The BEST home theater in AVS - Page 4

Well put!

I think CCOOL should host an AVS meet!

BTW, the colors look great in tune with the beach and gulf lifestyle.

Ash has the ultimate theater. It's Dennis Erskine designed AND with top notch gear. Aerial 20t speakers, Theta Citadel amps, Theta Casablanca III, etc. Not to knock the other guys but his is the best combination of design,aesthetics, and top notch gear that I have seen.

Ash's theater is art.

If one is faithful to his spouse, that person can truly say I can look at the rest and they sure look purty, but the only one that gives me any satisfaction is mine.

Bulldogger/Jeff,
Thanks for your kind comments… I have been accused of having a gold brocaded pretentious theater…
I did spend a lot of money on this theater and continue to do so but I did not inherit any trust fund have gotten here through hard work and sincerity.
But my vision in this theater, which Dennis converted to reality, was to have the magic of an old time movie theater with the best equipment and acoustics. We had the opportunity to build the room from scratch and were fortunate to get a good ceiling height at 12 feet at its peak. Most materials used in the room are non reflective including the gold and the blues, you cannot see your hand in front of your face when the lights are turned off.
You don’t have to be in a bat cave to get the ultimate movie experience; my theater can prove that you can have the best of both worlds.
I fully agree with Dennis that the room is the most important element in a theater, if the room is good even mediocre equipment will sound good. You can always add equipment as you go along.
Another extremely important aspect of the cinema is calibration, audio was down by Jim Harbor who in my humble opinion is the best out there video was done by Jeff Meir. Every time I change major video or audio source I get a new calibration done.
The equipment has gone through a lot of changes with the recent addition, this week of Crestron ADMS and Blu Ray Changer.
Here is the latest list:

Projector Sim2 Lumis Host
12 Foot Wide 2:35 Stewart Cinecurve Microperf 1.3 Gain with masking system.
ISCO 3 With Cineslide
3 Aerial 20T’s Version 2 Front Left Center
3 Theta Casablanca Citadel 1.5 Mono Amps
Triad Platinum 6 Total (4 Sides Two On Back)
Theta Dreadnaught 6 Channel
Aerial SW 12 Subs 2 Front left and right
Triad In Wall Subs Two One on side one on Back
Theta Casablanca CB3 with 3 Extreme DACS (soon to be HDMI 1.4 ???)
QSC For Bass Management
Crestron AV2 with TPS 6xi Panel For Remote Control
Crestron ADMS Media Server
Crestron 200 Disc Blu Ray Changer
Denon 3800 Blu Ray Player
DIRECTV HR 21 Pro DVR
Logitech Transporter FLAC Music Player
ADA Sirius Player
Toshiba HD DVD Player
Netgear 4TB NAS for FLAC Files
Lutron Light And Temperature Control
Richard Grey Powerhouse
PS Audio Power Play 9000
PS Audio Power Play Backup

Still looking for perfection and the thanks once again to you all.
Ash

Granted it's not for everyone but wow. Batman would be proud.

http://www.avsforum.com/t/1423499/check-out-this-2-million-dark-knight-home-theater
Edited by ThemBones - 10/4/12 at 9:34am

I don't know about the best, but I think the biggest is Achase's 105 seat theater. Clarence did a write up on it over on Curt's site.
http://www.curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6521&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=achase&&start=460

My ideal home cinema offers perfect image and sound. The rest is irrelevant. Ok, a comfy seat is needed as well. Absolutely not my thing are multi functional or 'theme' home cinemas or any other kind of dressing up the room for looking 'nice' when the film is NOT playing. My ideal room is the room that does not exist when the film is playing. Think of an image floating in completely black space and sound coming from nowhere. Don't know if it's fully achievable these days. For starters the projector needs near zero photon emission black and the walls etc. space age materials with 99.999% light absorption.

Understandable ! I like something between that room and your ideal. Of course, you're right, your ideal would be no compromises with lights off but would be the opposite of that Batman room where it would probably stink to high heaven in the lights off contest.

