Doug and Debby's Home Theater

[DougMac]

This is more of a placeholder. Someone on another thread asked about photos of our HT. We're about to go out of town and I can't go into detail right now. I'll come back later and fill in all the gory details. I'll post a few photos.

It was a basement build. Here's what it looked like when I started:



Roughly the same angle now that it's complete:



Here's a better view of the screen. It's Screen Gray painted on primed sheet rock. It looks great! You can see my Ascend 340 mains and SVS PB-12 NSD sub. The L/R speakers are on small TV stands.



There's a small area to the left of the main HT. I have some movie memorabilia there. The albums on the wall are part of my music collection.



Finally, here's the equipment rack. This is overexposed, the wall color is much darker. The rack is sitting on a platform in a storage closet. All equipment is easily accessed. This was one of the best things I did.



I did all the work, including framing, plumbing and electrical myself, other than putting down the carpet and hanging the ceiling. I did have help with the sheetrock.

Doug

[dolphinc]

Very nice. I love the equipment rack in the wall. Great Job....

[^Lestat^]

You did wonderful work on the basement. How large is that screen and how did you hide the pvc pipe?

[SeanMF]

Awesome job!

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by ^Lestat^

You did wonderful work on the basement. How large is that screen and how did you hide the pvc pipe?

The screen is 120" diagonal. Notice the soffit around and above the screen. That was my solution, it's behind the wall. I wanted to keep the ceiling at 9 feet.

[NiteJones]

DougMac, that's incredible. I don't know how you ever drag yourself out of there. That video rack was a stroke of brilliance. Did you say that screen was 120 diagonal?

Edit: Yes, apparently you did say 120 diagonal.

[Aerodude73]

That is one Sweet looking HT and that 120" Screen is incredible dude!
Are you running 5.1 or 7.1 (or 5.2?). Great rack idea as noted.

[ZedsDead]

Unique and attractive setup. You should be very proud of your efforts, and I like the color scheme you went with, it's something different.

[talstarone]

Beautiful Transformation of the Basement .

It turned out to look simply Amazing.
The Painted Screen turned our to Look Perfect.And the Equipment Rack Give it that High-End Look.

Great Job and an Awesome Home Theater.Exceptional Job and a Place I would Love to watch Movies at.

So Just Invite Me Over and I'ii Bring the Popcorn.
First Class Job,Thanks for Sharing.

[Fors*]

I'm jealous that you did all the work yourself! It looks great, and I am curious to see just how dark the green really is. The equipment rack being at near eye level was brilliant and with the glass door, it looks aesthetically awesome. I love my 92" screen, but I would love a 120" screen even more....very nice. What kind of projector do you have anyway? You did a great job, and I wish I had your skills to do as much as you did to your room as I could do to mine. Great job!

By the way, when you get the time, start a gallery so we can rate your HT!

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by Aerodude73

That is one Sweet looking HT and that 120" Screen is incredible dude!Are you running 5.1 or 7.1 (or 5.2?). Great rack idea as noted.

I wired the room for 7.2. The fronts are bi-wired, but not in use at the time. There's 275' of 12 AWG speaker wire! All wiring is run through conduits to allow changes/additions.

Right now I'm running 5.1. I'm using an older NAD T-762 receiver. It really sounds good and I'm not quite ready to give it up. While a receiver that does EQ would be nice, sweeps of the room show it's not bad.

Input is Dish Network, OTA (through the Satellite Box), PS3 for Blu-ray and games, WII, and a older Pionneer CD player capable of SACD and DVD Audio.

Projector is an Optoma HD70 (720p). Video is fed straight from HDMI sources through a switcher (Satellite, PS3) or component through the NAD (WII).

Speakers are:

L/C/R: Ascend CMT-340 SE's
Side Surrounds: Ascend CBM-170s SE's
Backs: Ascend HTM-200 Classics (currently dormant)
Sub: SVS PB-12 NSD

After watching "Dark Knight", I had to put 1/4" foam insulation strips in the door jambs to control the rattle! The SVS in the room measures pretty much flat down to 17HZ.

