 |
Your Home Theater Room Design
|
Bringing the HT Cinema experience home is the basic goal of the home theater enthusiast.
Whether you desire to avoid crowded theaters with over-priced concessions and poorly calibrated projection and sound systems or just would like to treat your family and friends to the newest DVD releases - a well planned and well designed home theater room environment brings the experience together. In this section you'll find info on video display and speaker placement, acoustic and lighting control considerations, home theater seating and furniture suggestions, and the little extras such as movie posters which complete the home cinema experience.
Overall home theater room design and your home theater system components layout is crucial for best systems performance and your personal comfort when enjoying a movie at home. Below each introduction is a link to more information on each topic where you will find more details on that subject.
Your video display device (whether it is a projection screen or big-screen TV) should be placed logically in relation to your seating and speakers. If you have a dedicated home theater room that task may be a bit easier than if you are incorporating an HT system into your living or family room. Either way you want your viewing and listening experience to be seamless and natural for the best home theater experience.
More info on
Home Theater Room Layout
Room Acoustics is also a major consideration
You can have the best, high dollar digital surround sound system and still not get the full potential of the system if your speakers are not properly placed within the room. Also you will want to make sure your HT room has some degree of sound absorbing properties but not be a totally "dead" room. Careful consideration of your HT room acoustics will help ensure thorough enjoyment of your favorite movie's soundtracks and prevent unnatural or hollow sounding audio.
More info on
Home Theater Acoustics
Lighting (or lack thereof) is important
If you choose a front projector and screen as your display device you will want a controlled lighting situation. Regardless of your display device of choice - home theater room lighting is a factor to consider. Whether you need to control ambient lighting or merely provide gentle atmospheric lighting during the movie there are various ways to achieve both goals.
More info on
Home Theater Room Lighting
Seating and Furniture - functional comfort
Seating considerations are very important room design factors. Of course more flexibility is available if you are designing a dedicated room than if you are incorporating a theater system into your existing living room layout. There currently are many manufacturers of Home Theater seating - from traditional theater seats to recliners and sofa-type seating to hi-tech models with built in butt-shaker sub-woofers. Above all remember that comfort should take precedence over hi-tech bells and whistles when it comes to home theater seating.
More info on
Home Theater Seating
Posters and Such for the "Finishing Touch"
The little extras that bring the cinema experience home should include a few of your favorite classic movie posters and perhaps a popcorn machine or "concession area" stocked with your favorite theater candy. Such extras are available for not too awful many dollars and may not be as expensive as you think. Such extra touches are mainly for the dedicated home theater room and adding them to your room design can bring the total theater experience together.
More info on
Home Theater Movie Posters
Google Pack comes with a great list of free Google software: the amazing Google Earth, Google Desktop, Google Toolbar, Google Talk, and Google Video Player. You also get the absolute best and safest internet browser -- Firefox -- (I switched to Firefox last year and now wonder why I used IE for so long - no more popups!). Plus Picasa, Norton Antivirus, Ad-Aware, Adobe Reader, Realplayer, a screensaver and GalleryPlayer. Quite the complete browser add-on package -- and it's FREE.
Home Theater Room Design
More Resources for Home Theaters
Home Theater Systems
