Midnite's DIY Theater Journal.

My Theater will be built as a partial DIY, partial hired help. I am currently in-progress building a new home. I will do my best to keep this initial post up to date with my design/implementation of the room.  I am designing the room in Google Sketchup. I also included something that some may find this useful as well, it is a Google sketch of a "THX Frustum" - put the center in your optimal position, and it will show you where your screen should go, how big it should be, and where you should put your speakers. Note that this was designed per the documentation on the THX site, so it uses the combined rear channel. You can find this in the sketchup model linked below. It is on the "THX Guides" layer.

Screenshots
Below are some screenshots taken from my Sketchup Model v. 2.1.0.







Design Information
This section will detail the design decisions I made for my home theater. I figured it may be helpful to others, and may even draw in some helpful comments before I get to actual implementation.  My current design is changing. I have been trying to come up with a theme for the theater and nothing really is cementing. So, I think I'll just steal from Ruben. His looks great, we'll see what I can do with my budget, which is clearly much less than his. Hopefully I won't be ripping things out quite as often, so maybe that will help. Once my sketchup re-design is done, I will post screenshots and an updated model here.

General Construction
The HT will be built on a concrete slab. The outer room dimensions are 27' x 16' 3". The bottom of the "upper" ceiling (room-in-room construction is planned) will be 11' 6" high.

Vendors:

• Outwater Plastics - Odds and ends plastics manufacturer

Floors

Suggested Vendors:

• Fabricmate (Related post by Sandman) provides GoM (Gilford of Maine)
  
  fabrics
• Masland Carpets

 

Walls
For walls, I decided to go with a double 4" wall separated by a 1.5" air gap. I would have preferred a 2" air gap as is recommended by the Green Glue literature, but for space reasons, that extra inch matters. On the HT side of the inner wall I will place a 1/2" layer of Oriented Strand Board (OSB), Green Glue (GG), and then a 5/8" layer of Gypsum Wall Board (GWB). Most of the outer wall will be brick, but for those areas that will have GWB on the "outside" with respect to the home theater, 5/8" GWB + GG + 5/8" GWB will be used. In all cases, double GWB will use non-overlapping seams and have a layer of green glue using one tube of green glue for every 4'x4' section of wall. All walls will be insulated with standard el-cheapo pink insulation. During construction, the inner walls will be tied the the external walls directly. Then diagonal 10' metal straps will be installed on the interior of the room at the corners and a 18" strip of OSB will be installed along each wall on the top of the inner ceiling joists. The external wall tie-ins will then be removed and the inner wall will be tested. The room should be fairly stable at this point, when the OSB goes up on the interior it should be more than rigid enough.

Ceiling
There will be double ceilings just as with the walls - a complete room in room construction. The bottom of the upper ceiling will be 11'6" above the slab and this ceiling will be placed on top of the outer walls. There will then be a large (~5") air gap and then another framed in ceiling will be placed on top of the inner walls. No sound protection measures will be taken on top of the upper ceiling. The bottom of the lower ceiling will have OSB + GG + GWB, non overlapping seams, and 1 tube of green glue for every 4'x4' section of the second layer of GWB.

HVAC
I will be using dedicated HVAC for the theater. There will be 2 high vents in the front of the room, 2 high returns in the rear of the room. There will also be a separate zone for the equipment closet with a vent at the top and a return at the bottom. My father-in-law is doing the HVAC and he has a system picked out. Hopefully we will be keeping the equipment closet around 60 degrees, the rest of the room 65-70 (I like it cold).
 

• Recommendation by Dennis Erskine

 

Stage
There will be a stage constructed in the front of the room that will house the front left and right mains as well as the subs that are built into the mains. It will be constructed using the following techniques:

• Acoustik Mat placed directly on slab
• Stage built directly on Acoustik Mat with at least 1/4" gap between all walls
• Sand fill entire stage

 

This is based on information from: here and here

Electrical

• Carlon Adjustable Zip Boxes (Related post by chinadog)

 

Acoustic Treatment
Really just getting started thinking about this, so this list will be evolving

• Corner Bass Traps (SandmanX installed)
• Panel Install (SandmanX advice - MDF vs. Particle Board)

Suggested Vendors:

• Sensible Sound Solutions (Related post
  
  by SandmanX) provides 2" Cotton

 

A/V Closet
There will be an A/V closet built onto the room. This closet will be framed with a staggered stud 6" wall (2x4 studs). Standard pink insulation will be weaved through the studs. The inside of the closet will have the same double 5/8" drywall as the rest of the HT. An equipment rack will be placed in this closet. I will be using the Middle Atlantic AXS-40-26. I chose this unit over the rotating version to more easily allow access into the A/V closet behind this unit, the total closet depth will be 3', and I prefer to maintain the ability to walk into it. The 40 height unit is the largest, according to Middle Atlantic, that will fit in a standard 80" height doorway since the rack must be elevated by about 3".

