HT combining RPTV and FPTV (1 Viewer)

[Max Knight]

Hi everyone,

I currently live in a lovely NYC loft, using a Toshiba TW40H80 as my display device. The HT is setup in the far end of the room, well away from the windows. I am looking towards purchasing a projector for movie viewing, and had given thought to doing away with the RPTV totally. My wife, however, is very attached to the RPTV (gotta love that!), and wants to have both the RPTV, and the FPTV (for movies 90% of the time, and a few TV shows).

My problem is now to figure out how to make this all work! In my poor ascii art way, I'm going to draw my setup:

|-----------D------
|.........s.........
|T.......e.........
|V.......a.........
|.........t.........
_------------------

The space between the front of the TV and the seating is 7 feet. The TV is 18" deep, more or less. The rear wall is a good 19' from the front wall. The ceilings are 12'6". I can't really move the seating back too much, as there is a door (D) on the "top" wall and I don't want to impede the flow of traffic.

I can mount the projector on the rear wall at pretty much any height I like.

I'm trying to figure out the best way to position the screen. I figure my options are as follows:

1. Project the screen onto the wall above and behind the TV. This might be too high an image? I imagine that in the dark the turned off TV wouldn't be a visual problem in and of itself.

2. Buy a standing screen and set it up in front of the TV for movie time. This might make us sit too close to the screen?

3. Lower the screen from the ceiling (that's a long way down!) to come just in front of the TV. This might make us sit too close as well?

So fellow HT nuts, and advice? Which of my screen position options do you think would be the best? And innovative ideas I have not considered?

Thanks!

 

[Neil Joseph]

And innovative ideas I have not considered?

I have a crazy idea. What is behind the front wall? Can you recess the RPTV into the front wall? Perhaps you can build a riser for your seating (wife approval of course) and have a permanent screen above the RPTV (on the front wall). How tall is the RPTV and how low can you go with the screen (from the floor)?

 

[TedE]

What about an entertainment center built around the TV? I know you can get custom built entertainment centers (or out of the box ones that will fit many RPTVs). I imagine that it wouldn't take a whole lot of engineering to mount a pull down screen along the top, probably hidden in something like a window valence. It could be designed to be almost flush with the front of the TV screen when pulled down, maintaining your current viewing distance.

 

[Max Knight]

The wall is a no-no in terms of recessing stuff. We are a corner unit so there isn't too far until it's sky and birds!

The TV is about 44" tall, and I have a center speaker on top of it now that is 6" tall, so let's call it 50" total height.

The entertainment center is an idea. I'd have to do some serious work to keep it in line with the rather modern and spare look of the loft. Maybe I could just build a discrete metal framework that would support the center speaker and provide a screen holding bar. That would also minimize the "enclosure" of the speakers and let them breathe.

Very interesting responses so far, please keep them coming!

 

[Max Knight]

So do people think that projecting the image on the wall with the bottom at a height of 50" would be too high? Am I going to get neck strain with that?

I'm trying to conceptualize a frame or some method of suspending the screen just in front of the TV, but that might prove difficult.

Thanks,

 

[Neil Joseph]

50" is fairly high unless you build a riser (approx 6") for the seating dropping the percepted height to 44". If you look at my setup, you will see that I ran into challanges because of my ceiling which is 13' high, using amounting pole for my projector that would not be too long (2ft), using as little keystoning as I could get by with, and having the screen not end up 7ft off the ground. My final height was about 44".

 

[Max Knight]

Hmm... Interesting setup Neil. How far do you sit from the screen? From your post, I understand that the lower edge of your screen is 44" above the floor?

I don't know that a riser would look all that great, especially because it's a couch and that would leave our feet dangling unless we made it a substantial riser. I think a screen framework might be the way to go.

 

[Max Knight]

Here is an interesting idea:
http://www.projectus.net/daldelin.html
This is a roll-up screen that sits on the floor, and extends upwards! It supports itself. I could just lay this on the floor in front of the TV (not a lot of traffic there), and roll it up as needed.

