I've been involved in countless home cinema and media room projects over the years, with varying amounts of design input. Based on all that, here are some of my best design tips, and classic pitfalls to avoid.
Home Cinema do's:
1) Start with the room
Or if there isn't a room yet - say if you're designing your new home from scratch - start with the number of people you'd like to entertain in comfort, which will dictate the room size you need.
Most often, we start with a defined room. That tells us a lot - how many seats can we have, and how much sound level and picture brightness we need for convincing performance. Many 'home cinema' products don't actually achieve the required performance levels even for a modest sized cinema
2) Consider additional uses
For some, a home cinema is for films and that's it - which is great. Others will want to use it for box sets, sport and even 'regular' TV. Some of us really enjoy console games, and many of us love music.
So think about what else you might like to use the room for. That will help you draw up the perfect brief - gamers might want USB charging in the seats, music lovers might want high performance and musical front speakers, and so on.
3) Control ambient light
In every commercial cinema, the lights go down before the feature starts. It should be like that at home too.
Control light levels with blackout blinds, curtains and dimmable lighting. Not only will the picture quality improve dramatically, you'll focus on the screen much more effectively - which enhances your experience.
Keep reflective and shiny materials outside your field of vision, and avoid bright white or gloss paint finishes - they will all cause unwelcome distractions.
4) Investigate room treatments and soundproofing
Crucially, they're two different things.
Room treatments make the room sound better - absorbers, diffusers and bass traps treat echoes and resonance for a more even sound. That means a better performance, which is also more consistent across seats.
Soundproofing keeps the sound of the cinema away from the outside, so you don't annoy your neighbours or family, and keeps external sound out of your cinema. This is one of the most cost-effective performance upgrades you can do. By lowering the background noise, the sound system doesn't have to work nearly as hard to sound fantastic.
Instead of a 'recording studio' look, you can conceal treatments behind a fabric wall system, which can also hide all the speakers.
5) Think about styling
Here, there's no wrong answer. There are so many styles of Home Cinema - art deco, midcentury modern, retro picture palace, futuristic and sci-fi, or luxury contemporary. Cinema has been with us for over a hundred years, so it's all appropriate.
Using our 3D design abilities, we can build your cinema in a digital model before we build in reality, so you can see exactly what you're getting.
Home Cinema don'ts:
6) Don't put the screen too high
This happens a lot. Unfortunately, it's really uncomfortable to watch over a long time, which affects your ability to become fully immersed in the action.
The centre of the picture should be at eye level, and no more than five degrees up or down from there. Just like when driving, or working at a computer, you just need to be comfortable.
7) Don't get the screen size wrong - too big, or too small
Too often, screen sizes are worked out like this: (i) what fits the space and (ii) what's in my budget? The problem is that you can end up with a picture that's either too small to fill up your senses - so it's not immersive enough - or it's so big you can't see what's happening at the sides, which is uncomfortable.
The 'sweet spot' is a viewing angle somewhere between 40º and 57º from your nose to the sides of the screen. That's big enough to feel like 'cinema' without being overwhelming and uncomfortable - just right.
Within that range, it's fine to use your own taste and judgement - visiting a good showroom should help. Mine is on the bigger side at 52º - I like it, but it also helps customers get this just right.
8) Don't put seats along the side walls
Remember how the sound system should be able to take you to other places? That's really hard to do if you're right next to a side wall, the sound system can't work its magic. You'll also find the bass sounds off.
That said, if you need to put 'occasional' seats in, that can be okay - say for having friends round to watch the game.
9) Avoid hard surfaces
Very hard, reflective surfaces - like porcelain floor tiles, or large expanses of glass, really affect how things sound. That's fine in a bathroom - all that echo makes our singing seem better - but it plays havoc with the soundtrack.
A good cinema sound system makes you feel like you're in another space, but if the room echoes too much, it can't work. It also makes it harder to hear what the actors are saying, especially at lower volumes.
10) Don't get hijacked!
Three things commonly get in the way of a great experience:
a) Design by Google
Sadly common - Google is useful, but reviews can be faked - we've all seen the pictures -and SEO is an arms race. Plenty of wildly unsuitable products score well for 'home cinema' because someone threw money at the problem.
b) Design by Spreadsheet
On a build especially, the entertainment space budget can get pushed down when the estimates for groundworks and the kitchen arrive. The problem is, some will say 'yes' to almost any budget, regardless of whether that spec can even work in your space. I will push back and say 'let's either spend more, or divide the room so your budget goes further', but plenty of others just go 'it sounds fine from my house' and take the order.
Room size vs performance vs budget - 'what does a home cinema cost'
c) Design by someone else's sales target
I see this all the time.
Home cinema is quite different to hi-fi because the content is so different - it's more dynamic, with much more low end. When you push a hi-fi speaker, the headroom isn't there, it starts to distort and sounds hard-edged. So you won't like it, and you'll either turn it down, or not use the room very much.
A few makes like Ascendo take this seriously - they engineered a completely new range for cinema performance, but many others just added a centre speaker to an existing hi-fi lineup, and then went for lunch.
The problem is, some hi-fi-centric makes are well established, especially in retail - so you get sold the wrong stuff, and your experience isn't nearly as good as it could have been, at any given spend. The guy at the counter? He's friendly, and knows the basics, but he's also on a target from Brand X.
11) DO - get specialist help for your home cinema project
Home Cinema is a specialist discipline. Your ideal provider should have a proven body of work, happy clients, and be suitably qualified.
I can build you a better home cinema. Let's get started.
WRITTEN BY
Owen Maddock
Owner & designer, Cinemaworks
I've spent twenty years looking for ways to make films feel more real in people's homes.
CEDIA® Member of Excellence, award-winning designer, podcast host, and the one you'll actually work with.
