
BlackTrax has vital role in Trinity Fellowship Church's presentation of Who Is This Jesus?' 23 December 2014
News
One year on, BlackTrax enables technology for live production & broadcast
Over a year ago, Trinity Fellowship Church (TFC) mega-church ministry based in Amarillo, TX first installed the BlackTrax realtime motion tracking solution from CAST BlackTrax Ltd. As part of the festive season, TFC is presenting an illustrated three-week sermon series called Who Is This Jesus?.
BlackTrax is part of TFC's lighting, sound and video system for its 3,800-seat auditorium set up as a theatre in the round.
Motion tracking One year on
BlackTrax realtime motion tracking solution was installed in August 2013 and has consistently been used a number of times each week ever since.
It definitely solved a lot of problems for me over the year weve been using it. As soon as BlackTrax was installed and I was able to control the iris and beam to a specific width no matter where the light tracked. The options of what we could accomplish suddenly became seemingly endless in terms of creating and maintaining the environments I had always envisioned, added Kevin Penrod, Lighting Designer at TFC.
The biggest challenge BlackTrax has helped me overcome is the sheer reliability that it is going to work with an incredible amount of smoothness during our services -- to the extent that it can practically go unnoticed if I want it to!
Thanks to the BTBeacon's' signal transmission, I can pick up my talent when they are off the stage before they step on the stage which is a huge confidence builder! The ability to track off the stage gives me more options creatively. On the average weekend it lets me light the talent sooner whichgives my camera team time to make adjustments before the talent shot needs to be taken, and a much cleaner transition.
BlackTrax has given us such a high success rate that I cant imagine going back to using another system or trying to light an in the round spacewithout it and still achieve the right lighting. Now there is always the choice of follow spot operators, but they come with a high insurance risk, take a lot of work to find when you need them as volunteers especially, and even the best follow spot op misses his mark from time to time, concluded Pernod.
Who Is This Jesus? sermon series
On the main stage, in the midst of services, worshippers are taken on a journey, travelling back to the time of Jesus. The sermon series run from three-weekends beginning on December 6th and 7th and into the next two consecutive weekends with services on Saturday nights at 5:30pm, and Sundays at 11:00am.
The sermon series is performed in the auditorium and recorded live with 10 HD cameras. The expected live viewing attendance per weekend is at 6,500people with another 1,500 people watching it back via video in TFC's eight campus locations in Texas and Oklahoma.
Enter BlackTrax
For Who Is This Jesus?, TFC actively tracked multiple worship leaders, two speaking pastors, and seven characters on stage each weekend over the three weeks.
BlackTrax tracks the talent and delivers the precise target data from the lighting control board to 82 automated lights including: 24 Coemar I-spots; 12 Martin Mac 101s; 12 High X-spot Xtremes; 26 Martin Mac 2000 Profiles; and, 8 Martin Mac 2000 Washes (Very Narrow Lenses).
BlackTrax is the only tool that allows me to create an environment on my stage while still being able to light my talent appropriately, explained Penrod.
Lighting is critical for TFC messaging to its worshippers, not only live in front of audiences but also broadcast over the Internet. BlackTrax works to enhance lighting through automation and presentation building an aura around them and which increases intimacy with each and every member of the congregation either in the immediate audience or remotely.
Without BlackTrax we had to limit the movement of our talent in special productions such as this, or if we didn't go that route the entire stage would be washed out in white and would destroy the overall effect I needed to achieve; this is just one of the many challenges we always faced by building in the round and were overcome by using BlackTrax. No other system performs sowell, added Penrod.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
07/10/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, today announced the latest Long-Term Supported (LTS) release of Dalet Flex. Build...
06/09/2026
June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
21/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/07/2026
Across the TV and streaming ecosystem, industry players face mounting pressure to do more with less. They must simplify operations, protect premium content and ...
21/07/2026
Tuxera, a leading prover of quality-assured file systems and networking technologies, is bringing its latest advances in connectivity performance to the media w...
21/07/2026
COW Jobs: Apple Motion Expert for Custom FCP Rigged Graphics Package
Brie Clayton July 21, 2026
0 Comments
HIRING: Apple Motion Expert for Custom FCP ...
21/07/2026
Cinegy GmbH, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, will use its presence at IBC2026 (stand 7.A01, Amsterdam RAI, 11 14 September) to...
21/07/2026
Calrec will be located in Hall 8, on Stand C47
Beyond bigger
For years, broadcast facilities were built around one assumption: provision for the biggest pro...
