Vistonics User Interface Eases Transition For Volunteer Technicians During Services
Demonstrating the ease of use and reliable performance of the Studer Vista 5 digital live console, the Immanuel Bible Church in Springfield, Virginia recently purchased a 42 fader Vista 5. The console, which has been installed at front-of-house in the 1,100-seat auditorium, was selected for its input and output capacity, its simplicity of use by novice operators, and its flexibility, allowing simultaneous control of the main house system and monitors as a truly 2-man console.
Services at Immanuel Bible Church range from the very simple, involving a dozen inputs, to large events such as Easter pageants, where 120 inputs are not unusual. Since many of the services rely on volunteers to mix the audio, operation had to be intuitive.
Tim Heacock, the church’s Director of Audio, Visual and Lighting, comments, “We’ve been able to effortlessly train volunteers to use the console due to its ease of use and Vistonics interface. During our Easter program, one operator was able to easily mix 79-channels of audio to the mains, 8 stage monitors and 2 “pit� feeds to the choir, as well as numerous additional outputs for other important tasks.“
The Vistonics user interface provides access to a complete set of functions displayed next to each rotary dial across all channels. All necessary parameters, including EQ, gain, Aux sends or routing, can be displayed with easy to read icons in a logical manner. Levels are displayed on the interface as a bar graph, time settings as circles, frequencies as frequency graphs, etc., allowing easy recognition of the function in its current state. Additionally, functions are represented by different colors to easily identify them at a quick glance.
While the functionality of the Vista 5 is very easy to learn, it cannot train volunteers on how to listen and mix properly. As these larger programs continue to grow, the church would like to purchase a secondary Vista 5 console for live recording mixes and studio mixes.
The positive training experience for the volunteers became evident because of the expanded 42-fader version of the console that was purchased over the standard 32-fader version. “With the addition of 10 extra input faders, one of the experienced staffers can act as a safety net for our volunteers,� said Heacock. “We can stand at one end of the console and have full access to all of the channels, so if the volunteer is slow on executing a cue, we’re right there to jump in as necessary but don’t have to knock them out of the way to do it.�
Heacock noted, “As we’ve become more and more familiar with some of the advanced functions of the Vista 5, our jobs have become easier and easier. We’ve learned how to set cues making it essentially a 1-button operation for our volunteers. The isolation feature has saved us quite a bit of time when our mixes have changed. Rather than go through each cue and change a level 5 db on one or two channels, we change it once and propagate it through the rest of the cues.�
Now, says Heacock, during one of our recent programs where there were ten showings, it has become simple to replace a singer’s levels when necessary. “We’ve set all of our levels for the entire show but obviously, each volunteer soloist can’t perform at every show. Due to the Vista 5’s flexibility, we’ve been able to set independent levels for each soloist; save that ‘profile’ as a file and simply recall it as necessary, adding it to a preexisting mix.�
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