hi everyone i'm scott newnam ceo of audio advice
we've designed and installed over a thousand theaters and this video is part
of our home theater design series that covers virtually everything about
designing a home theater in this video we're going to be talking
about laying out the physical space for your home theater we'll discuss all
the different aspects of laying out your room
and how to handle the elements of your room that you can control
and also those that you cannot control if you want more information on
anything covered in this video be sure to click the link in the description
that will take you to our full article on home theater layout
on our site there you can also explore all of our articles and videos on
virtually everything home theater related or even
design your own home theater in our interactive home theater design
tool now let's get started we're going to start by talking about general room
dimensions and acoustics ask any recording engineer and they will
tell you that the physical room dimensions
have a huge impact on the sound you'll be able to get in a room
if you're lucky enough to be designing your home theater from scratch
there are some ratios you can use to get your room to a great basic shape
the most famous is the golden ratio of 1 to 1.6
to 2.6 as an example a room with a 10-foot high ceiling would ideally be 16
feet wide and 26 feet long we won't get too deep
into this here but the dimensions are so important because the size and shape
of every room causes some frequencies to be amplified
and some to be almost completely cancelled out because of how sound waves
bounce off the walls and interact in your room this causes
some areas of the room to have overly boomy bass while other
areas have severely lacked bass no room is perfect but getting close to
the golden ratio and avoiding dimensions that are
multiples of each other will ensure your room has fairly
consistent bass in the main seating area also try to stay away from dimensions
that are close to each other the worst possible room would be a cube
say 10 feet by 10 feet by 10 feet even the best
sound system cannot overcome a really bad room
if you're building your room from scratch and are planning on multiple
rows of seating remember to count for riser height
when deciding ceiling height if you're unsure about your dimensions
and have the ability to adjust give us a call or chat with us at
audioadvice.com and we'll be glad to help
on the audio advice website we have a fully interactive design tool where you
can interactively adjust your room dimensions and different speaker setups
and get the optimal placement and design while there are ideal positions for
speakers oftentimes rooms don't allow for placing
speakers in the perfect positions at audio advice we carry plenty of
problem solver speakers that will ensure you still get great
sound even in a less than ideal room take a look at our article and video on
speaker layouts to get an idea of where they might need to be located
before you start adding other elements if you have the luxury of designing your
room from scratch this process is usually much more
straightforward the big decision is deciding what
speaker layout you want this could be a basic 5.1 setup or a
full-blown 7.2.4 setup or even beyond this for more information
on what these numbers mean check out our article and video on surround sound
options or go to our interactive tool and play
around with all the different options
when you're designing your home theater layout in general the screen wall will
typically be the short wall obviously your seating
layout will affect this especially in family rooms
but at the very least try to get the screen centered on the seating area
with your speakers an equal distance off to each side from the video display
if you're using a front projection system you also have the option of
putting the front speakers behind the screen you will find that
viewing a two hour movie or three hour game will be a lot more comfortable
if the screen is at about eye level a point of reference is to target the
bottom of your screen 30 to 36 inches off the floor
when flat panel tvs came on the scene many people started mounting the tv
above the fireplace mantel this setup isn't ideal for the muscles in your neck
so either mount it as low as you can or you can use
manual or power tv mounting brackets that will move the tv down for viewing
for tips on choosing the right screen size check out our article and video in
the link that explains all of the factors to
consider our interactive design tool also will show you what the various
optimal screen sizes are for your specific room setup
let's move on to paint and lighting when designing your room you want to try to
prevent light from windows from spilling onto
your screen if you have windows consider using some
sort of blackout curtain or shade heavy curtains often provide an
acoustic benefit too if you think about the last time you
were in a commercial theater you probably noticed
there were no windows and the walls and ceiling were painted
dark this is especially important for home theater rooms
with a front projection screen most screens reflect light off
at a pretty wide angle and you don't want that light reflecting back off the
walls dark gray is an ideal color but whatever
you choose make sure you use a matte or flat paint
finish when it comes to lighting you will want
to consider task lighting accent lighting and safety lighting
adding remote control to the lighting also adds a super cool wow factor to
your home theater if you watch some of our installation
videos of theaters we have built you'll see how we integrate different
types of lighting again be sure to look in the description
for our article that goes much more in depth on the do's and
don'ts of home theater lighting
if you're going for a real home theater experience with a large screen and
multiple rows of seating you'll need to think about sight lines
sight lines are the angle and direction the screen is viewed
from each seating position when you have more than one row of seating
a riser is needed so the back row can see over the front row without being
blocked in general you want at least an 8 inch
high riser if you have the ceiling height you
should go even higher a 12 or 16 inch platform is even better for the rear
rows the depth of the riser should be a
minimum of six feet to allow for people to pass
in front of the footrest on a recline theater chair
with a couch or other fixed type of seating you can sometimes get by with a
five foot deep riser if you're thinking about putting a
multi-row home theater system into a living room or spare bedroom you
can use prefabricated risers so you don't have to do any permanent
construction or if you have some carpentry skills
you can make them yourself if you want that third row of seating in your
theater but don't quite have the ceiling height for it
a cool option is building a bar behind the second row of seats
the bar stools will get people in the third row up high enough to avoid any
sight line issues while still being on the same riser as
the second row plus you'll have a great spot for the
big spread you'll put out for your watch parties
hopefully this overview has given you some insight on some of the smaller
details on home theater room layout that are
sometimes overlooked when planning a home theater room
this video is part of the audio advice home theater design series of videos
that cover all aspects of designing a home theater in our description you will
find links to all of the articles and videos as well
as our really cool interactive home theater design tool
if you have any questions or decide to like some help planning your theater
or maybe you'd rather just have someone build it for you
give us a call or chat with our team at audioadvice.com
or if you're near raleigh or charlotte swing into our stores
and we'd love to help you out
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and home theater content we'll see you next time