Transformer Party

Friday night's presentation of "Transformer" was a full house. The setup finally came together within the last hour. I had to make a quick dash to pick up my sub from Myer-Emco and get the room calibrated. I finally got around to adding a Buttkicker to the front row as well so there wouldn't be a fight over the rear row seating. I wasn't sure I would get it installed in time. I had a mounting plate drilled at work during the day, and got it installed right after work. From the sounds coming from the front row audience, it seemed to be working properly even though I didn't have a chance to test it before the show. It is not the proper way to install the kickers, because the couch is not on a platform. Luckily I have a table in front of the couch that people can put their feet on to isolate them from the floor when sitting upright. It works, but not as well as having a full platform. Of course if you lay on the couch it is not an issue, but does restrict the seating capacity to one or two.

The bass was tight and the dialog clear, the bass traps in back helped keep things from getting muddy or boomy even during the loudest of scenes.

Countdown to the Transformer Party

Almost everything is completed. Now I am waiting on my LFE sub to get here from the repair center at Meyer-Emco. It has taken 3 months for this repair, but it should be here on Friday. That will be cutting it close as I am having a group of friends over for a Transformer party. The sub will go under the stairs to the left of the 7001's. I will only have an hour to calibrate everything again, and that won't leave much time to check everything out. I will just have to wing it and hope for the best.

I was lucky enough to find a Circuit City store that was running the BOGO special, so I picked up "Transformers" and "Flags of Our Fathers". I couldn't resist previewing, and I must say that the soundtrack on "Transformers" had my teeth rattling at several points in the movie. This will replace "War of the Worlds" as my demo disc for the buttkickers.

New Paint

Over the last few weeks I have been busy repainting the Theatre. I decided to go with a darker burgundy to better match the leather seating. This also lowered the light level as the paint is much darker than before. I selected an 'egg shell' finish this time rather than "flat". While flat did look less shiny, it was also too easy to scuff. Just touching it ruined the finish.

As part of the repainting, I took down the black velvet material on the ceiling near the screen and painted it black. The rest of the ceiling was painted 18% gray. I also removed the side curtains to open up the space under the stairs.

The last few things left to do are to repaint the trim, close in the back of the stair to prevent light leakage, and add some crown molding over the top of the screen. I am also added fiberglass panels to the back wall and covered it with black velvet material. I doubled up the panels so they were 4 inches thick and left a 6 inch gap behind them. I also draped burgundy material over the DVD collection to make it a little neater.

I also moved the HD DVD player inside the cabinets. I didn't like the fan noise it produced when playing CD's. It is not so noticeable when watching a movie, as the projector fan drowns it out. It is dead quiet now when listening to music. It has me considering building a hush box for the projector and moving all the equipment inside the cabinets. My only concern is how to remove the heat that would be generated by the receiver. I will save this idea for the dead of winter when I have more time.