Whitehouse
This dramatic new-build house was designed and built by a property developer. We initially became involved to take on the commissioning of the large Lutron system, but soon were looking after the TV, Audio and Wifi technology as well.
When the property was sold the new buyers wanted to fit out the cinema room. This basement room had great potential for a cinema room, in that it was a good size, well located in the building with little natural light. However it was also quite a challenge as the room was all concrete with the exception of the right wall to the wine store which was all of glass.
This did mean the acoustics would need to be tacked if the room would be a success.
Our client was very accommodating and just specified that we couldn’t touch the rear wall, which had a specialist decorative wallpaper on it.
We modelled the room in 3D acoustic modelling software and predicted that the room would have an RT60 decay time of roughly 0.7 Sec. Ideally for a cinema one would like 0.3, but anything above 0.5 is going to be quite a problem.
Secondly a concrete box like this has a habit of holding in the bass energy, so it ends up having a strong modal structure – giving rise to a very erratic bass response, with some frequencies being overblown and others vanishing altogether. Attention needed to be paid to ensure adequate bass absorption was in-place.
Photos of the room before cinema and acoustic treatment installed Although a screen is shown – it was just a dummy to convey the idea of the cinema to potential buyers. It wasn’t even true 16:9 aspect ratio.
Photos of room after cinema installed with acoustic treatment shown – the cinema prints either side of the screen conceal special bass and broadband absorbers. Note also the ceiling panels aligned with ceiling first reflection point. These panels also disperse high frequency sound aiding the overall balance of sound.
This is an actual photo of the cinema in action – what you notice is the clear impact of the projector with the lights on, and some natural light coming in.
The client wanted the system both for day time sport viewing, as well a evening film viewing. The Barco projector is setup with two modes, calibrated for day and the other for night.
“The Cinema has been a great success, sky sports for my husband and Netflix for my daughter !, If ever I need to find them, its the first room I look in !”
Back to Case Studies