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Community Gets the Message Through at Milton High School
More than a year after its completion, Milton High School's new football stadium finally sounds as good as it looks. Located in the Atlanta suburb of Alpharetta, the stadium sports a high-end turf field and JumboTron screen, but until recently it had been plagued by a poorly designed and underpowered sound system.
"The sound was loud, but pretty much unintelligible," explains Mike Shetler of Atlanta-based VisionQuest Design and Production. "People in the stands couldn't really make out what was being said, but the school was getting plenty of complaints from the neighbours."
In fact, says Shetler, it ended up becoming a safety issue. "The night of their first home football game of 2007, they needed to evacuate the stadium due to a lightning storm, but the sound was so bad the crowd couldn't understand the announcement."
Shetler designed a new system utilizing three Community R2-694Z three-way long-throw loudspeakers to cover the home stands, along with a single R2-52Z unit to cover the visitors' stands. Two R.5-66TZ two-way loudspeakers on either side of the press box provide sound to the stands beside the press box. A Rane RPM-26z processor is used for speaker processing and to create the different zones, and the system is powered by Face F1200TX amplification.
"The Community loudspeakers have made a huge difference," says Shetler. "They've given us the directional control to focus the sound onto the field, and cut down on the neighbours' complaints. They deliver terrific intelligibility, so the announcements come through loud and clear, and great musical performance as well. And the weather-resistant factor was another tremendous plus."
Shetler says principal Ron Tesch and assistant principal Gene Dunn were both immediately impressed with the new system. "It was the shortest demonstration I've ever done; within 20 minutes, the school was sold on the system. Now their audio is finally on a par with the rest of the stadium."
19th March 2008
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