Rack Equipment
Middle Atlantic AXS-40-26-GG (rack)
TRACK50 (pull-out tracks)
TS310 (3.5" - 10" telescoping support for TRACK50)
AXS-WT50 (Cable management tray for TRACK50)

Screen
I am currently working on screen design. I would like to use a SMX screen, but it looks like it is out of my budget. I have inquired about getting just the raw screen material, but have not yet heard back.

• Sheerweave 4000
• Fidelio Black Velvet for masking (see this post by SandmanX)

 

Lighting
The current plan is to just use 4 wall sconces. I may add some floor/stage lighting as well, still debating.  As for sconces, I'm still searching. Our local theater has a light I really enjoy. I found this online, it is the closest I have found so far, but I don't want to spend >$400 per sconce.
 

• Step Lighting (Related post by chinadog)

 

To-Do List

• Review SandmanX thread - Done
• Review chinadog thread - Done
• Review mbgonzomd thread - Done
• Review Cathan thread - Done
• Review BIGmouthinDC thread - Done
• Review shawnwalters thread - Done
• Review CJO thread - Done
• Discuss HVAC solutions with contractor - In Progress
• Design theater in SketchUp - Done Enough
• Concrete Floor - Done
• Framing - Outer Room - Done
• Framing - Inner Room - Done
• External Decking / Brick - Done
• Door - Entrance - Done
• Wall Insulation - Done
• Electrical Rough-In - In Progress
• Wall Layer 1 - OSB - In Progress
• Attic Insulation - Not Started
• Attic Decking - Not Started
• HVAC - Not Started
• Wall Layer 2 - 5/8" GWB - Not Started
• A/V Closet OSB - Not Started
• A/V Closet GWB - Not Started
• Paint - Not Started
• Framing - Riser - Not Started
• Electrical Rough-In - Riser - Not Started
• Decking - Riser - Not Started
• Riser Component - Stair - Not Started
• Framing - Soffit - Not Started
• Decking - Soffit - Not Started
• Framing - Stage - Not Started
• Fill - Stage - Not Started
• Decking - Stage - Not Started
• Framing - Screen Wall - Not Started
• Framing - Columns - Not Started
• A/V Wiring - Not Started
• Sound Treatment - Not Started
• Equipment - Screen - Not Started
• Carpet - Not Started
• Equipment - Speakers - Not Started
• Equipment - Projector - Not Started
• Fabric Panels - Not Started
• Electrical - Final - Not Started
• Equipment - Rack - Not Started
• Equipment - Seating - Not Started
• Final Component Install / Calibration - Not Started
• Enjoy HT!

Acknowledgements
I'd like to thank, first off, the general forum community. Without AVS, I wouldn't even know what I wanted, much less have any hope of attaining a theatre of the quality that I hope to build. But I would like to also thank, in particular, several users who have posted great threads that I have directly used for this project. Note that this list will grow as I go through this project, so don't be offended if you're not here yet.

CJO: Great OP for consolidating information
Sandman: Must read thread
chinadog: Another great indexed thread

Edited by MidniteArrow - 8/18/12 at 9:18pm

***********************************************
* This is the old first post of this thread, for archive purposes *
***********************************************

***********************************************
** Old First Post Below This Line **********************
***********************************************

Well, it's been a while. I started thinking of doing my own home theater a few years ago, got an enthusiastic start, and then got smacked down with life. 2 kids later (please don't read that as a complaint), I'm about ready to start. Here's the old thread:

Old HT Thread

Sorry, none of the links in that thread will work because my file server had a fatal crash a while back.

