In this thred i will be posting pictures and descriptions of all the various material i can find to try projecting onto. My projector is not very bright so any gain in picture quality should be seen easily. This will also hopefully mean that whatever i find works should work for anyone else.

If anyone has a suggestions for what to test post it. (i cant test anything expensive, i don't have the money)

If you are wondering why i am doing this there are three reasons. 1. I'm curious. 2. I'm bored. 3. I want to give back to the community that has given me and so many others so much.

Any suggestions for how to better organize this would be nice. Also, how do i add a pole?

All lights off pictures are taken with a daylight white balance, 2.5 second exposure and a 2.9 f-stop.

-projector-

Ps-one type
light source-2x 23w (100w equivalent) CFLS in an aluminum foil lined box
lenses-Delta II RPTV lens
Resolution-320x240
Projection size- ~80" 4:3

-tested materials-

-materials that need to be tested-

*Construction Paper*
Black
Off white
gray

*aluminum foil*
flat
textured
sanded
put on textured surface
put under cloth


Testing will begin after i finish my pie.

Ok, first results are in. Here is are some stock images of my projected image. They are projected on a white wall.

Lights on.



Lights off.



These images are very accurate as to how it looks in real life. (yes i know my pj is a pos, but for under $100 im quite happy)

Ok, the first things i tested were some paper that i had laying around. In the pictures the papers are (from left to right), black construction paper, off white construction paper (i think it used to be white, it is just really old), and white printer paper.

Results. The black paper makes it look every dark (no, really? i never would have guessed. **smacks the little man in my head** Quiet, I'm busy. I really wish he would leave me alone some times.) and not much else. The off white paper made it look a tiny bit darker but seemed to improve contrast a little and the white paper brightened it a little and improved contrast a little. So, onto the pictures.

lights on.



lights off



There is no difference when the viewing angle is changed.

For my next test i tried a cotton dress shirt (i said anything and everything didn't i?).

Brightness appeared to increase slightly and contrast slightly but no major gain. Ambient light viewing did not change.

Lights on.



Lights off.

Now, onto a more interesting material, aluminum foil. i try a lot of different variations with it so there are going to be quite a few posts.

First i tried it flat, shiny side out. The image was see able at slight angles but anything more and it vanished. No real brightness gain, in fact, to me it looked darker.

Lights on



lights off



Next i tried it not so shiny side out. At angles up to 20-25* there was both a brightness and a contrast increase but any more of an angle and the image dissapeared. This increase was see able with both the lights off and the lights on.

Lights on



Lights off.



1 second exposure to show that the detail is still there.

Next, i tried the foil extremely crinkled, shiny side out.



The image dissapears in ambient light and the texture kills any detail but there is a gain in image brightness.

Lights on.



Lights off



Lights off aria where there is more detail



There was no difference weather it was the shiny side or not.

Next, after a bit more experimenting and getting the same results as above, i tried the foil not shiny side out and with a lot of little crinkles and then smoothed out. The results were quite impressive, not too much loss in detail (although still too much to use all the time) and a major increase in brightness and contrast. If the crinkles could be made on an almost microscopic scale it would be perfect but they are still to big.

Lights on.





Lights off.





That is all for tonight, i might do some more testing tomorrow, again, if anyone has suggestions, don't hesitate to say them. And questions are always welcome, even if they are stupid.

Do you have any satin sheets. Preferably in a light gray. If you don't have a sheet then maybe a shirt. There may be a lady in your life with some clothes made from a light satin like material. The light gray color will deepen the blacks while the sheen of the satin will give you some gain. The texture of the cloth weave will help diffuse the light so you don't get hot spotting.

I've been looking everywhere for grey sheets and they are not as easy to find as I thought they would be. Seems like everything I find has some sort of flower design on it or something else Anyway, I've been doing the same thing for the past week X, anything I can get my hands on to test has been attached to my screen (just a white sheet on a frame for now). My wife has a whole closet full of material for quilts and there MUST be something in there that will work. I have even tried a silver tarp behind my white sheet, which actually worked to brighten things up but I couldnt get the tarp to stretch enough to get the folds and wrinkles out, so the sheet wasnt flat of course. Keep up the testing, I think most of us need a cheap alternative to the high dollar maxxmudd and retail screens

Next time you are near a fabric store take a look at Blackout Cloth for a matte white that is superior to a white sheet. You could also look for very thin silver or light gray satin like materials. A satiny silver/gray over a matte white may be interesting.

I just bought the projection surface from 3 huge screens meant for portability (lik econcerts and shtuff like that)

i got all 3 for 23 shipped.

it's 2 da-lite and 1 draper screen.

hopefully they will be in good enough shape to use.

if so thats a great way to get a screen and for way cheap

the formula for rs-maxxmudd is everywhere... ...not to mention a lot of look-alikes using similiar ingredients and ratios.

to make a batch of rs-maxxmudd is about $40... so it's actually a fairly inexpensive screen solution.

but like any positive gain screen mix... if you chose to roll rather than to spray... it does require a little bit of skill to make sure it is free of roller marks. the cost shouldn't be much of an issue. however, i do understand the apprehension on it's application.

lastly... both joan's and hancock fabrics have silver/white fabrics that have the appearance of possibly boosting gain and could make for alternative screens.

nice thread and interesting results. i use 2 sheets of white panel board (home depot $11 each) with a couple of coats of behr upw ($20 for a gallon.) i plan on making pb_maxxx's mix sometime this summer and will post before/after pics. http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread....mp;#post6389745

have you tried the white sheet behind the lcd when stripped ,not sure what it is called ,,, it would be interesting to see if you could find something like that in a bigger app. , might start to look . Also I was thinking about the white panelling stuff ,i used to cover up in laundery room ,it has a nice white shiny finish and is cheap ,probable the same stuff in homedepot,at rona is usually 9 dollars... keep testing , please don't use your underwear in testing though,i don't think we need to see that test.HA

Hey x 25 try moving the non shinny foil to one of the dark edges and see how that looks.

Gee, I had some grey sheets left over from my single days.
Unfortunatly, they were white when I bought them.

Boy, this thread stopped in it's tracks!! What happened? Did everyone but me find a screen material that was so good they never came back???

Yea it's called Da-Lite High Power

I concour! I just got mine in and it's awesome. It really brings out colors brightly.

If your looking for screen samples log into da-lite.com and go to the contact area and go live chat with a customer rep and ask them to send you samples of the cinema versions , I received around 7 and they were all free!!!! You'll get contrast ones too with power ranges 1.0 to 2.8.

The high power 2.8 gain hooked me and reeled me in.

No, i just had no time. Between having surgery done, then cleaning the house and going to collage and then my birthday (my mom had a big party at the house, we spent a week getting ready) i had no time to do anything else. At the moment i am looking for a job, once i find one everything should get less hecktic and i can go back to doing testing and such. I also want to build a better projector and redo all the testing before i start testing new things.

I kinda figured it was somthing like that, it seemed like there was some good strides being made though... there isn't any reason (other than having special processes or machines) that you can't have results as good or almost as good as commercial screens... the holy grail is out there, we just have to find it!