Client
Wanda Group
Location
Qingdao, China
Completion date
2018
The Oriental Movie Metropolis Grand Theatre in Qingdao is a major Chinese studio, combining film and television production which includes a grand theatre of 2,000 seats, a medium theatre for 1,000 spectators, a multifunctional space, and cinemas.
The complex, which will be the main venue of Qingdao International Film Festival, covers a floor area of 25,000 m2. It has been described as the “Hollywood of the East”, and will be the largest movie production complex in the world, featuring some of the world’s largest and most technologically-advanced facilities.
Our Scope
Marshall Day Acoustics, as sub-consultant to dUCKS scéno, provided full acoustic design services from concept to completion. dUCKS scéno was theatre consultant for the concept design of the Grand Theatre, the technical and auxiliary spaces, which included the design of the stage machinery, lighting and audiovisual systems. The Grand Theatre was equipped with a Dolby Atmos system and Vivace, an artificial reverberation system.
Challenges
The design of the Grand Theatre’s room acoustics faced two key challenges:
- Defining suitable reverberation time criteria for such an unusually large amplified hall, whilst complying in principle with the Dolby ATMOS standards
- Designing suitable absorptive treatments that integrate into the interior design which favours hard looking surfaces
We were able to meet the above challenges through our highly accurate predictions of the acoustical performance of absorptive constructions, which were based on the calculation algorithms of our software Zorba.
Outcomes
The approach proved successful. The first commissioning measurements in the room demonstrated compliance with the design objectives. The measured reverberation time was below 1.0s at mid frequencies and below 1.2s at 125-250Hz. With a background noise level measured below NR25, no further interventions were required.
The acoustics of the Grand Theatre was completed and commissioned successfully. In late 2017, the theatre was evaluated by an expert panel formed by dozens of people and received very favourable feedback, including the quote below.
"It is not difficult to achieve a full score for one type of genre, but it is difficult to achieve full scores for every type of genres. If there is a college entrance contest among all the theatres, there is no doubt that the champion shall go to this theatre."
