Why a home theater?

Why not. One of the rooms in the basement was 10 feet wide and 22 feet long with no windows. I had originally thought it would be a good workshop space, but since we moved into the house almost 4 years ago I've used our garage as a workshop. I like being able to open the double-wide garage door and work on a project without being in a dark hole in the basement. This way I can watch the kids, and most of my projects are for the gardens, so working in the garage just made sense.

Then one day an idea hit me. "That space down stairs would make for a great home theater." I knew nothing about home theaters so I did a little research to find out if it would be realistic. What I found was affordable projection systems that put out great film-like images. These monstrous CRT projectors (mine is 150 lbs) are being tossed out of boardrooms and hotels across the country and being replaced by briefcase-sized LCD projectors. My Sony 1272q projector that sold for $22,000 six years ago was bought for $1,500. The kicker is that the output of the old CRT projectors is far superior to high-end LCD projectors, which cost several times more than what I paid for my unit.

So, why a home theater? I like movies. I don't like crowds and sitting in uncomfortable movie seats for two hours. I like to have a quesadilla and a rum and coke with a movie. In a good year we might see three movies at a theater, otherwise we just rent movies and watch them on 'microvision.'

I'd like to say I'm doing it for the kids, but I'm not. Their TV time is pretty much limited to Saturday morning cartoons and the occasional Star Trek (TNG or Enterprise). Nope, this is dad's room. Of course it's a family project and weekend movies (no TV allowed on school days) and Gator football games will be part of the fare.

So the theater concept locked in after reading about home theaters and visiting a couple home-theater websites. There seemed to be two types of home theaters, multi-purpose 'media rooms' and dedicated theaters. We're fortunate to have a huge house, and most of our rooms tend to be mult-purpose anyway, so the thought of having our own "theater" seemed pretty cool. Thus I wanted to design it as such, with movie posters, curtains and theater seating (well, recliners at least).

Bigger IS better

After setting up the projector in my office to act as a temporary theater, I was disappointed.

Disappointed that I spent FORTY YEARS ON THIS PLANET watching tiny little TVs.

The image is incredible. While DVD's look, great, even regular broadcast TV looks good. In addition to the projector, I also have a DVDO line doubler to improve the projected resolution. I set up the projector in the same way (but not ceiling mounted) in my office so I could work off real-world sizes for the distance from the screen (for the projector ceiling hole) and for the final screen size.

The image is 120", and the screen for 4:3 projecting (NTSC, normal TV dimension) is 8 feet wide and 5 feet tall. I can also watch widescreen movies and HDTV, and when I do the upper and lower portions of the screen aren't used. Did I mention that the screen size is 120 inches? At the moment I have a S-VHS VCR, a DVD player and a Video/Audio controller receiver that switches the signals and is the audio amplifier. All components are JVC.

The budget

One thing I found when researching theaters, is some of these people that put them in are insane. They'll spend $30,000 on a projector, build a new wing for $100,000 and put in $40,000 couches (I'm not making this up). Fortunately there are also a lot of DIYers who work on a tight budget, so I picked up a lot of pointers from them.

There's no separate budget for the theater, but the basement project breaks down like this (numbers are real, not estimated)

Lumber $500

Drywall $500

Electrical $600

Molding $300

Paint $200

A/C Heating ducts, registers and misc. $250

Permit $150

Tools not on hand $100

Carpet $2000 (we got a good deal)

Tile $200

So the basement project is running at about $5,000.

 

So in Mid January the process began...

click on the image for a larger view

After playing around with a handful of different concepts and running them by people who know what they're talking about, I've settled, in general, on the concept above. The biggest change is the projector. Instead of putting an LCD projector with a long throw in the back of the theater, I've been seduced by the forces that believe that CRT front projectors are by far the best way to go for my budget. Given that, I've settled on a Sony 1272q with a DVDO v.2 line doubler. The Sony has only 800 hours on it and will be purchased locally. The projector will be ceiling mounted in the center of the theater with the cables running aft to the "AV Gear" rack in the back of the theater.

The first challenge was figuring out what to do with my odd 'nook' space in the back. Beginning 4 feet off the ground, it goes back 8 feet and is 11 feet wide. My initial plans to use the area as a rear-projection zone didn't pan out, so I turned it into a storage space for seasonal decorations.

I'll document construction with two perspectives, the screen view where I'm standing in the back of the theater looking at the screen area, and the seating view, where I'm standing at the screen and looking at the seating area.

I've also included the time frame in the lower right of each sequence to keep track of how long the project takes. I usually get in an hour or two of work at night, and on the weekends if we're not busy with something else I try to get in about 4 or 5 hours. So far everything done is single-handed. Keep in mind, two other rooms are being built at the same time.

Wall color concepts