I'm happy with the equipment I have. Of course, there's always upgrade-itis and I'm not sure what I'll do first and when. Conceptually, I like separate amps and pre/pro. I'm looking forward to reviews of the new Emotiva pre/pro once it's released. I'd team it with some of their amps which get great reviews.

A 1080p upgrade from 720p seems logical. I'm waiting for the prices to fall. I sized the screen with 1080 in mind. From our viewing distance, we're right on the edge of seeing the screen door effect. Two feet closer and you can see it, but it's fine at normal viewing distance.

The original plan was to use an acoustically transparent screen. I did a lot of reading over on the Home Theater Shack site. I also ordered a sample of the screen material. At our normal viewing distance, the weave of the fabric was noticeable and distracting to my wife. In order to get the speakers behind the screen, she felt we would have to place it too far into the room. I read at Home Theater Shack about Sherwin Williams Grey Screen being a nice moderate gain paint. We actually use Pratt & Lambert paints, so I took a Grey Screen swatch and matched it at our paint center.

I went to extra care when framing and dry walling the front wall. We primed it with Kilz, then hung the projector and framed the screen. The image looked pretty darn good on the primed walls. I zoomed in just a hair when marking the screen area. I then painted on the screen color with two careful coats. We then checked the image and were amazed at how much better it looked compared to primer. There was more snap and the darks significantly improved. Now came the scary part. Again, I marked off the screen. I then carefully taped the border, then covered the screen area with plastic. I then painted the surround with Black Watch Green, which for all intents and purposes is black. Once the paint dryed, I removed the plastic and carefully peeled the border tape. There were no runs or paint lifts! Whew! All in all I guess I have about $20 in materials in the screen.

[Aerodude73]

Wow, excellent info in your above post on all the work you did! I wish I had a dedicated room to do something similar (100"+ screen). Maybe some day. Again tho', very very nice HT all around.

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by ZedsDead

Unique and attractive setup. You should be very proud of your efforts, and I like the color scheme you went with, it's something different.

I give Deb the credit for the colors. Even though it's a dedicated HT, we wanted it to be a warm and inviting place. We discussed this at length and decided that technically correct neutral grays would just be blah.

Deb is more adventurous on color choices than me. That's how we came up with "Chipmunk Stripe" in the little foyer area. Although it's a light color, there's no light spill on it from the screen and the lights in that area are off during movie watching.

Speaking of lighting, it's all recessed on two circuits, one for the lights in the foyer area and another for the main room area. The ones in the main area are on a remote controlled dimmer with a preset. We watch with just a smidge of ambient light.

[DougMac]

Originally Posted by talstarone

Beautiful Transformation of the Basement .

So Just Invite Me Over and I'ii Bring the Popcorn.
First Class Job,Thanks for Sharing.

You and everyone else are invited! Just give us a call.

We can either cook the popcorn in the microwave or in our air popper. I don't think I mentioned this, but I built a kitchenette adjoining the theater. It has everything but a stove, we use a toaster oven for the chocolate chip cookies.

I ran into a great deal on the cabinets and counter tops. They were in a break area of a business that closed. They're Kraft Maid and I picked them up for $400.

Thank to all for the kind words!

[JamesN]

Very nice job! You need to post pictures to your Gallery an open up voting. It's an easy 10 from me.

[solarrdadd]

stunning work and what an incredible before and after look. perfect 10

[Johk]

Looks really nice!

I love the equipment cabinet. Great work!

Originally Posted by DougMac

After watching "Dark Knight", I had to put 1/4" foam insulation strips in the door jambs to control the rattle! The SVS in the room measures pretty much flat down to 17HZ.

This is what I was planning to do! Maybe I'll have some time tonight.

[Hammie]

Very nice, Doug! You've done a great job transforming that basement space into a beautiful theater room. Kudos to Deb for the color palette. She did a great job picking out the colors.

[Turnda643]

Nice HT room! Looks amazing. You did an awesome job. Congrats to you and the misses. Now go enjoy!!

[Blu Titan]

Looks fantastic truly does. Great paint job, and design to your HT.