Actually the end goal IS to "mix" all of the instruments and people through the system. Once we have IEMs and take the guitar amps off stage that will be the case.
I am completely aware that we have multiple sources for the same sound and that it's creating mud. If I could do anything about it I would. But we don't have enough coverage from the JBLs, and we don't have good IEMs for the guitar players.
Believe it or not, out of every configuration we've attempted, this is the best we've been able to come up with. How it sounds now is the best it's ever sounded in this building.
Hi again Jason, I really wanted to add something in related to the above quote;
First I'll add a bit of background of myself. I went through the exact same thing you are just over a year ago at my last church where I was in charge of tech. This church is a pole type building with tall flat walls, a pitched ceiling and a stage area recessed into the back wall with wicked hard surfaces. To add injury to insult, the person "in charge" of audio when the church was built knew electric but NOT audio.
The stage area had a straight back wall and angles side walls greating a trapezoid, much like a speaker box, more on that later. Now here's the biggest issue, besides hard and untreated surfaces, a short distance to the back wall and the sound booth upstairs in a room with a cutout "window"... The speakers were installed @ 15' up from stage level on the side walls on the stage. They were slightly angled down but, not nough to direct sound to the people AND they completely washed the stage not to mention they were cross firing. Washing the stage with unnecessary sound was one problem however, the larger problem was the crazy comb filtering that was occuring. You could literally walk from one side to the other, parallel to the stage, in the center to rear of the room and every few feet you'd go from a muddy null point to a wicked hot spot back to a null etc...
I noticed the issue early on and slowly tried to bring it up but, it's a small country church that did the things they did because thats they way they always did them and didn't want to hurt the persons feelings that installed the speakers. Finally a few complaints were made regarding the hearing issues and I had my in or so I thought. I suggested re-deploying the speakers we had, after I had researched and researched, and determined I could actually get them to work pretty well in new locations. The person who installed the system was dead set on new speakers and that's what we did. It's a bit better BUT, with the cost of a bit of supplies for rigging and running cables and a lift, we could've been just as good as we were with spending $3000 on a new system. It's weird how similar our situations are/were...
Don't get me wrong, new speakers helped BUT, I deployed them where they would work. I'm convinced we could've reached nearly the same level of upgrade with a move of the previous speakers...
The above was just really to relate I know what you're going through as I lived it just over a year ago and I'm making my recommendations based on what I learned.
So the two points I'm going to try to make are:
1. Regarding your above comment, I mentioned the stage area of my past church was much like that of a speaker cabinet. Where that's relevant is even with IEM's you're still going to have a ton of stage volume being "pushed" off the stage into the seats due to the very nature of your stage area..It's a open sided box with hard surfaces and a tall ceiling, much like that of a speaker enclosure. Even with IEM's and moving the amps off stage along with the wedges you still have acoustic instruments do deal with in the drums, even though you have a shield, and acoustic guitar bodies and human voices... It appears as if your drum location is pretty close to a corner and near the back walls and unless the drum shield is a 360 degree enclosure with acoustic treatment you're going to be getting a bit of acoustic drum sound just from the stage.. There are a few things that can be done to actually let the drum kit help you but that's for a different post..
Not to mention you have the baptismal in the rear of the stage just above your sub...
I do believe that IEM's will help a bit but I am hoping you don't think they'll be the end all fix all solution. As Dick said, start with the vocals and get them mixed in and sounding good, then and only then add in what you can't hear coming off the stage. Your mix will be cleaner, honest...
2. More than speaker sound or quality, deployment of the speakers is the most critical part of the solution. It's pretty easy to get a Nexo or Meyer (insert your brand here) rig sounding like poop just by placing the speakers in the wrong locations. Likewise, it's not too difficult to get a cheap pair of $99 Kustoms, ok well maybe not those but you get my drift, sounding ok with proper placement and tuning..
I know you get the deployment thing as evidenced by your trying them in different locations and with or without the center speakers but I also think you may be having some issues with stage volume as well which is biasing your judgement of the location of the JBL's.
here are my questions/solutions...
1. Do you have a proper eq system on the JBL's? I've not used thos boxes but I've heard a lot of good things about them so I'm wondering if they aren't eq'd and dialed in. Again, you MUST take into account what's being pushed off stage and not into the PA as well...
2. Get a ladder or lift and get up to the flown centers and check them out. Maybe they're mis wired causing a phase issue or maybe somethings come un-wired... Maybe something is blown but I'd bet they can be fixed pretty easily. Could be an easy solution to your issue and you may not even need the JBL's afterward..
3. If they gave you a $3000 budget, research integrators in the area to see what it would actually cost to have them come in and measure out the room. Present it to the board in a way that they can understand that proper proir planning is prudent. Having a professional come in to analyze the system may help them acheive their goals AND save them $$$$.
We've wanted to put the whole band on IEMs for years but we just haven't been able to afford it yet. We'll see what happens next week when me and the decision maker go down to the local pro audio shop and try some stuff out.
Jason, I mean NO disrespect but that's going about it backwards. Trying things out without truly knowing what you need is kind of like talking to builder to build you a house before you had an architect design what you want/need. A sniper doesn't shoot then dial in his scope, he assesses, dials in, aims then shoots. 1 shot 1 kill, so to speak...
It seems I missed a whole page of responses here before I posted my $.02 but I want to add this.. I'd guess you're feeling pretty deflated now and maybe a bit ganged up on BUT, I can honestly only speak for myself as I've never met anyone posting here, I'm only trying to help you now and in the long run. Nothing is more irritating, to me, than when I see an Issue and it can be corrected gbut the person in charge doesn't see it or care about it or understand the need to fix it right, been there done that got the migrain from it, lol... I'm only guessing that's how you feel with your situation at church.
I do also understand when we're bleeding we need to put a bandage on the wound BUT, sometimes more is necessary and without seeking professional help, we won't know. If you have a cut and it's bleeding, put a bandage on it. If it doesn't stop the bleeding, go to the doctor to be sure the cut was addressed properly and will heal correctly otherwise you'll have issues with the same very woud later down the road. That's kind of a losse parallel to the point I'm trying to make. Believe me, even in my own company, I've hard to learn fix it right or don't fix it at all.
Spending $$ on good sound is applaudable, however it's best to do so with a distinct plan to acheive the desired results.
Ok, I've rambled on enough and my dog needs to go out but I'll part with this; A number of years ago I went to a sound training seminar with Kent Morris, from Cornerstone Media based in Atlanta. I didn't know he would be speaking about sound in church but as he opened up his session he said this: "
there's only one thing more important than God's word in church". At that point I thought I was going to get the secret to life or the most profound secret in all of history and I did get the latter, he followed it up with this, "
hearing God's word" It was a silly little statement BUT as it sank in and he expounded on his word, it hit me like a ton of bricks, what we do as church tech stewards is very, very, very important but most don't know that.. He talked about how sound is typically the last thing on the line item budget for most churches and it's nearly always an afterthought however, without it/us, what good would be the best sermon ever?
Hope any of my ramblings has helped.