and supplied the majority of the equipment. Part of the transformation was to move the control room from a balcony overlooking the stage to an enclosed space, which hides the new control room from the sanctuary. The new room, with the bulk of the components in rack-mounted systems, features 30 different displays that allow technicians to monitor and direct video output. "The control room resembles a production truck at an NFL football game," Postma says.

Since the original installation, the system has gone through two major upgrades. "As the technicians have learned how to use the equipment, they want more functionality out of the system," he says. "I try to pursue an open relationship with my clients as opposed to a one-shot deal."

One new project in the works is a redesign of the children's and junior high classrooms in the church. "Those tend to be rooms that are pretty intensive lighting and video areas," Storteboom says. "When we started looking at the project, the first thing we did was call Mark up because we need gear that is rack-mounted and movable."

He explains that as needs change, the church wants the ability to take existing A/V equipment and move it to other areas of the church. Postma's recommendations are critical in choosing the right equipment. "I'm talking to him because this gear has to have life beyond its current usage; quality has to be there because this equipment can't be junk in a couple of years," Storteboom says. As a result of his close working relationships with NorthRidge Church and other church clients, Postma says "about 90 percent of my business comes from word-of-mouth; advertising doesn't seem to yield a whole lot of business."

Many of Postma's clients purchase their equipment direct from the manufacturer. NorthRidge Church, for example, worked directly with Sony for its high-end broadcast cameras. But Postma plays a big role in recommending technology. NorthRidge Church uses three Dell PCs to add graphics capabilities to its A/V system. While the church bought the PCs direct from Dell, Postma specified which video card to use in the systems.

What's more, as PCs become an integral part of his systems, Postma says he'd be interested in pursing agent programs from PC vendors as long as the bureaucracy to join and maintain the relationship is minimal.

Postma also helped incorporate a new feature that expands NorthRidge Church's ministry beyond the church walls. "Two tower DVD burners create realtime DVDs," he says. "Ten minutes after the service is over, DVDs of the event are available for sale in the church bookstore."

Because of the DVD burning feature coordinated by Postma, Storteboom says the service "has a longer impact than one viewing; it can be shared with friends and neighbors."

The ultimate impact of a state-of-the-art A/V system is to make the church's message more relevant in a modern world. "We have a very biblically based message, yet we try to use modern means to convey that message," he says. "What do people do a lot of, especially the kids? It's video games and TV. People are used to seeing visual images and are used to hearing soundtracks. We try to use similar tools to convey that biblical message."