Picking Your Home Theater Design
You’ve finally decided to build your home theater! That’s great. So, now what?
There’s a lot that goes in to building a nice home theater. Before you start purchasing everything that catches your eye, it’s a good idea to sit down and make a plan on what exactly you’d like to have in your home theater. It’s also important to make a budget, and identify what items on your list are the most important purchases. You don’t want to blow all your money on comfy seats and then only have enough money leftover for a 27 inch monitor. So what do you need?
Display
One of the first things to think about when creating a home theater is the video setup you’d like. What many people don’t know is that your home theater can have just as impressive a picture quality as a professional movie theater. You just need to decide between a projector and an actual tv or monitor.
TV
The TV has been a centerpiece of home entertainment systems throughout the last several years. Fortunately, the price of a really nice TV has gone down a lot lately, and you can get a relatively large TV for a very fair price. With technologies such as OLED and QLED becoming a bigger part of the TV marketplace, you can get a very nice picture in your home theater room on a TV.
One reason a lot of people choose TVs for their home theaters is that the brightness and contrast on a TV is easier to control and it can be adjusted a lot higher than a projector. If there’s any ambient or background light in your home theater room, you’ll want to adjust your screen’s brightness and contrast higher. If you aren’t able to control the ambient light in the room you want your screen in, a TV may be the better choice for you.
Another big reason people choose TVs over projectors is that TVs are generally easier to install. Most installation requires you to put it somewhere, plug it in to a few wires, and you’re ready to go. Projectors require you to find a screen, a place to mount the projector, require wires to be run to the projector, and making sure your screen is properly placed. A TV gives you easy set up over a projector.
Projector
Many people choose to use a projector and screen display for their home theaters. There are also a lot of impressive new technologies being worked into projectors, making them more enjoyable to use. If you choose to use a projector, you can choose the size of your screen, the shape of your screen, and if your screen is fixed in place, or rolls up. Choosing a TV gives you fewer size options, but they’re easy to install.
Projector sizes tend to start between 100-120 inches, and you can get a good projector with good color, brightness, and even 4k resolution for a lot less than a high-end 4k TV. If you’re looking for a true big screen experience for your home theater, a projector will be more cost effective than a TV.
Sound
The other essential element of a good home theater system is having a quality sound system. A good sound system can transform your home theater from an ordinary room in your home to an exciting escape, a home movie theater. With a well-designed surround sound speaker setup, movies you watch in your home theater will envelope you in sound and create an immersive viewing experience.
Speakers come in all shapes and sizes. If you want big, towering bookshelf speakers, or slim, low profile speakers, you can probably find it. Today, in-wall speakers are capable of delivering quality audio at an affordable price. Plan out where you want your speakers, and make sure you’ve got them placed at the best possible angles to round out the sound quality of your home theater.
Seating
Have you ever gone to a movie and sat in an uncomfortable chair? How enjoyable was that movie? There are a lot of different seating options for you in your new home theater. You can get a bunch of couches, stadium style seating, reclining chairs, traditional movie theater seats, or even a few bean bag chairs. Pick what you’ll be comfortable in, and don’t forget that your comfort level can affect your quality of viewing experience.
Room
There’s more to designing a quality home theater than just putting in the right equipment. The room has to look and feel good too. It’s important that you pick a design aesthetic and stick with it. The lighting, tables, tv stand, or equipment rack can complete the design you’ve chosen for your home theater. While these things aren’t at the top of the purchasing list, it’s important that you bring the same kind of quality into your home theater room design as you do for the audio and video equipment you bring in.
