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Screen Placement and Calibrating the Projector Find out how important screen placement is for your new home theater. From "Home Theater" episode DHTW-105

Host Corey Greenberg is joined by engineer Mark Midyett to finish the home theater in this final episode.

In the previous four episodes of DIY's Home Theater Workshop, host Corey Greenberg, a technology expert, and engineer Mark Midyett have done the following:

• In the first episode, which was basically a Home Theater 101 class, you were enlightened about the latest and greatest trends in electronics, including information on screens, projectors and all components.

• Shared design tricks to help you create the best sound and picture possible.

• Explained formulas for determining the best seating positions and speaker placements in your new home theater.

• Shown you how to custom-build your floor, walls and ceiling to help make movie-theater magic.

• Shared do-it-yourself tricks on creating acoustic treatments so you can better enjoy the incredible sound that music and movies have to offer.

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Now it's time to wrap up this project by installing the screen and projector and programming the remote control. In this first segment you'll find out how to calibrate the video projector as well as the speaker levels.

In the early stages of building this home theater, Corey and Mark, along with homeowner Peter Moore, determined that the seating positions would be two-thirds back from the front wall and one-third away from the side walls (figure A). Once the chairs were placed, the screen location had to be determined. Home theater designers use a formula to figure out where the center of the screen should go:

• The center of the screen should be no higher than 15-degrees above the viewer, and the top of the screen should be no more than 35-degrees above the viewer. Since the "average" person sits 36" high in a chair, the center of the screen should be no higher than 5', 10" from the ground (figure B). And that's where we're hanging our screen on the wall.

Figure A

Figure B

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