Presentation software

[Thorsten.Evans]

Our church is still using a overhead projector and I have been asked to propose a computer based solution. My part of the job just entails PC, projector, DVD player, sound recording/duplication and software/hardware requirements for said installation. A couple of questions people might be able to answer:
I have read where others use EasyWorship and ProPresenter, but what about openlp? Not sure an additional $400 is in the budget for presentation software.
Where is a good place for research and price comparison for projectors? Doing a google search is overwhelming.
What PC hardware considerations should I be aware of? We are a small church and will likely only ever use 1 display screen and possible a feedback screen for the worship team/pastor.

[Stuart]

I'll leave others to talk about the software used. There are open source variants around I've heard of but never used.

However, the things I would urge you to consider carefully is the throw and the lumens.

The throw refers to how close or far back you have to physically site the projector and can make a huge difference to your budget. The lumens is effectively the strength of the projected image - you need a higher number the better.

For oursleves we run two projectors and the church is based in an old & large warehouse / factory with high ceilings, etc ... Anyway, we successfully run the two with 3000lumens - on really bright days it can be difficult to read so when we need to replace I will be pushing for higher again.

As to where - well as I'm in the UK I'd use these folks: http://www.projectorpoint.co.uk/ lots of types, cover the different types of room / uses, advice, etc .... be goo dto start here and then perhaps find a supplier in your locale?

[deric]

In our church is used SongPro (http://creationsoftware.com/aboutsongpro.php), you can try it for free. But the full version is also quite expensive.

[agirton]

We use Propresenter at our church and have for the last 4 years or so. v3 has been very stable and has great features. We are testing the v4 beta now and it has even more great features. If you have any direct questions I would love to answer them. We tried 3 different programs on windows and mac before deciding on PP3.

Andy

[tonygibbs16]

Hi,

We have been using EayWorship since 2007, and it has been very good for us (in an Anglican church with pillars.)
- There is an active community of users for it as well, with an active bulletin board that Softouch also support with answers to queries.

I definitely agree with thinking about brightness (measured in ANSI Lumens) and throw (distance between screen and projector) of the projector that you want.
- We have a 2400 ANSI Lumens projector, and it is just bright enough in winter when the sun is low in the sky.
- We have a Dell 2400XMP projector.

But don't forget about people issues, such as what if not everyone can see the screen, and do you still want to give people the opportunity to still use books.
- We have sightline issues (with pillars) but also we still wanted to give people a choice about using hymnbooks and paper Bibles (we project scripture versus.)
- Unfortunately, some people thought we were going to take these options away, so it is important to say whether you are going to do so or not.

Happy Easter! He is Risen!

Tony