Key Takeaways
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You don’t have to keep your home theater inside your house. We will show you how to build an outdoor home theater where you can watch movies, play music, and have fun with your friends and family.
Contents
Equipment Needed for an Outdoor Home Theater
You’ll need the following items to set up a portable home theater in your outdoor yard:
- A video projector
- A screen
- An audio system and speakers
- Content source devices
- Cables or wires
- A surge protector
Build a Screen for Your Outdoor Home Theater
Two or three well-pressed king-size white bedsheets can be used to make a projector screen. Place two sheets together with their long sides touching, and sew them together with white thread.
You can hang a bedsheet on a clothesline, a wall, or a rain drain. You need to be able to anchor or tie the sheet’s top, sides, and bottom so it stays tight and doesn’t flap in the wind. You might need clothespins, rope, duct tape, or some other kind of fixing material to help you hold the sheets together. You can also use or make a frame that looks like a square trampoline frame but is placed vertically.
Read More: How to Connect Your Phone to Your TV Using USB: [Updated Guide 2024]
Buy a Projector Screen for Outdoor Use
If it’s too hard to make and hang a screen, buy a big one that you can move around. Because its surface is reflective, a professional projector screen gives you a better picture, but it costs more and takes longer to set up. If you’re going to use a pre-made screen, get one that’s a little bigger than you think you’ll need. This will give you more options for setting up the projector.
Selecting a Video Projector
Change the distance between the projector and the screen when you set up your video projector to see what looks best in your room. How far away the screen is from the projector makes a big difference. There should be at least twenty feet between them.
It can be pricey to buy a video projector. Still, there are a lot of cheap projectors out there that work well and cost $1,500 or less. It costs more to watch movies in 3D because you need a 3D projector, a 3D Blu-ray player, 3D Blu-ray movies, and enough 3D glasses for everyone.
The Outdoor TV Alternative
A projector and screen together are the best and most affordable way to watch movies outside, but you can also choose an outdoor TV that stands alone. Outdoor LED/LCD TVs come in a range of styles and sizes, but most are between 32 and 65 inches.
Heavy-duty construction makes TVs made for outdoor use resistant to weather and temperature changes. Some are also resistant to rain. Some have cooling fans and heaters to deal with temperature changes, so they can be used all year in many places.
Outdoor TVs have anti-glare coatings that let you watch them during the day, but they look best when they’re not in full sunlight, like under a patio cover. These TVs cost more than LED or LCD TVs of the same size, and most of them don’t have any extra features. However, some of them can handle 4K display resolution.
Most outdoor TVs come with a simple sound system that might be enough for a small watching area. For an outdoor home theater experience, though, you should get an external sound system.
Pick Out Your Devices for Content Sources
An upscaling DVD player is better for a big screen if you want to play DVDs. It would be better to buy a small Blu-ray disc player. You could also hook up a laptop that has a DVD or Blu-ray drive to the screen.
Some other source items you might want are:
- DTV converter box: Most video displays don’t come with built-in TV tuners. A DTV converter box and an antenna can be used to watch live TV. These are the boxes that let analog TVs receive digital TV programs. First, hook up the music from the DTV converter box to the sound system. Then, hook up the projector’s composite video input to the yellow composite video output of the DTV converter box. While the DTV converter box can receive high-definition TV signals, it only sends out standard-definition signals.
- TV antenna: When you want to watch local TV, connect an antenna to an outdoor TV that has a tuner built-in. Some outdoor TVs let you get TV broadcasts from an indoor cable or satellite box without wires.
- Media streamer: You can use the composite, component, or HDMI ports on the video projector to add a media streamer.
Provide Audio Services for Backyards
While some video projectors come with an amplifier and speaker, the volume is usually only loud enough for small rooms like classes and business meetings. That’s why you need to set up the music for your outdoor home theater.
It should be fine with a simple two-channel audio receiver. You can also buy speakers that are mounted on the wall, built into the wall, or outside. These speakers will look better in your garden and sound better outside.
For best sound, put speakers on the wall in the top corners of the screen or the middle of each side’s top and bottom edges. If the speakers are floor-standing, place them below the left and right sides of the screen. They should be turned in a little toward the middle so that the sound goes toward the area where people are watching and listening. Try different settings for the speakers to see which ones work best.
Outdoor Home Theater Tips
To make your outdoor home theater experience even better, here are additional tips:
- Make sure that the projector can get a lot of air from the back and sides. A small video projector can get very hot. If the light temperature gets too high, it might turn off for a while. To keep the projector cool, you might need to add an extra fan from the outside.
- So your neighbors don’t get shocked by the noise, invite them over or let them know what you’re up to. If you want them to come to your outdoor home theater, you might want to offer them food.
- If you live in a neighborhood with a homeowners association, find out if there are any rules or ways to let them know about this kind of action. It’s important to follow noise rules in your neighborhood and listen to valid complaints.
- The movie house in your backyard is not a business. The public can’t see your ads—no flyers, posters, or neighborhood newsletters. You also can’t charge people to enter a place where a copyrighted movie or TV show is being shown.
- Keep parts away from fires and swimming pools. Keep an eye out for heat, smoke, water, and other dangerous things. Do not put the video projector on the top shelf of the rack if you live in a place that gets hot. This might need a rack that is higher and has an extra shelf inside.
- Check your surroundings for other things that might make it hard to see, like noise from outside sources and light from streetlights, garden lights, and your neighbors’ homes.
- Set aside a place in your garage or house to store the power line, sheet, speakers, and component rack. This will make it simple to put everything back together in the summer and for other events.