BurnItDwn's dedicated theater room

[BurnItDwn]

Hello,

I've been building an HT room on and off over the last year or so (with a LONG break after installing new lights, and then dealing with flooding which I have since minimized.)

The room is in my basement
10 feet wide x 27 feet long.

Along the back wall is a window (fully under ground, so it's got a window well on the outside.) This window is the fire escape so I can't block it.
Along the "front" wall, is a door to a bedroom in the basement (I made it my master bedroom since it's nice and dark and cold.)
And, the first 7 feet or so of the "front" of the room is open along one side which goes to the stairs, bathroom, and utility room.

::: In the year 2009 :::
Did Demolition work of the old 1970s style paneling. Removed a 2'x4' closeted off area (contains the water meter), and replaced it with a narrower and shallower frame with one side partially finished along the length of the water meter, and then open for the last 2+ feet (gonna stick my reciever, dvd player, uverse box, etc in there, my stereo cabinet just barely fits with a couple of inches clearance.)
I pulled out the ceiling flourescent tube lights (2 4 foot long 2 bulb fixtures), and replaced them with 6 recessed can lights on 2 seperate dimmer switch circuits. 3 along the back wall, with 75 watt Halogen bulbs, and 3 along the wall where the aisle will be to walk, with 40 watt incandescent (will replace with LED eventually, or maybe dimmable CFLs after some price drops.) They will typically be set just light enough that you can see where you're going and not bump into the wall.

::: Some Babbling:::
Along the remainder of the back wall (8 feet 2 inches width), I am going to mount a 6 foot laminate countertop on top of two 24 inch kitchen cabinets, with my small refrigerator in between them (room for popcorn maker, microwave, etc.) Because the AV cabinet will be only 2 feet 2 inches from the cabinets/countertop, I am going to put the cabinets on casters so I can move them out in order to connect and/or add equipment to the stereo cabinet, as well as to pull the stereo cabinet out in order to shut off the water. I added a new 20 amp GFCI circuit to power appliances, the room also has a 15 amp dedicated circuit for the rest of the outlets, so power should NOT be an issue.

:::Equpiment:::
I purchased a Mitsubishi HC3800 1080P projector with a 106inch motorized screen and ceiling mount from Costco's website.
Yamaha HTR5660 reciever (just using it for audio, though will run component and svideo to projector too, just in case)
I'll be picking up an HDMI switcher to switch between Uverse, DVD, HTPC since my reciever doesn't support HDMI, and my budget doesn't allow for me to replace it.
My front speakers are BIC RTR-1530s
My center is a JBL EC35, which I plan to ceiling mount directly in front of and above where the top of the screen will be visible. I may partially recess this above the ceiling level, and angle it down about 15 degrees.
My rear channels are a couple of crappy Sony MB300H 3 ways which I will be replacing with the RTR1530s once I upgrade them. (should have room in my budget next year)
I do not currently have a rear center surround, and the reciever does not support 7.1, so I will just be using 5.1 (eventually will upgrade to 7.1, as it would be an improvement due to the length of the room, but since the room is only 10 feet wide, 6.1 wouldn't really make a difference.
I picked up a BIC Accoustech PL-200 Subwoofer about a month ago, it's sitting in my living room currently with my olde 61inch NTSC RP TV. (along with my reciever, speakers, dvd player, etc)

:::More Babbling:::
This year, I've put up a new ceilinglink grid, painted a bunch of drop ceiling tiles, and hung most of them up. I put drywall for the back 4 feet of the ceiling. (The ceiling is pretty much 95% done.)

I've replaced water damaged drywall and drywalled the water meter/audio cabinet area.
I've sanded and mudded and sanded and mudded... ugh, I hate that part!
I've mounted the screen (still in plastic, due to dust)
I've primed 2 of the walls, which I will be painting black. Though Not the corners yet since I still need to sand and a final coat of mud. (hopefully just one "final" coat, not 3 more final coats!)

:::Cliffs:::
Building home theater, basement flooded, dealt with flooding issue, procrastinated, resumed construction, ran out of money so will be using patio furniture instead of proper furniture. Also won't be buying the lumber/carpet for the "riser" which will be 8 inches tall and approx the entire back 12 feet of the room until I raise some more $$$.

