Widescreen
Review's New State-Of-The-Art Reference
Theatre At New Facility
The following introduces a series of
articles on the design, development and
execution of a new state-of-the-art
Reference Home Theatre Laboratory at WSR's
new office facility.
After nine years of continuous growth, WSR
Publishing, Inc. has moved into its new
headquarters after outgrowing its old
offices. As owners and founders of
Widescreen Review® magazine (1992) and
other WSR Publishing, Inc. ventures,
including WidescreenReview.com,
SurroundMusic.net and WebDVD Publications,
Marlene and I have purchased a new 5,000
square foot building in Temecula (north of
San Diego, southeast of Los Angeles) to
house our fast-growing enterprises.
Build-out of the facility, which utilizes
over 7,000 square feet of offices and
"home theatre" review rooms on two floors,
commenced on January 2, 2001, and was
completed for move-in on March 24.
A key element of the new building is a
state-of-the-art reference theatre that
will serve as Widescreen Review's and
Surround Music's review laboratory.
Usually, dedicated home
theatres&endash;&endash;as designed and
promoted by Theo Kalomirakis' Theaters,
Theatre Design Associates, Inc., Acoustic
Innovations, First Impressions, etc. and
reported on in such picture-book dominant
publications as Audio Video Interiors and
Home Theater Interiors&endash;&endash;are
interior design driven rather than
optimized for video and audio performance.
Elaborate staging and seating areas
complemented by colorful fabric-covered
walls decorated with stylish sconces and
acoustically treated so as to usually
impart a "dead"-room sound are the rule.
Audio is regulated to non-full range
"hidden" dissimilar speaker designs all
around, often built into the walls. At
best, video displays (usually
front-projection types), are calibrated,
but always must fight with the light
pollution caused by ambient light and the
room interior colors, which to a lesser or
greater degree reflect back on to the
screen to contaminate the picture causing
a washed-out quality and less-than-ideal
contrast ratio.
Then, too, the audio implementation is
typically of the Home THX®-type, an
approach which attempts to "simulate" the
inherent limitations of "dubbing" stages
and thus, movie theatres. (See the side
bar on "The Home THX Approach.") The end
result is overly electronic-processed
audio which leaves untapped the full
potential of the multichannel 5.1 and 6.1
audio formats for delivering outstanding
soundstage and holosonic soundfield
imaging.
The approach at WSR is completely
different from that of THX, and the
typical approaches practiced by the
majority of theatre designers. We have
sought to build a home theatre in which
picture and sound performance is
paramount. Our implementation embraces
principles of purist high-end audio
applied with dedicated diligence to home
theatre to create a believable sense of
enveloping holosonic space.
While not colorfully ornate in interior
appearance, our built-from-the-ground-up
dedicated theatre's interior is striking
and optimally functional with no visual
distractions. We have eliminated ambient
light completely with our virtually
all-black treated room accentuated with
highlights in a video-complementary
gray.
We also decided to erect a component,
mirror-less, rear-projection system as our
principal viewing system, once again to
eliminate light pollution and maximize
picture contrast, shadow delineation,
clarity and visual impact.
A core philosophy at WSR is identical
full-range-capable speaker systems for
each of the five or six main channels and
their equidistant positioning relative to
the primary "sweet-spot" or "the
chair."
You can find this complete article in
Issue 48 of Widescreen Review
Magazine.
Click here to view issue 48 in the back issue section. |