When the film "Harsh Times" was out at the Cinema, it was hardly ever shown, & only at a cinema that was miles away & at 10pm so I never had the opportunity to watch it at the cinema, so I decided I would make a projector because it deserves to be watched on a big screen.

It is a 400W HD Dual Bulb Vega Overhead Projector,
( http://www.wedgwood-group.com/tci_l36-400c...in_lamp_ohp.htm )
with an Iiyama 15" LCD dismantled & positioned over the glass, separated by plywood fixings, & cooled by a single (although 2 fans fitted incase 2 will be needed when completed) 80mm 12V DC Fan (quiet fan with good airflow made by CoolerMaster). In the small room that we have it in it projects fantastically, & diagonally the projection is approximately 140" for a 2.35:1 aspect ratio film, I think it would probably be able to do bigger if it was in a bigger room, although I'm amazed at the size & quality of the projection. Original design came from here: http://tomshardware.co.uk/2004/11/13/super...for_/page9.html

I will be using it for films mainly. I am obsessed with the cinema, I love it, so much so that I have even downloaded cinema trailers for playing in sequence before films on my PJ: (Carlton Screen Advertising, XBOX360 Console 100 HD Titles, Gears of War Cinema Trailer, Apocalypto "Cinema experience" ad, Movie Trailers, Orange NY Blackout "Phones Off" ad, Homemade BBFC Image with film title).

I will be making a Plywood casing for the top of the projector to hold everything in place (fan, lcd, circuit boards, uv resistant glass, lcd buttons) & also to trap light.

I will use a HTPC with it mainly, but also my Xbox360.

I will post a video & photos when I go to the place with the projector again (other house).

It should look something like this from left-front angle:

Don't know if you'd be interested, but I'm an actor/impersonator and do a pretty good "movie guy" impersonation... if you wanted me to record some lines for your home theatre I'd be happy to do so.

I'm still waiting on my LCD to get my projector started... hope yours works out for you!

Thanks, if you could record yourself doing your best impersonation of the "Apocalypto Cinema Experience ad" found HERE, (timing must be exactly the same as the video) that would be great because I'm re-creating that ad with high quality trailers from the net, editing them with video studio 10. The audio from that video is ok, but it would be great to have a re-created voice for the ad. I'm also great at impersonating but you're a professional so you might be able to do a better impersonation of that voice. Thanks again.

I have done most of the measurements, drawn them onto the plywood, & used my Dremel to cut them out yesterday. Ordered a motherboard for the Desktop PC that I'll be using with the projector. I also did these new Photoshop drawings to show roughly what it should look like when completed. The hinged panels are to block the light coming from the projectors air vents.



Image should say "mesh cut-out" not emsh, typing error.

Hi again... sorry but I didn't grab your email to send the voice over work... you can email me at cpoc@internode.on.net and I'll send them to you that way Did you have a preferance for .wav or .mp3 (or other format)? Also do you have any size constraints on your emails?

Looking forward to seeing your projector results

I ordered the Anti-UV Glass from Izzotek after my paypal bank transfer funds had completed. Yesterday my PC parts arrived, & I built the PC (HTPC) which was my first PC build ever, installed the ATI Sapphire Radeon 9550 256mb, there are loads of display options, which will be great for adjusting the contrast as it says about HERE. I also installed & activated Windows XP & installed Freespire Linux. Tonight I should be going to my Dad's place (the place with the projector) to make some progress, take some photos & maybe even a video.
The enclosure has been cut out but needs a lot of sanding before it can be assembled.

The reason for the slow progress is that I have had bad eczema since the start of this year, & it gets worse when I get hot, at my Dad's place its usually freezing, so I have to put the heater on, which makes the eczema start itching.

blennus: sent you a pm, thanks.

I went to my Dad's place & took some photos. Here they are:
LCD

Projector

Most of the cut-outs

The Workroom

HTPC Rear

HTPC Front


HTPC Components:
Intel 3.2 Pentium 4 Socket 775 processor 541
Foxconn 865G7MF-SH motherboard
Heatsink and fan included
Intel chipset
Expansion Slots: 1 x AGP 8x, 3 x PCI
Integrated performance graphics
IDE: 2 x ATA 100
Serial ATA SATA / RAID: 2 x SATA I/150
Integrated 5.1 channel audio
LAN: Fast Ethernet 10/100 for networking / broadband
Corsair Memory VS1GBKIT400 PC3200 2x512MB CAS2.5
80GB 7200RPM Maxtor HDD
Pioneer DVD+-DL R/W
Samsung DVD ROM
ATI Sapphire Technology Radeon 9550 256MB AGP DVI-I VO
400W X-Power PSU
Salvaged Case from old PC that I got for free
80mm CoolerMaster 12V DC Fan used as intake fan
OS's: Microsoft Windows XP with Vista Transformation Pack 6.0, Freespire Linux

Dimensions Diagram

Here's the 30inch Widescreen TV to show the wall size comparison.

