My grey screen test. (1 Viewer)

[Dustin B]

Well I just wasted $30CDN on fabric and two cans of spray paint to be confident that I don't want to paint my screen.

Pictures are at the below link.

http://dustin.bunnyhug.net/screen.php


Summary:

From my testing, grey screens (I should caveat this to DIY blackout cloth, fabric side out, screens) definately improve black levels on digital projectors. But what they do to colors isn't a trade off I'm willing to make. Black levels are good enough on the my 300U that they don't bother me at all on bright scenes, and then only slightly on the very darkest scenes. On brighter scenes the sacrifice to color fidelity of the grey screens was to great for me.

 

[Neil Joseph]

I did the same kind of tests before I made my DIY screen except that I also tested various combinations of Behr Silver, Chromiance, and gray mixtures along with the tremco Tremclad High Heat Enamel Aluminium that I enede up using on my formica surface. I noticed much of the same things with the gray as your pictures depict but I found the alumnium to be less of a problem with colours than the gray was.

 

[Ron-P]

High heat enamel silver from Rustoleum is on the left and high heat enamel aluminum from Tremclad is on the right.

I tired that same Rustoleum and was very dissatisifited with the results. I could not find the Tremclad to give it a try. The Lowe's Valspar gray I used came with great results, nothing like those in your pics. Colors were vertually unaffected and black levels increased. It is a very light gray color.

I need to update my screen shots as I finally calibrated with AVIA last weekend, but even from my older shots from Moulin Rouge, you can see how nice black levels look in the first pic and how flesh tones and other colors are vertually unaffected in the second pic.

Screen Shots



Peace Out~

 

[Ron-P]

Hey Dustin, do you happen to know the thread size on your Panny? I am going to attempt to ceiling mount mine in the same type fashion you did.


Peace Out~

 

[Dustin B]

They are metric. Size is M4. Not the easiest things in the world to find. I lucked out and found some short ones. But I'm gonna be going to a bolt supply place soon to special order some much longer ones so I can actually do the compression spring thing.

 

[Ron-P]

Thanks Dustin, I'll hit up my local Lowe's and HD to see if they stock'em.


Peace Out~

 

[Rik P]

You may have better luck at Ace or a small hardware store. They usally carry more variety of nuts and bolts & various sizes of compression springs.
I built my l300U bracket the same way Monkey Man did (over at AVS) and its works great. Adjusting the projector is easy if you use the wing nuts and higher gauge compression springs.

Rick

 

[Andrew Pratt]

Dustin I highly recomend you give this mix a try.

DDog silver paint

 

[Dustin B]

Damn it Pratt. I was just gonna be happy with my plain blackout cloth screen and now I'm gonna have to waste more time and money experimenting with this Ddog mix

 

[Andrew Pratt]

Dustin its worth it My suggestion would be to get a small 4-6" foam roller and try just the silver/glaze/white and a drop of red and apply that directly to the rubbery side of the black out cloth. I tried all sorts of application methods incl a wagner sprayer but I found the roller worked best. The trick is apply as little paint as possible and keep working a wet edge. By that i mean get the roller wet then roll out most of the paint on the tray then roll on the screen. When you see you've rolled on the paint from the roller keep rolling over the wet area you just painted and the area around it so that you remove all the roller marks. You should be able to use just the weight of the roller for these last strokes and if you keep working along the edge of where you last left off you should always have a nice wet edge to paint against which will help get a seemless screen. I tried on my old 4:3 blackout screen to perfect my methods before starting on my new 16:9 screen. One last thing the reason you want it thin is that you can't touch up silver paint like you can with most other paint...its not the easiest stuff to work with but it is possible. Also stick to Behr Premium silver I tried a ralph lauren silver when I couldn't find the Behr and it had a large flake size and the screen glittered FYI HD carries Behr silver and glaze in a cardboard display next to the tills

 

[Michael TLV]

Greetings

Dustin ... proper adjustment of the grayscale on the projector can account for the effects of the gray screen.

Regards

 

[Neil Joseph]

Also, if you are going to apply paint using a roller, look for a product called Floetrol which can be found at Home Depot. It makes the paint act like an oil based paint so streaking is minimized.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

Also paint the screen leaned up against the wall so that if there are any drips they won't land on your screen but on the floor.

 

[Ron-P]

You may have better luck at Ace

I did, found all the 4m hardware I needed at the Ace by my house. I swung by Home Depot and picked up the pipe hardware. I just looked up Monkey_Man's mount and found I bought the same flange's and such that he used. I bought 1" diameter instead of 3/4" like his so I can run all the cables through the pipe into the ceiling. I built my Projector plate and ceiling plate last night. By this weekend she should be ceiling mounted.

Sorry for the thread derail Dustin :b


Peace Out~

 

[KenBo]

Dustin, where did you get your blackout cloth? I need to build a screen, I'm considering the Formica like Neil, but I wouldn't mind checking out the blackout as well.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

Ken most fabric stores carry black out cloth.

 

[Dustin B]

Michael, is there any way for me to make the greyscale adjustments without the appropriate measuring equipment or highering an ISF tech? Although if you ever make some trips out to Saskatchewan I might actually have to give you a try. What would the cost be for a greyscale and color adjustment on a digital projector.

No problem with the thread high jack Ron, but if my local bolt place won't be reasonable in special ordering me some longer M4 stove bolts I might half to fine you by getting you to mail some my way

Ken, like Andrew said I got it at a local fabric store. If they don't know what you are talking about it will be the stuff they mostly sell as backing or inserts for curtains. But someone in the store should know what you are asking for by the name blackout fabric.

 

[Ron-P]

No problem with the thread high jack Ron, but if my local bolt place won't be reasonable in special ordering me some longer M4 stove bolts I might half to fine you by getting you to mail some my way

Just say the word.



Peace Out~