BLYTHE, CA – St. Joan of Arc Catholic church, located near the Arizona border, is no slouch, technologically-speaking. The church offers worshippers a video system with three screens, several pan/tilt/zoom remote cameras and a digital video recording system.
With a recent addition of several "hot" condenser microphones for the choir with accompanying monitors, the church was left exposed to a substantial feedback risk, however. With multiple mix locations, it was too easy for individuals to mess up the system. Father Henri Licznerski called on San Bernardino's Enko Systems, Inc., to provide a solution.
"They previously had no auto mixing at all," said Enko's Dave Chitty. "And then they introduced five super-hot condensers for choir pickup. They sound really nice, but they made the sound tech duties quite a burden. In addition, it opened the system up to the ‘more me' dynamic, where everyone wants to turn up his or her own mic. In short, it had all the hallmarks of a well-designed system that was destined to sound unprofessional due to operator error." Chitty installed one Symetrix Jupiter 12 for the choir loft, and a second unit for the main house system.
Chitty also set up the Symetrix ARC-WEB for Licznerski's Android-based mobile phone. "Using a secure wireless network, I only had to configure a few items to get the ARC-WEB up and running," he said. "I gave the Jupiter 12 a static IP address and made it available on the network. His access is secured by a password, so that if anyone else happens to find it, they won't be able to access the sound system controls."
Chitty also installed a Symetrix ARC-2 wall panel with redundant controls. Both the ARC-2 and the ARC-WEB provide constrained volume control of the choir microphones, from +3dB to -12dB. Similar controls for the video mixer, ambient and podium mics give all the control needed. "The Father actually controls the sound system right from the podium," said Chitty. "The ARC-WEB is a remarkable advance, and it is a fitting component of a very forward thinking church."
For more information, visit: www.symetrix.co.