Art

I could live with a room with current state of the art equipment provided there was a steady stream of new movies on par with the likes of The Third Man, 2001, Solaris (1972), Blade Runner, The Birds and Rear Window released each month to watch in it...

I could not agree with you more hence the design and simplicity of my theatre...I would not say that it is one of the best here but I like it...there are a number of "build" and "final" photos that can be seen here http://www.avsforum.com/t/1235898/new-theater-build-pictorial-essay-what-do-you-think

That goes in the right direction.
My favourite is Mark H's "black hole" which is close to what can be done these days. My own isn't bad either, but with black velvet light absorption is still not nearly good enough for what I aim for. Someone please put adhesive super black material on the market, and super black carpets.

I know there are theaters out there better than mine but, thanks to all the input here, I am very pleased with my own dedicated room - sound and video on my Lumis.

That said, Art's theater? Wow!

This theater may not be the final word in aethetics (unless you are into black minimalist design), but in terms of sound and video quality it is probably pretty close to the state of the art.

http://www.madronadigital.com/Showroom/HomeTheater.html

Hi All, I am rolling the dice again...Albiorix: 5,726 miles away.

You have a very nice theatre room Jeff. What I'll give to build again.

http://www.protostar.biz/flock.htm

I found that a few years ago when I was looking to do the same for my room. They sell it as light trap material in telescopes. It's available in full bulk rolls with adhesive backing. I remember it being pricy, but not insane. I think one or two people on the forum tried it and had problems with the adhesive after a while. They also sell it without the adhesive backing. Lockheed used to sell a super black paint, although I think it was the "blackness" in the IR spectrum that made it special. It was still ultra black for visible spectrum as well. It was commercially available, but I have not seen it available in a long time. It's one of those mystery materials like fluorinert or opium... everyone has heard of it but no one knows how to get it.

CINERAMAX I hope the pool doesn't suffer any leaks over that state of the art home theater....

Hehe, Let's pray not.

With 30 years in construction I was thinking the same thing!

+1.

It gets worse when you know what is above....

There is absolutely a level that some of you reach on your theaters that just puts the rest of us in awe. Amazing theaters, all of you!

In addition to all of the theaters mentioned in this thread, I'd like to mention Mcascio's "Cinemar" theater as well. I followed his thread in the past year and was very impressed with his work and results.
http://www.avsforum.com/t/1208912/the-cinemar-home-theater-construction-thread

That is a beauty. Love the colour combo and styling.

Wow they look awesome.

I enter with trepidation into a thread discussing the best Home Theaters, as there are some formidable beasts in these parts....

That is close to my ideal as well. And I was stuck with only a main-floor living room to use. But given the compromises, I feel I've come as close to this ideal as I could (given budget). By day the room is extremely inviting, comfortable and even bright with the sun coming in. But for watching movies I can quickly transform it into essentially a "bat cave." My screen wall is surrounded by black velvet (with automated black velvet masking for various aspect ratios). All speakers are covered in black velvet so the are completely invisible during movies. I have black velvet curtains that draw quickly around the entire room. Black velvet that throws on to the area beneath the screen. And a dark brown felt ceiling (room has dark brown material furniture, very non-reflective). It is ridiculously dark under these circumstances. The projected image floats in complete pitch blackness. You can't see the floor or the side walls or around the image even if you try. It's amazing how much this increases the viewing experience. The last detail in this project is that I can still just faintly see the brown velvet ceiling which isn't as pitch black as the black velvet. So I've come up with a way to do the visible portion of the ceiling in black velvet for watching movies (to be constructed soon). Then it will truly be pitch black on every surface. Right now it takes me about 30 to 40 seconds to transform the room from "normal" and sunny looking, to bat-cave. Details in the links below my name if interested.

Rich, your theater is a good example of what one can do to turn an existing room into a home theater. That looks great !!

Well thank yee Craig!

+1



Rich,

As soon as I first saw your space, I copied the pic and showed my wife. It's my fave of living space HT, .....no question.

I do believe I've shared this with you before, however it's certainly worth another shout out.