Need Help On Mattes (1 Viewer)

[Andrea W]

Forgive me for asking this question. I know it's been asked many times, and back in April I saved a link to an awsome thread here on the subject, but procrastinated too long and now it's gone.
I'm looking for suggestions on and examples of mattes. I have a Hitachi 43FDX01B RPTV, which has an A/V cabinet and center speaker butted up to the right of it. You can see it pictured in my room here:
http://darius.mobius-soft.com/~andrea/ht/

 

[Andrea W]

Bump

 

[Michael Shannon]

Hi Andrea, I used black foam board I purchased at a art-supply store. I have sizes for different aspect ratios. I used velcro strip on the front of my Tosh 43 inch tv that blends in pretty well. After noticing the color on your TV that idea probably would not look the best. I would suggest elastic and put the velcro strips on the sides or back of your TV. If you place velcro strip on the TV and Mattes it should be easy to use with your diffent size mattes for various Aspect Ratios.
Patrick Sun has a excellent area on his site on how to build mattes that I followed and it was easy and cheap. Maybe he will post a link for you in this thread.
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[Glen_L]

Here are a couple of links (the first is Patrick Sun's, as mentioned above):
http://www.io.com/~patman/ht.html#mattes
http://www.bus.ucf.edu/cwhite/theater/Mattes.htm

 

[Andrea W]

I've finally made my mattes. I bought a sheet of lucite and cut strips to size for my TV in both the 1.85 and 2.35 ratios. I cut it so the lucite will fit within the borders of my TV screen (inside the lip, so to speak). I also realized that despite having my TV converged by a service tech, the geometry is not quite perfect. The gray bars at the top are bigger than the bars at the bottom. So I ended up with 4 different sized strips. Anyway, then I glued black felt to the lucite and wrapped it around the edges but not all the way around the whole strip (so there was still some bare lucite on the back). I stuck removable wall mounts (reusable squares with a special removable adhesive) to the back on the lucite. This "sticks" the mattes to the screen (my TV has a screen protector). It "unsticks" quite nicely. Here's the finished product. Click the images for larger pictures.
Link Removed*Link Removed
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http://darius.mobius-soft.com/~andrea/ht/
[Edited last by Andrea W on August 21, 2001 at 11:45 PM]

 

[Robert G]

Good job Andrea. How do you like them so far. I know that I could never do with out them for 2.35:1 AR movies. I have a widescreen set so 1.85:1 plus overscan = no bars for those movies.

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[Andrea W]

If I had to do it again, I would go with darker (smoke colored) lucite rather than the clear. They really need two layers of black felt. I've fixed (glued another felt layer to) my 1.85 set, but not my 2.35 set.
They really make a difference! My TV has a 16x9 mode so for 2.35 anamorphic movies, I have gray bars and black bars. Looks really goofy. Until I stick on the mattes.
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http://darius.mobius-soft.com/~andrea/ht/

 

[Jason Merrick]

Let me ask you guys a question...
Are mattes worth it for a direct-view 27" (as opposed to a RPTV 27"

) or will they not make that big of a difference?
I go into the service menu for all anamorphic DVD's and perform the squeeze trick, so I do get a funny small whitish/grey rectangle at the bottom of the image, which a matte would probably cover nicely... but is it that big of a difference?
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[Philip Hamm]

Beautiful photos and nice mattes. Thanks for sharing!
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Philip Hamm
AIM: PhilBiker

 

[Matt DeVillier]

Are mattes worth it for a direct-view 27" (as opposed to a RPTV 27" ) or will they not make that big of a difference?

I recently made mattes for my 27" wega and won't watch movies without them again
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My DVD collection

 

[Jason Merrick]

Thanks Matt!
What process did you use? Any of the above?
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[RyanM]

Jason,
I have a 32" direct view. I simply used a single sheet of black posterboard (

 

[Jay Mitchosky]

I'm interested in the wall adhesive Andrea mentions. I made a similar style of mattes for my TV using black foam board. They are cut to size for top and bottom (with the unexpected benefit of beveled edges due to the angle of the cut that allow them to sit neatly in place). Up until now I've been using basic masking tape (folded over) to keep them in place not having come up with a better solution.
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--Jay
"No one can hear when you're screaming in digital."
My Home Theatre Pictures...
"You're no messiah. You're, you're a movie of the week. You're a ... t-shirt, at best."

 

[Andrea W]

Jay, this is what I used:
Link Removed
I got them at Office Max or Office Depot.
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http://darius.mobius-soft.com/~andrea/ht/

 

[Joe D]

Mattes are great for Direct View TV's, I made mattes about a year ago for my 25" TV, and they work great. I just laugh when someone questions using mattes, saying they calibrated with Avia or whatever, so the blacks should be black. HA HA HA.
BTW, it is good to calibrate, I'm not dissing that.
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Joe Dahlen
"Take hold of the flame, you've got nothing to lose, but everything to gain."

 

[Marianne]

Are mattes worth it for a direct-view 27" (as opposed to a RPTV 27" ) or will they not make that big of a difference?

Jason,
I have a 27" direct-view TV and I have used mattes for several months. I use black felt strips folded in half attached by velcro to the sides of the TV. They can be moved up or down depending on the AR of the DVD. The felt strips stretch to fit the curve of the screen.
Mattes work really well for me because my TV is black and in a cabinet. When the lights are out (backlight only) the picture appears in correct AR floating in a black space.
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Marianne
"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here,
this is the War Room Home Theater Forum!"