:::Links to pictures:::
Note: These were all taken with my cell phone Camera. It is a very shitty camera, so they are blurry and look like crap, but, you can get the general idea.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20091101_Basement_Lights_Installed.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20091101_Basement_Lights_Installed2.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20091101_Basement_Lights_Installed3.jpg

After finally finishing all the electrical work, and a summer with minimal flooding (just minor seepage), I finally started working on the Ceiling Late in June. Early in July, I made some real progress so used the crappy camera on my cell phone to take pictures.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100807_Ceiling_Progress1.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100807_Ceiling_Progress2.jpg

So, The dimensions of the screen according to costco's website as well as the manual, is 98 inches, I get it, and the damn thing measures like 105 or 106 inches. The width from the soffit to the wall is 100 inches. I almost started to cry, but, thankfully, my friend was there to call me a moron, and then mount it above the soffit/wall (the actual screen part is 98 inches, which fits, with about an inch of clearance on each side.)
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Holy_crap_the_screen_is_huge.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Holy_crap_the_screen_is_huge2.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_mud_on_the_corner.jpg

Started to prime the one wall that I was done with mudding/sanding for the entire length front to back, except for the corner.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Started_priming.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Started_priming2.jpg

This is the corner. Corners suck!
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Need_to_work_on_corner_before_prime_it.jpg

We fvcked up when doing a cutout while replacing water damaged drywall, didn't want to go through the effort to fix it right, since it was "close enough" so we used little tiny pieces cut out which are pressed against the electrical box behind it.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100827_Cutout_too_big__halfassed_fix.jpg

Got the primer on the second wall, after finishing sanding the last of the patches that I had worked on earlier in the week
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100827_Primed_Second_Wall.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100827_Primed_Wall_By_Ceiling.jpg


One of my distractions
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100820_Mmmm_Mead.jpg


MANY thanks to my friend Brad who helped me out a ton with his slightly less novice "know how" than me, and for all the hard hours of work he's put in!!!







EDIT 0828
Sanded and put up more primer. Just needed some touch up mudding on a part of the room, so haven't primed that yet.
2nd coat on 2 long walls,
1st coat on soffit and back wall.

Better light conditions so pictures shouldn't be quite as horrible as many...
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100828_Back_Wall_First_Coat_Primer.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100828_Back_Wall_First_Coat_Primer2.jpg

EDIT 0905
Better Quality pic from 0807 of the ceiling.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100807_Ceiling_Better_Quality.jpg

Hooked up my laptop to the projector via VGA for testing it out and lining everything up. Painting is done and room has been cleaned up.
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100904_The_Screen.jpg
http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/burnitdwn/20100905_Dalek1.jpg

 

[Exterous]

My eyes! They bleed! You need a better camera

Are you planning on any acoustical treatments? Also I may have missed it but how did the basement flood?

 

[BurnItDwn]

You're right, I do need a better camera, it's on my list of things to buy once I have extra expendable $$$.

As far as acoustic treatments, I plan on putting my rear riser on rubber uboats, and filling it with insulation, so it may help to trap some bass. I also plan to hang some accoustic panels along the walls to help cut down on reflections, it will be far from perfect, but 99% of the time, the room will be used for movies, so the acoustics should be "good enough."

The window well in the back of the room used to flood. The previous owners had buried the drain, and the property grading kinda sucked so that if there was a ton of snow melt in a day or a lot of rain in a day, it would fill up the window well, and then come into the house by the gallon. We dug out the window well about 2 feet deep, and discovered there was a drain, so we made a big open channel that goes to the drain with PVC pipe, and then refilled what we had dug with like 150 pounds of gravel.
Now, the window well no longer floods.

We also did some regrading along the one wall where the water used to flow into the window well. I raised the ground along the foundation about 6 inches and sloped away from the house about 30 degrees. I need to do some more touch up along the corners, but I haven't had the time or the effort.

The only flooding that occurs now, is seepage, and the worst I've seen it flood since we fixed the window well drain, was a puddle in the back of the room. I do have a sump pump, but it's on the far opposite side of the house. And I don't have sewers, so there can't be a "sewer backup" type of problem.