Case studies

Howell & Associates - Winner Of CEDIA Electronic Lifestyles Award 2003 For Best Home Theatre: $70,000 - $100,000 (2/2/2004)

Essay

The homeowner is in the business of building bridges. He wanted us to incorporate a famous bridge into the design of the room. The Brooklyn Bridge came to mind immediately, with the New York City skyline as the background. The homeowner and his family felt that this would be an appropriate tribute to the victims of the September 11th tragedy.

When you enter the room you are immediately surrounded by the city. The New York City mural was painted on vinyl at our facilities and was later adhered to the theater walls. The skyline wraps around from the back of the room through to the viewing area right into a three dimensional Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge was made with MDF and details were routered into the wood. Small steel rods were used to create the suspension. The fiber optics were installed directly into the drywall before the ceiling was mounted. The ceiling was constructed using two layers of drywall to reduce sound transfer to the main floor.

Since entry into the media room would be at the back right side of the room, the client did not want a rear seating riser to be visible. In order to achieve tiered seating, we designed a step and landing outside the double door entry. The landing was extended into the room, becoming the main floor for the back row of seating and the bar area with a step down to the first row of seating.

The client's large DVD collection is easily accessible through the Kenwood Entre Entertainment Hub and 401 disc DVD changer. DVD cover art, disc name and genre are retrieved via the internet. The client can search for movies by year, title, genre and disc number. We also incorporated his existing multi-room audio system into the home theater. The client's music collection is stored on an Imerge Sound Server and can be accessed on the screen or the two-way wireless Crestron touch panel. Music can be searched for by album title, artist or genre.

Equipment List

Crestron STX-1700c Wireless 2-Way Control Panel
Crestron CP2e - Processor
Crestron STRFGWX - RF Gateway
Crestron CT-1000 In Wall Touch Panel
Denon AVR-3802 - 110 Watt x 5 Receiver
Express Vu 6000 model High Definition Satellite Receiver
Lutron GRX-MR-6A - Six Zone Grafik Eye
M&K 3 x LCR750THX - Left, Center, Right Speakers
M&K MX105 - 100 Watt Dual 12" Subwoofer
M&K 2 x SW53 - In Ceiling Speakers
Monster HTS 2000 - Power Bar
Runco CL-500 - 848x600 DLP Projector
Stewart 92" Diagonal Grayhawk Screen
Kenwood Entre - Entertainment Hub
Kenwood DV-5900M - 401 Disc DVD Changer
Toshiba 4 x 27 A42 - 27" Flat Screen Television
Express Vu 4 x 3100 model Slave Satellite Receiver

Time And Expertise Worksheet

Task	Hours
Client Interviews Electronic Design and Engineering Proposal and System Documentation Preparation Project Management Pre-wire/Rough-in Trim-out Shop time for Racking and Testing Programming Final Installation and Calibration Client Instruction Interior Design and/or Architecture by your Company Interior Design and/or Architecture by Others Project Management by Others Other time (Describe):	5 25 10 10 20 22 10 51 50 4 194 40 N/A N/A
Total Hours to Complete	441

This case study appears courtesy of CEDIA and Howell & Associates.

Howell & Associates offers expertise in high-end custom theatre installation, and is based in Burlington, Ontario, Canada.

www.cedia.org
www.howellandassociates.com