A few things have changed. It's no longer in the basement, but rather we'll be adding a ground level (flexible) exterior room. It's pretty much all up in the air. And yes, I've already got an e-mail out to Dennis.

I guess my first decision is, should it be a rectangle? I've found some suggestions that non-rectangle rooms have better sound, but then most of the gallery pictures I see seem to be rectangles.

Links
I'm using 3D Studio Max to visualize the project. These links are to screenshots/movies that will be kept updated. They will always point to the latest version of the renders.

Full Movie (~20 MB)

***********************
* Original second post below *
***********************

Looks like budget might be tight on this. We've hired an architect to design our house. I keep waffling between adding Dennis Erskine (sp?) as a second architect to just do the home theater. In the end, doesn't it all just come down to hard-budget decisions. I'd love to have Dennis design it, but that's another $5k minimum, and if the room gets too far up in cost, it's a no-go.

On another note, I'm formally starting the seating search. I plan on doing seating for 8. There will be 3 tiers (2 raised tiers and ground level), and the rear tier will be full of exercise equipment.

So far, my list consists of:

Berkline
Barcalounger (local dealer)
Palliser (current favorite)
Encore
Bass (culled for price)
Lovan (culled for options)
Coaster

I'm just starting this, so please free to add to my list, I'd like to review all competent options. My budget is $400-$1000 / chair, although this is one of the places I plan to save money, rather than go hog-wild.

Well, I work out about 4 times a week for about an hour. My wife does the same (or rather will as soon as we build a house and get her elliptical walker out of storage). The house will be about 4000 square feet, so there should be plenty of room to put some equipment somewhere. When we sat down and started talking about where to put it, the HT just made the most sense. It's the most entertaining room in our house, and when you're spending an hour on an elliptical walker, entertainment is paramount (yes, that's a pun - she usually ends up watching Voyager while on the walker).

I'm not too concerned with a movie theater feel, or even the aesthetics to a huge degree. I'm a functionality kind of guy. I do want it to be comfortable. We're not dead set on the exercise equipment in the room, but I'm definitely leaning that way. I mean, it will be behind all the seating, so it's not like it will actually take away from the movie viewing experience. There could be some sonic issues I guess, so that might be a decision point.

Well, I could understand that if the equipment would actually interfere with the A/V experience. I just don't see how it will.

One thing I have thought of doing to mitigate the effect is to put up a movable wall / curtain that can hide the equipment. This might make things difficult for the rear channel though, but not impossible.

I understand your point CCDAstro, but it's not like the equipment will be in use while I'm trying to have friends over to get a good movie experience. It seems to me it would enhance the experience while working out without detracting while not working out. Maybe I'm wrong, I'll give it some more thought. We're still a good 3 months from construction in a best case scenario. Even if I went this route and hated it, I could just replace the back row with seats, so it's not like it's a huge risk.

I'm currently planning on 7.1, which is why a curtain would be difficult. I think a movable wall could probably be fitted with some sort of sonic panels, but that would be a more expensive option.

CCDAstro - could you PM me? I wanted to pick your brain about ICF, but figured it wasn't very applicable to this thread (and you appear to have public PMs turned off).

I guess another decision point will be speakers. I currently have a NHT VT/VS-2.4 6.1 system. It sounds good enough for me in my living room (just 5.1, have the 6th for backup in case of failure). If I can pick up another VS-2.4, this could be a 7.1 system. I'm just not sure if it would be buff enough for a home theater. Right now I'm thinking the room will be around 25x20, but that's still up for debate.

NHT VT-2.4 Towers (1 pair)
NHT Vs-2.4 Center/Surrounds (2 pair)

I know from preliminary talks with Dennis that the room design will be a bigger factor than speakers. I just don't know if these are buff enough for a home theater or not.

If I replace them, I'm looking at the Onix Rocket line, but admittedly haven't done any serious speaker research lately.

First off, thanks for the comments. All opinions are welcome, read, and contemplated.

Adding a room
The problem is that we do not have the budget to add yet another room to the house, and all the rooms are taken up with something. So we've got to stick the workout stuff somewhere. The home theater is the only room that has only a single story component. All other rooms either have a room below or a room above. So if I add 200 sqft to any of them for the equipment, this effectively kills our house floorplan, which is yet another reason the HT is an attractive option. Yeah, adding a dedicated gym would be great. So would having the 50k to do it. Our architect is already under orders to reduce the cost of the home.

