I have been viewing this website for a little while now and have decided I want to include a theater in a new construction home we are wanting to do. So being a newbie I have 3 questions:

1. For those who have tried, do you think someone who has never did a theater before, can do it?

2. What programs or you using to design your theaters? ( I was thinking about buying Turbocad 8.0 because of the price, but give your suggestions on what should I use.)

3. What is the perfect size for a dedicated theater? (I was thinking 25ft L x 15-16 ft W, but please give suggestions.)

I'm looking forward to hearing from you and learning as much as I can. Thanks AVS Forum Members.

Madehumble, my advice is to go to a few home theater meets. Seeing other rooms in a finished state will give you lots of ideas.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?s=&daysprune=&f=61
Spend lots of time here in the builder forums when ever you have a spare moment.
Look at other members theaters on this site.
Decide how serious you want to get with your build. Do you want a dedicated room? Perhaps a media type room?? My advice is a dedicated room simply for the privacy you will get by not having to worry if you have the sound to loud, bothering others in the house. Or perhaps other activities are bothering your movie experience.
Check out these threads.
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=855958
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=549924
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=255432


Craig

Thanks suffolk112000, I will look into these asap. I am serious but I know it will take time to get my design down for my dedicated theater. Thanks again.

1. For those who have tried, do you think someone who has never did a theater before, can do it?

2. What programs or you using to design your theaters? ( I was thinking about buying Turbocad 8.0 because of the price, but give your suggestions on what should I use.)

3. What is the perfect size for a dedicated theater? (I was thinking 25ft L x 15-16 ft W, but please give suggestions.)




1. Absolutely. Many of the people that made theaters in this forum did it on their first try. It might not have been the absolute perfect theater, but I'm sure 99 percent of them don't regret their decision to do it.

2. I have no idea. I didn't use any programs at all with mine. Just looked at other peoples build threads, and tried to emulate what other people were doing.

3. 25 feet long is a pretty good length. As for the width, it depends on how many chairs you want in your rows. If you are fine with 3 chairs, then 15, 16ft wide will work okay, but if you want 4 chairs, I think you'll want a wider room. You don't want the people on the outside sitting super close to the side wall with the side surrounds. Another big consideration to think about is the height of the ceiling. If at all possible, see if there is anyway that the room you are going to make into a theater can have 9 foot ceilings, or even 9 1/2 feet ceilings. Alot of people have 7ft and 8ft ceilings, and most of us would kill to have an extra foot. (this has alot to do with how high your screen will be off the ground and projector placement issues)


The best advice is to read tons and tons of build threads. Find the ones that have like 10 or more pages of postings, and read them from beginning to end, and read as many of them as you possibly can. You will get so much valuable information from them. Alot of people talk about how they spent 6 months or a year just reading posts before starting their theater, and in retrospect, I wish I had done the same. Instead, I started building my theater, and then started to read build posts. Definitley not the way to do it. I'm about 70 percent done on my theater, but have already realized that I've made alot of mistakes. Still, I know when my theater is done, I'm going to love it. I'm sure at some point I'll decide to re-do it, and make it that much better, but if you can read a ton of build threads, and take your time and plan things out, things will go much better for you in the long run. Whatever you do, don't think that this is something beyond your abilities. Anybody can do this. It just takes patience, time and hard work. And wheelbarrels of money, lol!

1. Absolutely. As Anthony was saying, quite a few of the beautiful DIY projects in the forum are by HT first-timers. That said, it helps if you have some kind of experience in one or more of the necessary trades - whether it's carpentry, framing, electrical, AV hobbyist knowledge, acoustics, interior design or whatever - because it gives you a bit of solid ground to stand on and build out from. But again, there's nothing there that you can't learn from AVSers as you go along. Many of the big threads (I like to call 'em the heavy hitters :D) are so detailed that they're basically step-by-step instructions on how to do this - pick one or two that especially appeal to you, learn from their successes and mistakes, and alter from there to suit your taste and space.

2. It really, really doesn't matter what you use. Whatever you feel comfortable exploring in or whatever you have lying around or is free - it really doesn't make much sense to spend $ on this if you don't have to. Some engineering types do use CAD software from TurboCAD to full-blown Autodesk installations. Pro 3D visualizers use whatever they typically work in. Amateur 3D enthusiasts like Google Sketchup. People with Office Pro lying around at home or work use Visio. As a digital designer I've used literally all of the above, plus Illustrator, Photoshop and pen-on-napkin. The most important thing is not the software or resulting render, but that the process helps you sort out -in your head- what it is you want to do, how to achieve it, and that it communicates to others what -they- need to do if you are hiring out certain portions.

