Curved Display, JDome, Immersive 3D Display

Post by **Tretboot** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 5:12 pm

Hi!
I hope this is the right place to put some ideas i have been thinking about and maybe get a few pointers from people who might have also tried stuff like this, or just share them for inspiration.

I have been stepped away a bit from 3D and all for a while, but recently my eye cought an advertisment for a Projector that only costs 49 Euros. So i went on and researched how cheap projectors really got and had a first "revelation" because i wanted an Eyefinity Setup with 3 big screens for a while. Seems to be very doable with good 720p Projectors starting at around 500 Euros. Then i went to youtube and found out there are a few companies selling software to blend 2 or more Projector images nicely on curved surfaces, like this:

[youtube-hd]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOY2lREuwjU[/youtube-hd]

With DLP Projectors this probably would also work with shutterglasses to put even more 3d to it. Another very nice product that sadly still seems not to be on the market is the jDome, wich is just a half sphere that gets the image rear projected on, mirrored and you change the fov in your game to really get you into the game.

[youtube-hd]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-IvzpFE7nc[/youtube-hd]

So i am thinking about taking that on as a first step and try to build something like this with 1 Projector to start with, and maybe later when i have more money to spend to get a second one and maybe a 3rd one.

I also own a TrackIR wich is working pretty nice, but on a 32" LCD not as immersive as it could be, i would love to have something like this:

[youtube-hd]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWm9PtzWvko[/youtube-hd]

I will start moving into a new flat very soon, so i will have a room that i can plan out and finally realize my dream of a holodeck, or well the closest one can get with todays technology.
So my first steps will be to plan out the room for projection. From some other Forums i learned that it will really help to have the room itself not reflect much light, best to have a black ceiling and dark walls. The room will be 4.9 Meters deep and the wall on wich i want to project 3.8 Meters Wide. For Projectors i figured out to either get an Optoma HD600X or a eMachines V700 DLP (wich is the same as the Acer H5360 only a bit cheaper). Are those good for my plans, or would there be better options that might be able to give me a bigger screen in that room?

My gaming rig has an ATI 5850, so for 3d i think it would need some 3rd party software, ontop of other 3rd party software for the curved surface, not sure how well that will work. But 3D so far is not really the main objective at the moment as i am more into a 3 Dimensional screen itself and the immersion i would just get from that. I still need to do some research on materials that will work well for rear projecton or will be fairly cheap and easy to bend into a curved surface. Also as i mention the paint in the room and maybe some cheap way to get a good wall to project on just by using the right paint on that wall for normal non curved movie watching or maybe 3D Gaming with DLP Link 3D Technology. Seems you could really do a lot of interesting things once you get a projector and some space for using it in (right now i only have a very small room with low ceiling, so a projector was not an option untill now).

Maybe you guys have some input. I was also thinking about maybe getting a pico projector first to fiddle around with building some scary looking head mounted display and track ir for motion tracking, but i think a bigger one gives me the more interesting options and would also be a lot more usable if all this DIY will totally fail.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 7:04 pm

I tell you what: if you don't wanna fail , consider this 99% likely to work scenario & give up on curved screen & compensation. For that you'll need laser measurement and ray tracing simulation in order to do it right, not really nice project. I propose simpler.

First, this is a rear projection setup, I think the best bang too.
What you need:

3x DLP , and 3x hush box to silence 'em. ( DLP can be emachines V700 or 5360 these are the same)

3x transparent acrylic sheets with dark finish microglass rear projection foil's on them.

What you get is: 3840*720*2 pixels, no hotspot, very very bright, very good ansi contrast, usable at daylight , no ghosting, no ghosting when looking around , transportable 1by1...

upgrade path exist: get your hush box even better by tinkering with the DLP light dump... You can reach better on - off contrast... even 8000 is possible...

Post by **Tretboot** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 7:32 pm

That was the idea that i had first. Then i did see those nice videos and the idea did grow... But the software for correction is also kinda expensive, would be cool if ATI/AMD could integrate that into their drivers (or maybe not, i hate the CCC as it is, if you get it to work...).

Good thing is: The Starting point for all this is the same, getting a affordable DLP Projektor (don't really have the money for 3 right now) and you seem to recommend the same i figured out would work nice. From what i gathered on the Net the Optoma should have better contrast, but not as many lumens. That might be critical for 3D were the shutter glasses will eat a lot of the light.

Also i was thinking for a second to maybe get 3 really cheap projectors with only 1024 or 800 resolution, as i could probably afford 3 and the resolution would add up, but i have the feeling that i won't be that happy and wish for more resolution.

Thanks for your input, you might be right with the curved thing beeing tough. Still i could try out the jDome thing, just have to come up with a cheap solution for it. There must be some piece of hardware that is dome shaped, the right size and can be used for this, i am gonna keep my eyes open for that.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 7:56 pm

you'd want a laser light engine or CRT beamer for a curved screen to start with.

And white surface is also unusable, those screens inherently contain metal coating to a degree (sparkies).

