Alloway Parish Church is in Ayrshire, just a stone’s throw from Burns’ Cottage. In a situation familiar to many churches, the minister and congregation were keen to use more visual elements in worship, but their Victorian building did not allow for easy projection. Various experiments with portable screens were tried, but proved unsatisfactory, and the congregational board turned to us for help.

Our initial site visit revealed that the only possible place to mount a standard projection screen was from one of the roof beams, some 22ft above the chancel. Whilst the beam provided a solid fixing, the screen would be far too high for the congregation to view comfortably, and mounting a projector would be very difficult.

The solution? A custom built projection screen, with extra blank fabric above the projection surface, thus bringing the image down to a comfortable level.

The screen is 8ft wide, but a massive 18ft long. This is the longest we have ever supplied by far, and we haven’t heard of anything else even approaching this size anywhere else. The screen can come down to almost head level, but can be used at a variety of heights to suit different events. A specific concern was for children sitting in the front pews, and the screen can come right down to their level.

We also supplied a 3500 lumen Hitachi projector, which ensures a clear, bright image in any lighting conditions. We used a rear projection system, with a custom-built stand supplied for the projector. This gives the church maximum flexibility, and allows them to use the projector elsewhere as well.

The church already has a fairly comprehensive lighting system, which does a great job of brightening up what could otherwise be a very gloomy space. Immediately after the screen was installed, we noticed that some of the spotlights were spilling onto the screen. Since the church have a programmable controller, it will be easy to set up a scene that omits these lights for times when the screen is in use.

The project took quite a while to complete, partly because of the long lead times to get custom screens built, but also because it was very difficult to find manufacturers who could build one to the specifications required. There was a false start when a screen was delivered with the wrong type of skin, but this gave us a useful opportunity to check screen depths.