From the Booth: Episode 6 – Night of Worship

Welcome to Episode 6 of “From the Booth.” This recording came from our yearly, one church, Night of Worship, held at our largest campus here in St. Charles. This time I had a bit more time to prepare and do playback throughout the week so I believe I Was able to end up in a more refined state than I usually get to for this concert. Nothing too crazy changed in the setup but we are doing a few original songs sprinkled throughout the set, which made the night a bit special in that way. Enjoy the video and please let me know what you think of the mix either here in the comments, on facebook, or by dropping me an email (daniel@studiostagelive.com).

Here are the particulars for this recording:

1. This video was made from our recording of our Night of Worship. There were a few mistakes in there and some fun situations that I needed to work through (including a few console issues, big thanks to SSL’s quick response after the fact that helped solve the issue) but, things happen. It’s how you respond and work through it that matters. If you have any questions about this, feel free to comment below or email me and I can walk through what happened if you’d like privately. Just one last quick note, I did edit out the speaking during the performance to help shorten the video, if you have any questions about how we mic up speakers, be sure to check a series I wrote on this topic recently (find it at this link).
2. The audio you hear is from the broadcast mix of the FOH console. This mix is built from my master bus with the FX turned down just a bit to help them sit better in a studio environment and that’s it. It’s not a perfect mix for broadcast but it does a good job at translating a mix designed for an auditorium down to a mix suitable for personal viewing.
3. You will see 4 videos in a matrix.  The top left video is my Smaart machine. Within that video, the green is real-time, the orange is a 10 sec average of the real time, the red (if you even see it) is what is coming out of the console (you’ll typically only see if there is an issue with our gear which I don’t believe there was). The SPL number is 1 minute average of the instantaneous readings, which is how we measure the services. The top right is the broadcast video feed. Bottom left is a camera showing what I’m doing, I hope this camera angle is helpful. If a different idea about where that camera could be, just let me know, I’m always open to trying new things. The bottom right  is basically what I see, that camera is looking over my right shoulder. Because the lighting was quite a bit more dynamic the gopro was struggling a bit, I hope you get the idea. This spot is also open for ideas, I toyed with capturing my waves screen but I wasn’t sure how helpful that would actually be. Let me know what you think!
4. Here is the general layout of the SSL L500+ that I’m operating.  Top left bank of faders generally sits on my drum inputs and drum FX feeds and can access my mixed outputs if need be.  The Left bank at my waist (left hand) is used for instruments and tracks and access my main outputs and groups if I need to check on something or make an adjustment.  The bank in front of me (right hand) is almost always on the VOX page of the console which also has my VCAs which allows me to quickly make larger mix changes. Please don’t hesitate to ask questions in the comments if you’d like to know more.
5. There is a Waves SoundGrid running and awhile ago I wrote up a 9 week series outlining my basic template for that system. You can find that here.
6. Song names are listed on the Youtube page and all credit goes to the band for the performance, the song authors, and to God for allowing me to work with such a great team.

If you like what you see and would like to receive an email when new content is released please feel free to subscribe at this link! Also, if you have any questions about what you see, please feel free to reach out to me in an email at daniel@studiostagelive.com and I’ll do my best to answer your question.