Essential Install | CEDIA
This family media
room completed by
Connected Works
underlines the
ability of cinema
to bring people
together
Is home cinema
entering a
golden age?
Owen thinks so
Is Home Cinema
Still Relevant In 2017?
Yes, more relevant than ever, argues Owen Maddock,
owner at Bristol-based home technology specialists
ConnectedWorks and self-confessed cinephile.
It started with a little Twitter spat. In a discussion about
home cinema, one very active member tweeted ‘I don’t
get it’ and I replied ‘but I don’t get Polo; that’s okay…’ and
things escalated. Our industry is fi lled with passionate
people which is wonderful, but I thought it worth
explaining what’s behind my thinking.
In the wider market, people who once bought entry AV
receivers and 5.1 satellite speakers are now buying sound-
bars. Where simplicity and ease of install are critical, that
makes complete sense.
But, up from there, cinema at home remains very
popular and is growing nicely. That’s not my opinion! It’s from Lucasfi lm (THX), Dolby
Labs and other global standard-setting bodies.
Sound should take you away to another world, while
reproducing all the dynamics of the orchestra. More
recently, immersive 3D audio is a major step forward in
this sense of immersion.
When we create our cinemas, the best part is the
handover. Clients may be experiencing true cinema at
home for the fi rst time. Ideally, the children will be there –
the look on their faces should be all the feedback you need.
Reasons To Be Useful –
One, Two, Three It all depends on the room. Room size dictates the ideal
spec and that affects the equipment and the price. Double
the distance to speakers means the power needed goes
up four times. So, £100k might be opulent – but, in a fairly
large space, it might just be ‘what’s needed’.
That same room size versus performance trade-off
happens with all-in-one systems too – the only difference
is, there’s nothing you can do. The system just performs
less well – or struggles more – in larger spaces. Never
assume that one quality fi ts all.
We still hear, ‘you might as well go to the cinema’ or, ‘you
only watch one fi lm a week’ (you might). But today, there
are new reasons to fi re up the cinema:
• ‘Event’ TV: It started with The Sopranos. Box-set TV is
brilliantly well-made and entertains for hours. I’m really
looking forward to Stranger Things 2.
• Gaming: Playing games on a well-designed cinema
is breathtakingly impressive. This is an important and
substantial market.
• Sport: Many clients love sport! Where appropriate,
design for ‘watching sport with friends’.
• Plus, perhaps a fourth: Home cinema brings families
together and gets everyone off their phones.
The Golden Age
Today’s Home Cinema purchaser is extremely lucky.
Projectors are brighter, more colourful and more accurate.
Modern AVRs and pre/processors vastly outperform
their predecessors. We can achieve more with less, just
because the tech has improved.
The Cinema Experience
Cinema is a designed experience, meant to fi ll up your
senses. Picture should occupy most of your fi eld of vision.
At mainstream sizes, in most rooms, a TV doesn’t do it.
32 | July 2017
Did We Mention The Price?
Design Training
If you want to take advantage of the market opportunity,
then make sure you get trained. CEDIA’s two-day
interactive Cinema Design Specialist course is core
training for home cinema designers. Day 1 teaches
engineering fundamentals; on Day 2 you apply them to
a challenging client brief. This excellent course certainly
raised my cinema game – it’s essential. We stayed off ‘the
numbers’ for this piece – they’re in the training.
I fi rmly believe there is still a very good cinema
business for home technology integrators and will be for
many years to come.
For more information on joining CEDIA, visit the
association’s website at www.cedia.co.uk.
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or join the CEDIA group on LinkedIn.