 

[Doug_B]

OK.
1) The pull down screen from the ceiling is not uncommon at all. There is no need to hide the TV completely; it just needs to be low enough for a comfortable view heightwise. If your center channel speaker sits on the TV, maybe a perforated pulldown is in order. I do agree that 7 ft (minus screen thickness and offset from TV) is close, butyou can get a screeen size that is appropriate for that distance.
2) What is on the wall behind your seat? Can you mount a screen there? The distance sounds OK. Put your couch on a rotating platform (you did ask for innovative ).
Doug

 

[Max Knight]

Hi Doug, thanks for the comments.

I think my problem has been solved! I did some measurements, and there is a weird angles soffit-like projection that sticks out above my TV sticks far enough out that a screen mounted to it would clear the TV! That Soffit (I have no idea how to spell that) is only 10' above the floor, so a normal ceiling mount would work there.

Now the question is how much work would it be to put in one of those cool in-ceiling screens? Anyone ever done that here?

 

[Luke_Y]

there is a weird angles soffit-like projection that sticks out above my TV sticks far enough out that a screen mounted to it would clear the TV!...Now the question is how much work would it be to put in one of those cool in-ceiling screens?

Do you know what the "soffit" area is for? Is there anything inside it like HVAC ducts or anything? If so that may limit your ability to mount a motorized in ceiling screen but you should still be OK to mount a drop down screen externally there. Look into it and let us know what you find.

 

[Max Knight]

I'm going to try and contact our Condo office and see if they can tell me what's in there. It's a large soffit, so I'm betting there will be a fair amount of space in it.

 

[Mike Hamilton]

Beware of using a perforated screen, particularly with a fixed pixel projector.
First, light striking the screen is also going to go right through it, illuminating what ever is behind it. From your description, it will be the Toshiba, so light hitting the Toshiba will be reflected back through the screen via the perforations, and disturb color balance.

Secondly, perforations sometimes line up with the pixel patterns on the screen surface, creating a puzzling, non-electronic moire effect that will terribly annoy you.

Is it possible to relocate the center channel in some fashion? I have seen where the speakers in an RPTV have been replaced with high quality car speakers that get shielded via "bucking" magnets glued to those on the replacement speaker motor structure (obviously, the size of the original and the replacement speakers must match!).
An auto A/B switch from Sonance or Niles can then divert the center channel audio signal from the internal and external amplifiers.

Yes, there are negatives relative to timbre matching that make this less than ideal, but the trade-off is well worth it. In once sense, movie sound is virtually completely manufactured by design, so clarity of voice is the primary concern. This is easily accomplished with judicious selection of the replacement speaker. An adulterated, large, front projected video image is not going to be as easy to fix with the problems described above.

 

[Max Knight]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for the heads up about the perforated screen. I think that I should be able to move the center channel to a stand in front of the screen without too much issue. There is a large coffee table that would be troubling at the moment, but we are planning on replacing that with something smaller.

 

[Max Knight]

Ok, I've been crunching some numbers and this is what I have come up with.

Since my seating would be about 7' from the screen (can't really move this back and further), I can get away with about a 64" diagonal 16x9 screen. This would mean a screen height of 31".

Given a 31" screen height, how far off the floor should the lower edge of the screen be?

From what I've heard a ceiling mounted projector has to line up the center of the lens with the top of the screen. So if the bottom of the screen is X inches above the floor, then the top of the screen would be X + 31 inches above the floor, and this is where the projector would have to be.

I'm guessing we are talking about 36" maybe for X. That means the projector can only be 67" above the floor, way too low for a ceiling mount with my high ceilings. The rear wall is pretty far away (about 14' from the screen). Using a panasonic AE300 (the projector I was considering), that would leave about a 120" diagonal 16x9 screen, WAY too big for my seating.

Given that the AE300 has some keystone correction, about how high do you guys think I could put the projector?