Seating
I've already budgeted for 3 rows of seating, which means even with the equipment, I could do seating for 8-10. It would be very, very, very rare that I'd need more seating than that.

Aesthetics
Yeah, that would kill the theater "feel" when you walk in the room and look at the back row. But that's not a factor for me. I'm not saying that's not a valid concern for some theaters, but for mine, I could care less. What I expect to feel when I look at that back row is, "boy, sure glad I don't have to drive to the gym".

Audio/Video experience
Now, what I will care about, is it negatively affecting the watching-a-movie experience with the caveat that there will not be any working out during movie watching. If just having the equipment in the room will cause a drop in the audio and/or Video quality, that would be a major strike against.

The pro-reason for this is that there's really not anywhere else for this stuff to go. Which means I'll still be stuck going to a gym. Gym membership is $45 / month. $540 / year. ~$15k over the lifetime of the home loan. Add in the value of the 30 minutes just getting to/from the gym takes out of my workday, at about $50/hour, and going to a gym costs a LOT of money. Essentially, not going to a gym almost pays for the equipment cost of the home theater. Easily pays for the projector and seating. And I've got a sneaky suspicion that if it doesn't go in the home theater, it won't be going in the house at all.

But like I said, nothing is final, and I really appreciate the input.

Well, we've hired an architect (about 2 weeks ago) to finalize the plans, so the exact floorplan is in a state of flux. I'll post my current floorplan when I figure out how to upload, if that's even possible. I may need to get some fileserving service as my home webserver is on the fritz.

The thing to keep in mind is that we are talking about 150-200 sqft of equipment. We have a HUGE elliptical walker, and to stop going to the gym, I'll need freeweights and a few benches. I might could get away with a single machine, but probably not (I do so hate anything that slows down my workout).

4000 sqft was rounding - realistically it's currently about 3200 sqft + the home theater, which is estimated to be about 20x25. That may come down some depending on whether the architect can do it without sacraficing functionality, which hopefully he can.

Ok, I hosted floorplan screenshots:

First floor
Second floor

Here's an initial floorplan for my thoughts. I'm sure it will get tweaked, tweaked, tweaked, Dennised, and tweaked.

Midnite's Home Theater Floorplan

Input welcome.

It's a little big, so I'll probably scale it back some due to budget. Although I really don't want to later wish it were larger. I'd rather just put in some OT to pay for it.

Oops. I got a PM warning me that there may be a virus (probably not "virus" per se, but some sort of data phisher) in my screenshots. I put them in as hyperlinks instead of images with a warning so if you're confident in your virus blockers, feel free to look at them. I plan on running a full system scan as soon as I get home, but in the meantime, be warned, and I'm sorry if I infected anyone.

According to Norton, it was a false alarm. Unless, of course, Norton is weaky, weaky. But if that's so, blame Norton!

I got this all put into 3ds max and took a first stab at lighting. It's got ledge around the top with a rope light (think that's called a soffit) and 16 can lights throughout the room. Hopefully I can find some can lights with a similar light profile.

I updated the initial thread post with a link to the movie that I will keep current, not that I actually expect any of you to sit through the 20 MB download. It's WMV HD (WMV 9). Needless to say - don't waste time trying to stream this. Save it first and watch it local, although right now it's pretty boring.

Full Movie (~20 MB WMV 9)

I'm currently trying to decide a good screen width / speaker combo / room size. I sat down and put together a 3dsmax scene with my initial wants and the room ended up being a 20' x 30', with a 3' screen wall making the interior "room" 20' x 30'. This ended up feeling way too big when the final animations were done. So I've shrunk it down to a 20' x 25' room. For seating, I'm leaning towards 3 rows of 4 chairs, and have berkline 45009s in the max scene. It now looks near what I want. I'll post screens when I get home, I left it rendering a 1100 frame movie.

For screen width, does anyone have any tips? The last time I researched this, I think I came up with main L/R should be 45 degrees off of the nominal seating position and should be separated by twice the screen width. Using that as a guide, I currently have it setup for a 10' wide screen (16x9). But I just stopped by dolby.com and the information there suggested the mains should be about 22-30 degrees off of nominal. Are my screen width figures off as well? I didn't see anything at dolby that addressed screen width.