Photo: Ken Howard, lead photographer, Metropolitan Opera, New York City, LA Opera, and Atlanta Opera.
Think about it. Traditional image magnification (IMAG) shots displayed on screens on either side of the worship platform don’t tell a story. Not on their own. While the typical IMAG facial closeup shot can certainly help convey the emotion and intensity of the speaker or subject, adding to the information and story that’s being relayed, it really only tells you what the subject looks like and how they’re feeling about what they’re saying.
Today, the spatial dimensions that necessitated IMAG have changed. Historically, IMAG images helped attendees in large venues feel personally connected to the speaker and the message—someone standing on a platform that was potentially many, many feet away, depending on where an attendee was seated in the vast space. But in recent years, the sheer magnitude of the megachurch worship space has waned in favor of smaller, more intimate venues, dubbed multisites and dotted all across urban areas.
“The handcuffs are off for creative people. You can do a lot with a little money. Experiment."
Clay Jacobsen, Director, Southern California
Now imagine this. Instead of removing those twin displays flanking the stage because they’re no longer needed for their original function, what if those screens were used in a new and different way? What if they instead displayed content that reinforces the richer meaning behind what the speaker is saying or the praise and worship team is communicating—telling a parallel story that helps to drive the main message home?
One place to look, listen, and see the possibilities today is in the world of musical theatre, where the new approach is being used in stage performances. On a trajectory similar to churches and worship services during the pandemic, musical theatre has had to find a way to reach people online, in their living rooms, in other states, and in various locales around the world. So perhaps elements of this new digital media content creation will make its way into church.
But on what level? To help uncover the possibilities that may lie ahead for churches, CP asked a live TV director with church-world experience and two world-class live stage performance creatives for their take.
(One important voice we don’t have is yours. Tell us your thoughts in the comments section below, and let us know what you are seeing and creating at your church.)
The merits and drawbacks of pre-produced content
Clay Jacobsen is a freelance television director living in Southern California. He has directed shows such as Entertainment Tonight, The Jerry Lewis Telethon, Jeopardy!, Prime Time Country, and is a Christian novelist. Recently, he authored a piece for LA-based Christian filmmaker Phil Cooke’s website, www.cookemediagroup.com, on IMAG do’s and don’ts for churches. Jacobsen and Cooke are friends who met in their early years as students at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Director Clay Jacobsen at the switcher, Oral Roberts University, Tulsa, OK
This is what Jacobsen notes about the alternative IMAG concept: “It should have legs [in the church world], but the problem is the lead time to produce this type of creative content. Augmenting what’s going on in the sermon takes pre-production planning and so forth.”
He adds, “Using creatively produced content to be displayed on the IMAG screens, which would reinforce the main message the pastor is sharing, might work best in some kind of specialty standpoint”—for instance, in a Christmas or Easter service—“then you could really augment what the pastor is saying.”
For live streaming of a church’s dramatic content, in particular, the addition of pre-produced creative messaging could be seriously engaging for viewers at home—helping to get the Message in front of more eyes.
As Jacobsen notes regarding live streamed content, “If it’s a full-on dramatic piece, the streaming and IMAG would both get the clip, but if the pastor or principals on the stage interacted in some way with or during the piece, then the streaming should incorporate both images through a split screen or shots of the principals and the IMAG screen. Think of how ‘In Memoriam’ pieces in award shows are done, we often go back and forth from the full-frame montage to show set shots with the montage in the screen alongside a live performer.”
Professional content creators weigh in
Pre-produced creative digital media was used in summer 2022’s off-Broadway production of Cabaret by the Atlanta Opera at the city’s historic Pullman Yards, a multipurpose film production and arts space. The venue is similar to today’s church multisites in several ways, the most important being its intimate setting with limited seating. At Pullman Yards, attendees are close enough to the stage that they can clearly see speakers’ and performers’ faces—so at the performance of Cabaret, the screens on each side of the platform were used to display pre-produced content, rather than traditional IMAG. (As an aside, the performance on the stage was captured and live streamed by the Atlanta Opera’s Spotlight Media film team and showcased on the opera company’s over-the-top, or OTT, streaming channel.)
Ken Howard2021
For the production of Cabaret, the pre-produced content consisted of artistic backstory into the characters’ remembrances and deepest feelings. And it served to reinforce the main story playing out onstage.