Speakers

Projector on

Wall being projected onto, with the lights off. (When the LCD is connected, the diagonal film dimension is approximately 140 inches. I didn't connect the LCD tonight as I forgot to take the power cord for the HTPC with me). Iwill move the boxs & clear the able when I have the LCD connected, as the film area is from wall to wall in that area.

I would sit on the middle seat when watching a film.

PHOTOSHOPPED to show film area

PHOTOSHOPPED to show film area & size

I am really looking foreward to seeing some screenies here.
Go for it.Enjoy yourself.
Cheers P

Thanks, nice to have a new reply also. Maybe in a week or two it should be assembled. Then I'll take some photos of the LCD Projection & videos too.

The Anti-UV Glass arrived from Izzotek.com today, it is clear, so I don't think it will block visible light. Also today I realized that when I've got the projector assembled & the VGA port soldered to my Xbox360, I'll be able to play Dead Rising, before I left it, because on a normal TV the text is unreadable & the zombies in the distance are hard to spot, not on an LCD though (1024x768).

Yesterday I sanded all the edges of the plywood enclosure parts, & cut some new areas from them to make the projection "arm" fit & have space to move up & down. Today I assembled 3 of the 4 sides & super-glued them together, as well as sanding all the cuts that I made to the plywood. More plywood parts will need to be made for it to be perfect, as you can only design so much without actually assembling parts & finding out how well things work. Tomorrow I plan to cut out the hole for the circuits to fit through (rear plywood piece), cut out the piece that the circuits will rest on, glue the lcd holding triangles into the inside of the enclosure, & glue the circuit holding board into there too. Then I should be able to test it. I might need to cut the metal base that the LCD circuits are screwed to though. (When I tested it before that was with polystyrene strips to hold the LCD).

Got the basics of the enclosure glued together today (for the setup to be functional). The lid & Anti-UV Glass holder still needs to be made, but I have the templates drawn onto the plywood ready to cut. I will be taking photos tonight, will probably post them tomorrow.

I like the idea of incorporating part of a ohp, I've been kicking that idea around also to get around a small room issue. I built the standard setup but I have to keystone it soo severely I can't get the whole screen to focus . I'm anxious to see how your's works out!

Photos at last (camera increased the brightness even though I turned flash off), also the camera makes the photos blurry I don't know why):

potc2dmc-3 Captan Jack Sparrow in the Jungle

potc2dmc-2 Davy Jones

potc2dmc-1 Captain Jack Sparrow & Elizabeth Turner

Casino Royale Boat

300 Xerxes Persian God

300 Spartan King Battle

300 Spartan King Ati Radeon 9550

300 So Called Immortals 1

300 So Called Immortals 2 (Close up)

300 Persian Rhino

300 Persian Messenger

300 Magician


I read in a few threads on here that homemade projectors always have a loss of colour compared to commercial projectors, & the photos of the homemade pj's had greyish colours, although I didn't build the actual ohp myself, the concept with the lcd & enclosure is pretty much the same, & as you can see from the pirates of the Caribbean photo with jack sparrow in the jungle, there is no loss of colour, no grey colour replacement either.

I'm also thinking of trying to make the light reflect through the side areas that currently are overlapping the fresnel by using some aluminium tape to catch & reflect any light through it, I don't know if it would work or there's room for this though with the fans blowing air under the lcd; the pj is at my dad's place.

Also the TV cabinet was moved forward slightly so the film projection currently is about 120" out of a possible 140" for a 2.35:1 aspect ratio film. It's almost impossible to move on your own as the TV weighs a lot, so for now it will do.

Post opinions please, unless you don't like it 'cos its an ohp.

Anyone know how to possibly make the medium blacks/greys/blues appear properly? At the moment they are just dark black.
It is fantastic in bright-medium brightness scenes, but any darker & the greys/blues appear black. I'm hoping that it can be sorted by painting the enclosure with black matte dye, & finishing the enclosure so that less light is in the room. I have tried lots of different contrast/brightness settings with the graphics card, the one photo of the settings with 300 was best for that trailer, but everything else that has darker scenes has really dark blacks.

Here's the projector (unfinished):

To compare the (poor quality) photo of the projection to the original image in the 300 trailer:

Poor quality photo of great projection:

Photoshopped original movie trailer frame onto the photo to have exactly the same size & proportions as the photograph of the projected trailer above.
This is not a projection screenshot, it is just to show the original video so that you can compare it to the photo of the projected video above:


Also in reality the projection is way better than the photograph.

i had similar problems with dark scenes being too dark, i painted my projection wall with the maxxmudd formula and got a vast improvement in dark scene clarity.

is that a ll triplet in the top of your ohp?