With my proposal a microglass RP screen, the problem rather might be the micrometer size of beads, do those fuse at given distance? Or what your "eyes" think of defocused bulb DLP on curved silver screen, or about the yet rather 'obscure' laser speckle.

Microbead screens are widespread now and highly regarded ,for example the da-lite high power, read about that screen on AVSforums, you'll find nothing but excitement.

The evolution of that screen ( evenly sized and shaped micrometer glass screen) is the rear projection screen that contains microglass suspended in black matrix for total ambient light rejection. And you can obtain this in europe for cheap.

oh and about the resolution "angst" of yours, thats unfounded, you'll know when you actually see DLP. Don't thikn much of the added resolution with extra projectors, you will be overwhelmed with one. : DDD

Post by **Tretboot** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 8:42 pm

That sounds interesting... now if one could get such a screen into a dome shape it probably would be perfect for the immersive fps gaming. I am trying to absorb a lot of the info on the net, lots of forums etc. also more from the home cinema people. Seems just an empty white/gray wall is not really what you want and it would be better to paint the wall were it will be projected on in black and get a screen (for movies etc.) as a start. Not sure if i want to go rear projection for movies, as it will shrink the screensize and eat up a lot of the usable room.

My resolution "angst" is not for those 720p beamers, but for those at half the price having only native 800*600 or maybe even those pico led beamers. If it would be feasable to build something with 3 of those it would be even cheaper than getting 3LCD Monitors while beeing able to have big screens (but lower res). Also i maybe could just get one in the pricerange between 100 and 200 euros and try out some ideas and later use it for the bedroom on the ceiling or if its really portable to do some fun stuff with it. Are those worth their money or is it better invested into a better beamer or a screen etc?

Problem is i sort of want to plan ahead for all sorts of things. One is beeing able sort of the whole wall as a screen vor movies and maybe some games. Beeing able to do some 3d and also have a toy to test some stuff like that jDome or some curved display things with the option of later adding more projectors. At least from those youtube videos i got the idea that with the right kind of software i can just use 3DLP projectors and stitch it together nice (i have also seen some without software, really not nice).

Also this is more of a longterm project. Will probably take some years untill i have 3 projectors, unless something unexpected happens in my life...

Post by **tritosine5G** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 9:14 pm

I think curved screen is overrated at this point in time , you can't do better than a vikuiti class RP screen, and the size is not crucial with RP, and other advantages overwhelm anything the other screens ever had to offer. Trust me on this one, Ansi contrast is the most important spec in 3D right now then comes FOV,& high contrast RP screen gives you the unparalleled flexibility.

http://multimedia.3m.com/mws/mediawebse ... 0Sheet.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgLxQBTbrcs&NR=1[/youtube]

Post by **cybereality** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 10:00 pm

Those curved screens are really intriguing, especially if you can combine them with 3 projectors and stereo 3D. I think the ultra-wide FOV and peripheral vision alone would be pretty immersive, as I have experienced at planetarium shows. It really is something else, I can only imagine what playing a game like this would be like. However I am not sure that will really make up for the lack of stereo 3D. Personally I think I might even rather game on my current 22" 3D monitor then even that crazy setup in the first video you posted, if it meant I had to play in 2D. 2D is just so flat and dull, peripheral vision alone is only going to mask that. So ultimately you want something like the Nvidia 3D Vision Surround with 3x 3D projectors. Clearly that might cost you a little bit, but its not out of the question. For example, the ViewSonic PJD5112 SVGA 3D projector is only $349 and works with Nvidia 3D Vision. 3 of those will cost you around $1000, but then you also have to figure the cost of the SLI gaming rig you need to run that. Plus any projector mounts, screens and/or paint, cabling, etc. it can get expensive quick. But still relatively cheap for a ghetto holodeck, thats for sure.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 10:49 pm

Presence of light: To better understand the impact of the presence of light in a room on the contrast ratio performance, consider the light emitted by just one candle in a room one meter away from a display surface whose black level stands at 0.1 cd/m2 in total darkness. This is sufficient to render the image from say a 10,000:1 rated contrast ratio video projector the same as one projected by a 900:1 CR rated projector when the latter is displayed in a totally dark room!

Increase the light in the room to approximately 30 LUX; this corresponds to the light emitted by a small incandescent lamp. Contrast figures above 100:1 would now turn out to be simply academic even in the case of video projectors with say a relatively high 2500 ANSI Lumens brightness rating. Why?

To maintain a 'low' 200:1 contrast ratio under 30 LUX of ambient light, your projector have to generate more than 6000 LUX for the brightest areas. But to maintain this level of brightness over say a 100-inch diagonal 16:9 unity gain screen (30 square ft), you need a projector with at least 16,000 ANSI-Lumens output. Your 2500 ANSI Lumens projector will never maintain a 200:1 contrast even in a dimly lit room, least image its quoted 10,000:1 contrast ratio under the presence of higher levels of ambient light. (For more information on projector screens and video projector output, please refer to our article: Understanding projector screens.)

