Screen types

[KennyG]

I'm currently using a Draper Premier with 1.3 gain, but it looks like I have this monster sold, and will be getting a slightly smaller one to fit my room.
In your opinion who makes the best screen in the 1.3 to 1.5 gain range?
I have heard good things about Stewart, but can't seem to get into their web site.

[JonMarsh]

There are many people that swear by Stewart; they definitely have some quality products, with prices to match!

My favorite is the DA-LITE HighPower surface for retroreflective (no hotspotting, very small beads (8 um), no sparkles or other weirdness, good control of room light, and even works well in ceiling mount, though best in that mode with a dark ceiling (to control light scatter). Their smaller 16X9 is 96" diagonal; of course, they have lots of options, pull downs, etc. Another interesting surface they make is their Wide Power, which is used for the Insta THeater screens, may be available on some others. Not quite as much gain, but better suited for ceiling mount.
My friend Bill Cushman points out that the human eye doesn't start to close down on the iris (from full open in the dark) until you get up to about 50 ft. Lamberts. This can be just achieved with a High Power surface and a 10HT, which in Cinema black and with practical color setting has a maximum light output of around 600 lumens, resulting in about 47 ft. lamberts off the screen. Obviously, for any CRT setup, this much screen gain is not overdoing it. Try getting one of the sample patch kits; you can put up a big piece of white foam core artboard, which is a nice, bright, clean white, (no gain, obviously!) and try some of the various screen types from DA-LITE. I've seen photo's of how this looks; it's a little startling, actually!

Regards, and happy weekend!

-Jon




Earth First!
_______________________________
We'll screw up the other planets later....

[KennyG]

I'm going to try getting samples from Da-Lite and stewart, I have now seen stewart's studiotek 130 surface, it's a much better surface than my Draper.