Thanks for the info about the paint, I'll look into that. The triplet is the one that came with the OHP, I have thought about replacing it with a LL large one though (cutting the metal or making a plywood enclosure piece for it if it's larger than the current one, the one in the photo is 80mm diameter). Would replacing it with a LL triplet improve the colours & contrast?

probably not, the only reason you would want to change the triplet was if the current one wan't collecting all the available light. But your unit was designed using that lense arrangement from the factory so I would say it's optimaly set up, now if you changed the light source you would get better color rendering i've seem that when i switched bulbs from a e29 to a t15, my colors look alot better at that point then you would have to switch triplets to catch the light from the new bulb if the arc was larger

Thanks for the info. I was wondering, do you still have some of that Maxxmudd paint formula? If you do I might be interested in buying a piece of board or something with that paint applied to test the paint with my projection. Ideally the board should be something lightweight to minimize shipping costs as I'm in the UK. A3 paper size would be enough. Would this be possible?

My plans: (to improve greys/blues)

Cover up ffc connectors from beneath them (most ambient light is coming from here, probably more than vent holes)
Reduce ambient light, it is probably the same tone as the blues & greys, making it less visible or washing out these colours?
Make & attach a dividing sheet of plywood between lcd & circuits (metal shielding may be reflecting light onto LCD)
Test some smooth shiny material (e.g plastic) as a projection screen
Paint the enclosure with black dye to minimise reflected light onto the LCD screen
Make top of enclosure, & attach Uvilex Anti-UV Glass
The rough textured wall is good for high gain screen setup, for ambient light or dim projection, according to http://www.convergent-av.co.uk/article2.html so might need to change "screen" from rough wall to something else when ambient light is reduced)
Test maxxmudd paint (buy painted board A3 paper sized from LL member?)

Any amount of ambient light will destroy the darkest shades on the picture... I know because during my test, the light getting out of the gap at the top of the box where the wires came out didnt seem like much, but when I covered it up, the picture looked much more clear.

Thanks for the info. If I can get the dark greys to show, it will be almost perfect. Currently the colours are vibrant, the image is very sharp, except the left side (but I think that's the wall that's causing that side to be out of focus so moving the pj to the right a bit should sort it out), dark blacks are dark black, but dark greys/blues are black. This is most noticable in Pirates of the Caribbean 2 in the dark scenes on Davy Jones' Flying Dutchman ship, only the lightest areas are showing, mainly just the faces of the characters, anything pitch black is very black, & anything dark grey is black. On the LCD itself, looking at it directly, the image is perfect. Daylight scenes have good brightness & very vibrant colours, even on default colour settings, in the same way as those new samsung hdtv's. When I get my video capture card drivers working, I'll post some videos, as the video camera might represent the quality of the projection better than the camera does. (The camera makes the projection look brighter/paler & very blurry).

I found out that it's the position of the video on the LCD that's the problem. The darker colours appear black-grey when at the top of the LCD, lower-middle they are fine. Unfortunately when adding a piece of plywood to the projector under the connectors at the top of the LCD, one of them became slightly loose & so now the right column of the LCD where that connector was is blanc with some lines of colur. It's OK though as moving the LDC to the right allows for video playback at the projector's light source width. Before the LCD overlapped the projector's light source. It just means that I won't be able to use the Xbox360 with the LCD.

Here are some comparison photos from the Casino Royale Trailer:

Top:

Lower Middle:

Both Together (identical images, just different positions):

nope I used everything i made but the formula is posted over in the screen area

That's OK. If I were to buy a large LL Triplet, I'm guessing that it would possibly solve the problem with the dark colours being grey at the top of the LCD because it would probably capture the light from the top of the LCD better. I know it's not the optimal lens for this projector as you said above, but would it be as good as if not better? Is it worth a go?

I would probably fiddle with the bulb color temp before I changed the lenses, your ohp was more than likely setup to project b/w images,text which most are if you are still using the bulb it was designed with changing that may give you better color rendering but thats just my opinion I did try a few different bulbs and did notice a change for the better when i switched to a t15, my colors were cold before and with the t15 they got more vibrant.

I see you are also getting alot of light bleed at the top of your screen from the area where your connectors are, block that with some felt or something that won't ruin the connectors and you'll probably see better colors along the top because any light bleeds will wash out your colors.