Nicholas Hussong, a Tony Award-winning theatrical designer for live stage production and the designer for Cabaret at Pullman Yards, describes his approach to the pre-produced visual content like this: “The heart was still the live performance onstage, but the audience got to dig deeper into the emotional space and turn up the emotion just a bit,” he shares. “It was different from other productions because this was not a literal interpretation, but it was meeting the characters in the story and pushing that forward.”
Nicholas Hussong, Live Stage Production Designer
Hussong worked in tight collaboration with the production director, Tomer Zvulun, who is also the Atlanta Opera’s general and artistic director, to create the messaging and get it right.
“Storytelling is my job as a director,” Zvulun states. “I work together with other storytellers in a creative collaboration." In the realm of live theatre production, the elements Zvulun will collaborate on and create with include digital media, projection, music, scenery, costumes, and light.
Regarding creative digital content, specifically, Zvulun notes, “Can it work in other ways (such as church)? Sure. As long as it serves the story and the people responsible for telling the story, and as long as they're discussing the content, in collaboration, and staying on the same page.”
As an example, Zvulun says, "Let's say the message is live, and the speaker is talking about death. You're not going to show a rose onscreen. No. The speaker, the creative team, [everyone] must talk in advance."
“There are people with great cameras doing great work, but there are also people without great cameras doing great work. The psychology and the conversation behind the message are more important than the technology.”
Nicholas Hussong, Live Stage Production Designer
In terms of figuring out what content to create to augment the main message coming from the stage, Zvulun states that the obvious fundamentals are critical: “Align it with the message. How will I tell the story—and what story am I telling?”
Tomer Zvulun, General and Artistic Director, Atlanta Opera, Atlanta, GA; image: Orel Cohen
Hussong concurs, saying this about the pre-produced content he created for Cabaret, “I wanted to support the direction of the performance, and help them have as much success as possible—in a way that was not distracting.”
Once the creative team mapped out the direction of the pre-produced content for its screens on either side of the live performance, Hussong went to work producing the high-definition digital content using Spotlight Media’s Felipe Barral, an Emmy Award-winning producer and director. And even though most other content creators, like those at churches, would not have access to these stratospheric resources and co-collaborators, Hussong says, “A lot of people can pull off the basics with one simple camera and editing on their computer.”
He adds, “We have potent weaponry at our disposal. In the past few years, the technology has moved so fast—so quickly and very cheaply—that people can create effects that were unfathomable before. The problem is, these tools can be used by someone who doesn’t understand the direction (of the message or performance), and they can have the wrong aim.”
Easing into the future
To sum up, although many content creators can pull off pre-produced content to appear on side-stage displays, not everyone can do it in a way that truly reinforces the direction of the live message. Or as Hussong noted previously, they can create distraction rather than deeper engagement, if they’re not careful—and if they’re not collaboratively thoughtful and intentional.
Hussong adds, “How you use the tools is where it’s at. There are people with great cameras doing great work, but there are also people without great cameras doing great work. The psychology and the conversation behind the message are more important than the technology.”
Projection mapping, too, factors into the discussion on creative content that helps to reinforce the main message happening in live performance. On this topic, Zvulun notes, “People have misconceptions that projection can portray something realistic or display scenery. When I use it, it’s to get deeper into the psychology of the performer and the moment, and to add texture. But it’s not to replace what’s onstage or something that is real.”
When it comes to pre-producing content to reinforce live messaging at church—or any type of pre-produced content a church team may undertake—ideas and their execution don’t necessarily have to come at a premium. And church film teams have ready resources at their disposal: YouTube, for instance, live performance in secular venues they visit, and their own peers.
As Jacobsen suggests, “Scour the internet for assets. Look at background images, moving images, and pre-produced theatrical stuff that other churches have done. Find churches that are doing what you’re wanting to do. Visit them. Talk to them. See what they’re doing, and mimic it.”
He closes, “It can be hard working with others and getting volunteers onboard.” Yet, at this point in history, “The handcuffs are off for creative people. You can do a lot with a little money. Experiment. Nothing’s off limits, but keep in mind the ultimate goal: the message the pastor is trying to get across. Add to it, don’t distract.”
