A LOOK AT WHAT’S NEW IN HOME THEATRES
People want to see the equipment less and less.
ROBERT BORZELLI
As technology continues to evolve, particularly in the residential realm, so, too, does home entertainment. Streaming services have allowed us to pull a myriad of TV series as well as movies from countless sources, and home-theatre innovators are diligently working to give customers more options when it comes to home-viewing.
“One thing that is really important is you have to define what a home theatre is,” said Daniel Daigneault, president of Cineconsulte Inc. “To many people, a home theatre is just a big screen on their wall with a few speakers when, realistically, it’s not — that’s called a TV or media room.
“A home theatre is when you’re dedicating an entire room to a specific function.”
“While a dedicated TV room is on the decline, we are trying to integrate theatre functions into their living rooms,” added Robert Borzelli of Fillion Électronique.
Innovations on both the picture and audio side of home theatres are on the rise, elevating the overall viewing experience, Borzelli said.
“There are UHD TVs on the picture side, which gives you a more precise picture because there are more lines of resolution. People want bigger screens than they used to, so today people are buying 70 inches and over.”
In audio, there’s a new home theatre feature called Atmos, which offers more dimension to the sound of home theatres. Relatively new to the market in the last six months or so, this new way of achieving sound effects had once been reserved for large public movie theatres.
“First 3D came out in pictures and now we have three-dimensional sound with speakers in the ceiling,” Borzelli said. “It gives you dimension overhead. Imagine a plane passing overhead where the sound comes out of the ceiling.
“Most of the systems can simulate an Atmos mode with an amplifier. However, there’s only about 20 to 30 movies that are available and recorded in this format. And you need to be very careful with the positioning of those speakers, which becomes critical to achieving 3D sound.”
Setting up these systems needs to be done in an effective yet seamless way, not just for functionality but in order to remain stylish, too.
“People want to see the equipment less and less,” Borzelli said. “What people have to be careful with is that the wiring has to be prepared accordingly — it’s not as simple as it used to be to set up. The TV has to be compatible and the sound system has to be compatible.
“People are also now going more into in-wall speakers, which are speakers that you barely see,” he added. “The big speaker is not dead, but slowing down considerably and being replaced by smaller speakers which, if well-tuned and well-selected, will give you results very similar to the big speaker.
“People don’t want humongous speakers in their living rooms; they tend to go with in-wall speakers.”
This new wave of residential home theatre technology is quickly making the need for public movie theatres obsolete. Who needs to shell out half a week’s salary for a night out at the movies when all of the technologies can be integrated at home?
“You’re in your house, you can have people over, you can talk — all in the comfort of your home,” Daigneault said.
“People didn’t have busy lives back when we went to drive-ins. Now, on the weekends, kids have activities, people are working, and we have such busy lives that it’s very nice to bring that experience of the movie to our homes. And it’s even closer to experiencing what you have in the theatres.
“The needs of the consumer are evolving as the Y generation and even younger are growing up and getting jobs and starting out at life.
“Their requirements are a lot different than (those of ) my parents or your parents — and the industry is keeping up.”