Thanks for the info. I placed a strip of plywood under the connectors, & adjusted the settings on the LCD itself: colour contrast, brightness, & power/picture mode & the image is much better now. The triplet is closer to the lower half of the LCD, so moving the LCD down a bit improved the contrast in dark areas (if you look at an lcd from below it, it appears dark, moving up above it makes it light, so from the triplet's position with the lcd where it was originally, the image was darker at the top). So after finishing the enclosure & painting it matte black with dye it should be perfect. Xbox360 games look great with it also, vibrant colours & now much better contrast. I also installed my video capture card so when the projector is completed I'll record, capture, & upload a few videos in PAL DVD quality/resolution.

Where can I buy a large LL Mirror & large LL Triplet lens? On the store website it only seems to sell the evo projector? Has anyone got a link?

found it here

Thanks.

I'm thinking of upgrading to a 17" LCD TFT with 8ms response rate & a higher contrast ratio http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?quick...#specifications.
Other than possible FFC issues the only possible problem would be that I wouldn't be able to use the Xbox360 with it as efficiently (because it would fill the 17" screen & the actual projection light source is slightly less than a 15" screen in size). I want to know if LCD TFT monitors these days have the video source digital size adjustment like there used to be on those large CRT monitors (where you just press the vertical & horizontal buttons to reduce or increase the display size on the screen itself, not necessarily filling the whole of the screen area).

I don't know how bad your current LCD is but you really have to have all the light leaks fixed before you can judge the contrast of the final image.

I have seen many 300 and 500 to 1 panels look OK.

Thanks for the reply, I was asking mainly because of the higher resolution & possible digital screen size adjustment, as well as the much faster refresh rate for xbox360, but I am happy with the lcd that I have for films, & it's ok for xbox360. I am looking forward to finishing the enclosure, testing it, & posting photos & video(s). However I have not made any progress with it since the last update because of the eczema. As soon as I feel ready I'll start on the top pieces of the enclosure, I already have them drawn onto the plywood. I also have nearly finished my cinema trailers sequence, re-creating the Apocalypto cinema experience ad from scratch using trailers & Video Studio 10 Plus.

Recently I built the lid of the enclosure, which improved the contrast at the top half of the projection greatly. Although the majority of light was coming from the small gap at the bottom of the lcd where it meets the wood, every light leak causes the black to be more grey, so I'm hoping that after fixing all light leaks the blacks will look more detailed & contrasted instead of being just flat dark grey. My 5.1 DD surround speakers arrived today, which are great, the bass shakes the floor even at 1/4 bass control.
http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quick...NavigationKey=0
The majority of the trailers are completed, so playing them before a film tricks you into thinking you're at cineworld. When everything is complete I'll video the projection & upload it.

Also upgraded power dvd 5 to 7 for the 5.1 support, so the total spent now is about £450, which I'm very happy with.

And we have video...
it's a shame that uploading reduced the quality a lot (recorded in full dvd quality, 2.35:1), but I said I'd upload a video so here it is....

300 trailer projected (110" approximately):
http://s62.photobucket.com/albums/h91/garl...erprojected.flv

Note: blurring is the auto-focus on the video camera.

Masking off the unused areas of the LCD, & replacing the curtains with thicker ones made the projection perfect. The only con is that the sunny scenes look a bit bright in the white areas, but that's the same as if you were actually there, the white sunlit areas would glare like that. Dark scenes have good contrast now, I forgot I was watching a projection even when watching the dark "davy jones/flying dutchman" scenes of pirates of the Caribbean 2: dead man's chest.

Projector itself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KY43_yLxVE

Harsh Times Trailer Projected:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e77_862NV-A

Apocalypto Cinema Experience Trailer finished (rough cut version 1.1). I will probably make a 300 one, & some for upcoming films. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSEqAXjB6PQ

I'm thinking of getting the 10.62 720P HD Projection Panel LCD/TFT for my birthday in October. The projector will be improved as well (I have designed it further, for better image quality & also to fit the new lcd when I get it). The Cinema Trailers sequence is coming along too.

Anyone who wants to see a high quality video of a DIY projector, check out my video of the 300 trailer projected (full DVD quality, NOT youtube quality):

http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?acti...63744C81F7365D7

The file (97MB) will be available to download for seven days.

It looks to me that the FFC type things at the top of the LCD are being projected through, which isn't good because they couls melt VERY easily. So I would put a peice of wood under them or cardboard, something just so that the light isn't shinning through them.

I did, although I haven't taken any photos of the projector or projection since, only videos. The contrast is fantastic now after sealing all light leaks.

Today I bought the 10.6" Samsung LCD with MST Controller from manhattanlcd.com
Can't wait to see the improvement in resolution & to have the screen fitting in the projector's light area fully for xbox360 & ease of pc use (no more guessing where the mouse cursor is).

Although I really don't feel like stripping the AG off from it, hopefully it will be as good as my current lcd or better without removing the AG etc.