3. It depends on how you want to use it, how much space you have, and how many people you expect in there typically and maximally. There are a few guidelines for improved acoustics such as no equal dimensions, but really, you need to sort out the first three things first. As the owner of a tiny city house, I've got about 8' by 15' to work with - and hey, it's perfect - for me. :D

You certainly CAN do it yourself. Just keep in mind that it will probably take you three times longer than you think. IF you're lucky. If not, it will take 5 or 6 times as long. I KNOW from experience.

And maybe BigMouthInDC will add his two cents on this too! But looking at his thread (and having seen it in person), it is well worth the wait.

It does help to have SOME skills, but I think the desire and the patience to do it are more important. So far, I've found there's really no secret to it, but there ARE best practices. And don't be surprised that by the time you get comfortable with any one skill (framming, electric, plumbing, drywalling, etc), you will be ready to move on to the next.

Reading and asking as much as you can here will get you really far along the way.

Good luck!
Tom (over 2 years and still pulling electric!)

Be afraid, be very afraid (mostly kidding):

#2) Many people use sketchup (free, google it, and DO THE TUTORIALS) and visio (some have through work with MS Office, or can be gotten cheaply on ebay) for models and floor plans respectively.

Here are my half-assed attempts at each, some people really go all out:

Sketchup:
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u129/dc_pilgrim/ht_r2.jpg
Visio
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u129/dc_pilgrim/Drawing6.jpg

Another CAD option: google A9CAD. It's free and has pretty good functionality.

The best advice is to read all the applicable sections of the forums here till your eyeballs feel like they will fall out.
there are a lot of things to consider besides the dimensions of the room. there is sound isolation, and acoustic treatment which is different, there is the aspect ratio of the screen you will use, Do you want to go with a Contant Image Height and a "Scope" screen, or go with a 16:9. Do you want the sound to come from the screen? in which case you need a good AT =acoustically transparent screen. What kind of seating do you want, Real theater seats? recliners? couches? how many rows are you doing and how high do your risers need to be have to be in relation to your screen size and position? Do you have the headroom for that? the projector, does it have the throw range you need do you need horizontal or vertical offset and if so does the projector you are considering provide it, Is it bright enough.
what about lighting? do you want everything to be controlled remotely? the list goes on and on and it pays to know as much as you can and answer as many of these questions as you can before you get too far in your design and before you do any construction or purchasing.
The time spent learning as much as you can is time well spent.

I second McCall!

Read, read, read on this forum - there is a lot of knowledge that helped us all out at one time or another. Good luck!

You guys are the best, I not only think I have found a great forum, but a forum of great minds. Thank you for your replies and I will use all advice given. Thanks again.

Yep, anyone can do it. I've built two now and didn't use any programs. I did a LOT of reading on AVS. As far as your dimensions, you should be able to build a nice HT. By all means stay away from a square room. My best piece of advice is to read here for a while and look at lots of build threads. I have lots of neighbors who have dedicated HTs. Some are quite nice and have a lot of wood and trim detail. However, I don't know of any that have any significant acoustic treatment. It seems like a lot of extra expense and labor to do, but it makes a HUGE difference in the overall movie experience. I'd say the most important thing you can do to improve a room is to add acoustic treatment. There is a prettly long acoustic treatment thread here on AVS.

Thanks jeff great advice.

Its like going to school and hitting the books and the final test will be the Home Theater room you design and build. If I can do it you can also. Pick the amount you want to spend and apply your lessons. They say Money and Imagiantion you can do anything. The Money may run short but the Imagantion forever lives here. Good luck to you, there are people here that help you and they don't have a clue how much. All these Home Theater rooms work on the money and Imagantion theory.

McCall's post was an excellent primer on many of the basics that you have to decide on. You'll find that many parameters are dependent on another, so you gave to calculate them all before you spend a dime. For example: where the seats are located depends on room size, projector throw distance, how much legroom between rows, is there going to be room behind the last room, etc.

To start, you have to decide what type of room you want. Dedicated (movies/music only) rooms generally fall into two types: those who want front speakers and equipment hidden and those who don't. The former is by far more popular and the latter is generally preferred by audiophiles. In either case, a decision needs to be made as to where the screen is going to be relative to the front wall (I'm assuming FP). Most owners build a false wall a couple feet into the room, so their front speakers are not schmucked against the front wall. That is going to determine seating distance, riser height, PJ throw, surround locations.....and on and on.

"You can do it!!"
- Rob Schneider in The Waterboy.