Showline SL PAR 150 ZOOM Luminaires Add Vibrant Color to Walnut Ridge Baptist Church

	Walnut Ridge Baptist Church with Philips Entertainment's Showline SL PAR 150 Zoom luminaires

At Walnut Ridge Baptist Church in Mansfield, Texas, the congregation holds two distinct worship services. The first is a traditional worship service, but the second is a more contemporary worship environment. Wanting to upgrade their lighting system to better encompass all the aspects of both services, Walnut Ridge turned to Gemini Light Sound and Video to oversee a full lighting renovation. Fully understanding what the church wanted to accomplish, Gemini installed 74 Showline SL PAR 150 ZOOM luminaires from Philips Entertainment.

"Gemini previously worked with Walnut Ridge Baptist Church on another lighting application and for this lighting renovation they were looking to mainly do two things," began Todd Graham, project lead installer. "First, they were looking for something more efficient than their current system which consisted of high-wattage traditional theatrical fixtures. Second, they wanted the ability to better use color in their contemporary services. With their fixtures being 30' in the air it was becoming time-consuming and costly to routinely change gels so we suggested going with an LED-based lighting plot and we decided on using 74 Showline SL PAR 150 Zoom luminaires."

The Showline SL PAR 150 Zoom is a die-cast aluminum LED Par can that utilizes nine high-powered and homogenized 15W RGBW LED's to produce over 3,200 lumens of output. The manual zoom provides a beam angle range from 15- to 70-degrees and the split yoke bracket allows for easy hanging or floor mounting. The rugged construction, internal power supply, and ease of use make the SL PAR 150 Zoom a natural replacement for conventional theatrical PAR fixtures by providing designers with the highest output and best color uniformity.

Graham continued, "We first saw the Showline SL PAR 150 Zoom through our regional sales manager Jeff O'Brien who does a great job of keeping us up-to-date with all the latest product offerings from Philips Entertainment. We really liked the price point plus the controllable beam angle that alleviates hot spots. It allows us to do a nice, even wash whether it be for house or theatrical lighting. The SL PAR 150 Zoom is a very desirable fixture."

With the lighting renovation moving forward, Graham and the Gemini team got to work upgrading the theatrical lighting instruments inside the Walnut Ridge sanctuary. But as the project continued, Graham made a suggestion that took the system to a whole new level of creativity.

"As we got further into the renovation, we began to speaking with them about not only upgrading their theatrical lighting, but also upgrading the house lighting system to really immerse the congregation into the experience and completely capture the long-term savings that is involved with LED fixtures," explained Graham. "Initially there was bit of skepticism but once we were able to show them the technology innovations that have occurred in the theatrical LED market, they fell in love with the idea. The SL PAR 150 Zoom now gives them the house white they desire, plus whenever they want to wash the congregation in color they have almost unlimited options. Both the lumen output and the beam angle make this fixture ideal for this application and they are absolutely thrilled with the performance of the SL PAR 150 Zoom."

Now that the full scope of the project had been realized it was time for the installation of the new fixtures which could not be easier. Simple daisy-chaining of power and data, along with a split yoke bracket, allow for quick setup in any orientation, and convenient configuration is also made possible through the use of the standard Showline LCD menu system.

"For the install, we reused the existing hang points and since the SL PAR 150 Zoom fixtures run on data instead of voltage, we were able to cable them to have individual control of each fixture throughout the entire sanctuary," said Graham. "This was a really great feature to the installation because not only do they have individual control over color, they also have individual control over dimming so that they can really highlight different areas of the house drawing focus to any area when needed."

Additionally, to ensure that color matching inconsistencies are a thing of the past, all Showline luminaires feature the Philips harmonize color calibration technology; a proprietary, advanced LED color matching system that consists of three correction modules to provide consistent color control and intensity as well as output of the highest quality.

Graham concluded, "We have used the SL PAR 150 Zoom on several projects and I think that the color consistency of the fixture is one of its primary advantages. They are very dependable and durable, and their evenly distributed beam angle is tremendous. A lot of churches out there have hot spots, but with the SL PAR 150 Zoom there are no hot spots and it gives a beautiful even wash of color or bright white. Out of 74 fixtures, we had absolutely no 'out of the box' issues. When we got them all up, they worked exactly as they were supposed to and they look great. This is the first job we have done where you can color change the entire sanctuary and it has exceeded all expectations. The colors are extremely vibrant, rich, and consistent between all the SL PAR 150 Zoom luminaires."