How did we live before PQ?

I need to take a few minutes to sing the praises of the Digidesign PQ controllers as a part of a Venue system.  I know there are some other alternatives out there, but after going through my first major holiday on our Venue platform, I can’t imagine doing monitoring any other way without adding another console (which is out of the question for us).

When Kensington began 18 years ago, FOH and monitor duties were covered by a single desk and operator.  Fast forward 18 years and FOH, monitor, and broadcast duties are still covered by a single desk and operator.  Because we’ve lived this way for so long, it is not in our paradigm to do it differently.  Enter PQ.  Now we get the best of both worlds because we are still technically functioning under a single desk and operator, but we’ve been able to move the far bulk of monitor mixing out of the engineer’s head and into the hands of the artists.

The magic of the PQ system for us is in a couple things…

1. Because PQ is simply a remote control for a stereo matrix on the console, we are able to provide an artist with control whether they are using ears or wedges.  Our stage is probably 80% ears week to week, but there’s normally a mix or two of wedges in each service.  Because PQ is so tightly integrated into the console, I don’t have to worry about giving the artist control since if it gets out of hand, I also have access to the mix.
2. Being able to automate PQ mixes throughout a service is really cool.  I’ve found that the majority of our guys would rather not have their mixes automated since they don’t need very many changes.  But PQ ties so cleanly into the console automation that it is wonderful to be able to offer a patch or level change to be stored so they don’t have to worry about it.
3. It sounds great.  I’ve listened to some other systems and have never been impressed by how they actually sound.  PQ really sounds good.  You can drive it hard and it will respond just like the console – smooth and analog sounding.
4. Because no audio passes through the PQ controller, we’ve been very successful giving a mixer to the stage center worship leader for rehearsal so they have full flexibility to dial their mix, store it into each song’s snapshot, then remove the mixer for the service so we don’t have to look at it.  Works great!

Now it is rare to have to worry about monitors.  Soundcheck has been revolutionized because we don’t have to spend all the time for me to do FOH things – dial gain and get stuff happening, then go around the stage and build everyone’s mixes.  Once I’ve established gain for everyone, the band just needs to run a verse/chorus a time or two so that everyone can dial in, and we’re ready to go.  It should go without saying that I’m also able to provide a better FOH product because of not having to think about monitors.

QLab Version 2.0!

Exciting news!  Quietly over the past week, version 2.0 of QLab was released by Figure53.  This new version has some pretty impressive features and my preliminary testing has gone quite well.

Here’s a rundown of what I consider notable new features…

• Updated GUI with a single integrated layout
• Audio waveform display of cues so you can visually trim or loop audio files inside the app
• Vamping is really cool!  Define a looping section in an audio track and then pop out of it with a Devamp Cue so the next time around the loop the track will just keep playing to the end or into another track.
• Draw your own fade curves
• Auto follow in addition to auto continue!  QLab is now a solid alternative to iTunes for preshow playlists.
• Trigger cue lists from MIDI or Linear Timecode
• Full app scripting with AppleScript

QLab has become a staple in my audio toolbox for all kinds of SFX or prerecorded music playback.  Version 2.0 ups the ante in some major ways.  Big kudos to the developers for an update that makes an already solid app that much better!

Speaker Mic

One of our weakest links in the audio chain since I have been at Kensington has been our speaker mics.  We’ve used DPA 4066 headsets for at least 4 years now but I have had a couple issues with what I consider weak points.

• I’m not a big fan of the microdot connector.  It is nice to have the flexibility of being able to use the headset with different brands of wireless manufacturers, but we had regular trouble of that microdot either not being tight enough and causing audio noise, or coming loose through the course of a 3 service day when the speaker is wearing the mic throughout that whole time.
• I really dislike the fact that the mic can move inside the headset assembly so that a speaker could accidentally move the mic from ideal position by hugging someone the wrong way, eating and bending it, or getting their cable caught on something and it tugs the mic in the headset just a bit.
• Even though we used omni-pattern 4066s, we found that placement was extremely critical to get ideal frequency response.  When you combine the mic moving in the headset with the frequency response stuff, I think the 4066 is pretty people intensive to get right.  It was very important for me to personally fit the mic to the speaker each week and go through a pretty lengthy soundcheck to make sure it was positioned properly.  Then still in 25% of the cases, by the time the speaker would actually hit the stage to give the message, it wouldn’t sound like it had in soundcheck.

When I was hanging with my buddies on the crew for the Joyce Meyer conference last summer, I got a great idea from what I saw there to hopefully come up with a better option.  Everyone I know in church production world with the exception of Willow Creek uses a Countryman E6 on their speakers with great results.  However, KCC has historically had nothing with trouble with them.  Fragile build, difficult to place on an artist and not have them move, and reliability trouble during use on stage were most notable.  Also consider that we have a teaching team of 8 people, so re-fitting an E6 to each speaker would be a nightmare.

When Joyce was speaking, I was amazed at the quality of her voice and also loved that I could hardly see the mic on IMAG.  Come to find out, their rig was a cocoa E6 (the medium brown color since a darker mic hides on the skin better than a lighter one) custom-fit to a DPA headset.  That way you get the sound quality benefit of the E6 (I’m not sure there’s a better sounding mic for talking heads) while the stability and fit benefits of a dual ear headset design.  So a few months ago I set out to build our own version of this.

Its pretty easy to do.  All I did is take a DPA headset from an old 4066 that was not fixable, curve the E6 so it fit around one of the ears as you can see in the photo, and then use some small clear heatshrink to mate the two to each other.

What’s so great about this setup is that the headset provides instant stability on the head so the mic position cannot move.  Now when we aim the mic for the speaker, we don’t have to worry about it changing by the time they reach the stage during the service.  I’ve also found that the need to adjust mic placement from speaker to speaker is much less since the distance from ear to mouth doesn’t change when we fit to each speaker – the only thing we’re adjusting is the size of the headset around the back of their head.

Is this setup perfect?  Sadly no.  We’re still struggling with finding the ideal placement for the E6 on the cheek so we don’t get breathing noise or extremely random pops.  I think its just a placement deal so I’m curious for feedback based on what you see here.

However, in spite of the lingering stuff to work out, this mic sounds great, looks fabulous on video, and sufficiently answers all of my problems with the 4066.

PM1D Fun

A few days ago I received a fun email from the buyer of our PM1D system last fall…

“Tuesday night I received a call from our touring arena manager here at Penn State. They were in a bit of a bind, with 7k tickets sold for Chris Tomlin and one very dead pm5d-rh.  Mind you this was 5:30 for a 7:00 curtain.  Small negotiation later, they were mixing on our (your old) pm1d.  Interesting, you may be able to take the console out of the church, but… you know the rest.”

Small world indeed.