21/07/2026
Pebble, the leading automation, content management and integrated channel specialist, will discuss its future-facing developments for the new generation of medi...
21/07/2026
nxtedition returns to IBC2026 with its consolidated production platform, showing how scripting, editing, graphics, AI-assisted tools and automation can work wit...
21/07/2026
C2PA content signing helps broadcasters, public institutions, and publishers give audiences a verifiable record of where their video content came from and how i...
21/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
21/07/2026
New capability centralizes collaboration, feedback, security and status tracking within VIDA, providing a structured, auditable approach to master quality contr...
21/07/2026
Lightcraft Launches Exclusive Spark Story Beta for Filmmakers and Creators at SI...
21/07/2026
Indie Road Movie Where in the Hell Shot with Pocket Cinema Camera 4K
Brie Clayton July 20, 2026
0 Comments
Colorist blends vintage film looks to shape...
21/07/2026
Which USS Defiant Pulse Phaser effect is better?
Graham Quince July 20, 2026
0 Comments
Aargh, ever since @DarkRavenProductions posted a comment ask...
21/07/2026
AI has entered the gigascale era.
The world's most advanced AI factories are bringing together hundreds of thousands of GPUs and CPUs to train frontier mod...
21/07/2026
NVIDIA Vera Rubin is here, and it's going gigascale.
Vera Rubin NVL72 produ...
21/07/2026
160 hours of Irish storytelling for 2026
KIN and The Walsh Sisters return
RT has today unveiled its most ambitious drama slate ever, with a record-breakin...
20/07/2026
The former Northwestern broadcast-operations leader is helping train the next generation of live-sports-production talent across the Big Ten
The sports-product...
20/07/2026
By Lucy Spicer
One of the most exciting things about the Sundance Film Festival is having a front-row seat for the bright future of independent filmmaking. Whi...
20/07/2026
Product range now readily available in the UK
Graph Tech Guitar Labs have just announced the launch of a new UK Online Store that makes it quicker and easie...
20/07/2026
Popular headset gains active noise cancellation
The Maxwell headet was Audeze's first foray into the gaming world, and thanks to its Dolby Atmos compati...
20/07/2026
The NFVF, an agency of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture, has released t...
20/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
20/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
20/07/2026
Starfish Technologies will use IBC2026 to showcase the flexibility of its transport stream processing software, including the latest versions of TS Splicer (Win...
20/07/2026
Bitfocus, the specialist in media control and monitoring, will show at IBC2026 (Elgato stand 8.D31, Amsterdam RAI, 11 14 September) how its Buttons control la...
20/07/2026
Mediagenix, a global leader in smart content solutions to profitably connect the right content to the right audience, today announced new AI capabilities that e...
20/07/2026
Big Blue Marble's Cloud DRM has been nominated in the DRM/Content Protection category of the 2026 Streaming Media Readers' Choice Awards.
Only four pro...
20/07/2026
Monday 20 July 2026
Sky brings free global roaming to millions of loyal custome...
20/07/2026
Red Seat Ventures Announces Introduction of Premium Creator and Podcast Communit...
20/07/2026
FIFA World Cup Final sets new RT Player record as the most-streamed single event in the platform's history
Over 1 million viewers watched live on RT 2 as ...
20/07/2026
At this year's SIGGRAPH conference, running through Thursday, July 23, in Lo...
20/07/2026
Erin Davis calls it the SuperDuperPOD. That's two things in one name: phar...
19/07/2026
Justin Bieber, Madonna, Shakira, BTS make for a diverse lineup, and the venue ad...
19/07/2026
The stage is set: three-time champion Argentina will defend its World Cup title ...
19/07/2026
Channel strip plug-in gets upgraded
Acustica Audio's vintage-inspired channel strip plug-in has just been treated to an update that expands its tonal ra...
18/07/2026
Topics include pre-match ceremonies, live performances, the tournament's fir...
18/07/2026
When FIFA and HBS set out to produce the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the numbers alone ...
18/07/2026
Captures nine sought-after Fender amps
IK Multimedia's latest TONEX expansion captures a selection of nine rare Brown Panel' Fender amps that were ...
18/07/2026
Latest batch ships alongside firmware update
Since being unveiled at Superbooth 2025, Frap Tools' debut polysynth has been met with widespread praise, a...
18/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
18/07/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
17/07/2026
In-venue and creative video staffers at the professional and collegiate level ha...