L-Acoustics powered a recent upgrade to Wave Church’s sound system. The project was powered by L-Acoustics’ L-ISA immersive configuration built on L Series loudspeakers.

The multi-site church’s Virginia Beach headquarters is an 80,000-square-foot center built around a 2,500-seat worship auditorium. L-Acoustics said that the church wanted production sound to match its ambition.

The company said that the sanctuary itself was an obstacle, as the room is a 180-degree space wide across the seating and low in trim height, and the church’s previous mono system left dead spots and uneven coverage.

“One of the big issues we’ve long struggled with is achieving a stereo image in a room with a wide layout and low trim height,” said Wave Church production director Steve “Tig” Tignor.

Wave Church also turned to HouseRight, a house-worship AVL specialist, to help with the upgrades. L-Acoustics implemented its L2D array in an effort to deliver output and clarity necessary without the bulk that had caused the sightline problems.

“The production style at Wave Church is highly dynamic and creative,” said Tony Alany, HouseRight’s church relations contact. “In my early conversations with Tig and the team at Wave, balancing that style with satisfying all of the challenges of trim height, volume targets, and coverage were never quite possible with any of the available products at the time—until the release of the L Series. When I saw its reveal event, I knew it was the key to what Wave was looking for. Within three days, I had arranged a trip up to NYC to see the product in person, and there was no turning back. Once they had settled on L2D, L-ISA was clearly the next conversation, which gave them a much wider palette to work with.”

The installation centers on a Scene system of five L-Acoustics L2D arrays. An Extension system adds four arrays of three A10i Focus over one A10 Wide, two on each side of the main Scene hangs, while out-fills comprise four A15i Focus over one A15i Wide behind the far left and right Scene arrays. The company said that low end comes from nine KS28 subs flown centrally in three cardioid-configured hangs behind the middle Scene array. Out in the house, 12 X12 serve as delays for the upper stadium seating areas, with eight more X12 spread out across the stage lip as spatialized front-fills. L-Acoustics LA7.16i amplified controllers drive the Scene and Extension arrays, out-fills and delays, while LA12X drive the subs and front-fills and an L-ISA Processor II handles the auditorium’s object-based mix.

L-Acoustics said the room’s wide geometry shaped how the system was configured, and the priority was to keep every listener inside the L-ISA zone. HouseRight used L-ISA to match the front-fills at the front of the room with the rear arc of X12 as imaging delays to carry spatial placement all the way through the back row of seating.

“L2D gave us the power and impact we needed in a much smaller form factor, which resolved our line-of-sight issues,” Tignor said. “Going from mono with dead spots to true spatial for most of the room was a night-and-day difference. The immersive sound is wonderful, but that panoramic image is probably my favorite thing about the system.”