DIYer Displays the Art of Home Theater
By Rachel Cericola
Rob Sprance isn't a film snob. This indie film fan is just a do-it-yourselfer with a small theater in his spare bedroom.

Rob Sprance cherishes the indie vibe, but he also isn’t afraid to blast a little Bourne in his bedroom theater. That’s right; his “Arthouse” home theater is located in a spare bedroom on the second floor.

“The only other option was my basement, which has a ceiling height of only 6 feet and these big steel poles to support the house,” says Rob of his choice of location. “It’s great if I wanted to build a torture chamber, but for a theater ... not so much.”



So Rob put the theater in that spare room, which is located at the very last door in the upstairs hallway. Although he has sound isolation measures in place, he does admit that sleeping in the next room could be a problem. However, he and wife Maria usually share the theater experience together. “You’d have to ask the cats,” he quips.

Choosing the room was a no-brainer. The demolition process was a whole other story. To get the effect that he wanted, Rob wanted to start from scratch. That meant ripping out the walls all the way down to the studs. The closet was also removed, which added another three feet to the room. He could have spent $400 on a Dumpster. However, he decided to call in a pro, after they made an offer he couldn’t refuse: $800 to do the whole deed, including carting off the excess. For the rest of the project, he was on his own.

With the demo out of the way and a blank canvas to work with, Rob had a lot of planning to do. Figuring out the viewing angles, screen height, second row height and other such details proved to be the most challenging piece of his project. However, creating the perimeter soffit was no picnic, either. “Making the perimeter soffit come out even in spite of the crooked walls of the house certainly had me coming up with some new, creative words,” Rob says.

Equipment was also an issue, so he spent a lot of time running his selections by the members of the AVS Forum. “Some of the suggestions on AVS saved the day for me,” he says. “They are not afraid to tell you when you are about to do something stupid, which happens to be pretty often in my case.”

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