Let's continue playing with numbers! To better understand the whole issue of the presence of ambient light and its effects on contrast performance, consider a contrast rating of say 2,500:1 and a maximum luminance level of 250 cd/m2 for the brightest part of the image. Then the darkest part of the image will have a luminance of just 0.1 cd/m2 in the complete absence of ambient light.

Let's introduce the presence of a dim light source in the room and assume that just 5 cd/m2 of this light is being reflected by the screen surface.

Contrast ratio would than change as follows:

= While Luminance/Black Luminance

= (250 + 5)/(0.1 + 5) or 255/5.1 = 50:1

This means that our contrast ratio has now changed from the original 2,500:1 to just 50:1!

And it only takes a very dim light source for a display to reflect as much as 5 cd/m2 of light. A shinny screen surfaces such as that of a CRT may easily reflect as much as 80% of the light falling on the screen.

It is thus clear that unless you watch your moves in a completely dark environment, it would be useless to stress too much and pay more for a device with a too high contrast ratio rating!

Post by **Tretboot** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 11:07 pm

Ghetto Holodeck, i like that

But i will not go the 3D Vision road as i got a ATI 5850 now (i did play around with 3D Vision Discover a while ago on my old 8800GT) but there are ways to make ati work with a DLP too i think, might have to dig deeper into that.

Contrast and all will not be such a big issue i think, as i will go all out and get a black ceiling and dark walls (i did grow up sitting at the pc in the dark, in my world it has always been black anyhow...). I will have some LCDs running probably as i like having more than one screen but i plan for keeping high contrast.

I have the feeling this will at first not really go into a big DIY but into buying a nice priced DLP Projector that is 3d Capable and see if i can make it work nice in 3d and have a lot more space to look at with track ir (also pretty immersive, must rock with a very big diagonal).

Another idea would be to use something like tritosine recommeded as sort of a roomdivider that with the push of a button becomes a scifi like screen. But so far i seem to be on the right track with getting a DLP Projector. As i said i played around with red cyan for a while and was enthusiastic at times... but it faded and i gamed on in 2D. But most of it was because of ghosting and ugly colours, not beeing able to see red nice and all that, wich as far as i gathered will be perfect with DLP. Having that on a wall/screen that is serval meters across probably could be a lot bigger as having it curved.

Post by **cybereality** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 11:18 pm

Well even with a 2D setup you can still always use red/cyan glasses. Of course not the best quality but if you are on a mission for a ghetto holodeck you must take anything you can get. If that means trading some color fidelity to get a whole extra dimension, I think that is a fair deal.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 11:23 pm

I already have 2x H5360's and it's no problem getting two screens in the room* , 2x JBL 4430's, a pair of Quad ESL57, and a smoking jesus titty cinnamon 42kg CRT MONTSTER sony FW900 I just scored for 50 eur , and also a mitsubishi diamondtron . Damn .

But Im making place for this rear projection screen dudes and I bet it will be superb before I try dual polarized actually. Active FTW. And btw this silver screen deals with ambient light very good too.

Oh and my room is quite small actually but my bed can be turned up against the wall hehe, fun .

*especially if the RP screen is retroreflective!! , and the silver is ceiling mount angular .

Post by **Tretboot** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 11:31 pm

Hehe. Well it will not be that Ghetto, this is more sort of one step out of the ghetto i hope. The red/cyan was interesting to discover lord of the rings online in 3d and all the other gameworlds, but for real gaming i preferred to be able to read colored text and not get conused by colorfighting or how you might call it when some colored objects are mostly invisible to one eye and very bright to the other. A DLP Beamer will fix this and give me all the options for playing with maybe just curved cardbord (i can spend days just putting crazy ideas together and have a good time). And if i really like it i can go the upgrade path and convert all the walls of my holodeck into displays with more projectors specially as prices will always go down.

Would be interesting if people with DLP projectors using 3D (maybe on ATI) could give some input. I will reboot myself now and check back in a couple of hours

Post by **cybereality** » Mon Feb 07, 2011 11:54 pm

Tretboot wrote: Would be interesting if people with DLP projectors using 3D (maybe on ATI) could give some input. I will reboot myself now and check back in a couple of hours

If you go look on the iz3d.com forums you might find some info about this. I know some people were able to get it to work, but there was still some issues with losing sync every now and then and stuff like that. So it is not a flawless implementation at this point. Maybe it works better on certain models, I don't know. I still think Nvidia has the only no-nonsense solution. AMD still hasn't got their act together, but they are trying. Maybe in a few months they will release a new driver to fix this.

Post by **Tretboot** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 10:54 am

Well things have improved since i last checked. The iz3d driver works in DX10 and 11 and i had some fun with red/cyan glasses. But i remebred why stopped doing that.

1 i have to use 2 glasses on top of each other to get rid of most the ghosting leaving me with not much colour.
2 My brain needs a few minutes to really adjust to it untill it finally clicks
3 When i stop gaming my brain again needs time to readjust leaving me with red/cyan view without glasses (left eye colour too cold, right eye too warm) in the real world.

Point 3 is the worst, not only does everything look strange (its a bit fun, closing one eye then the other and see different colourtemperatures of the world) but it makes me colourblind for a while, brown and red look the same.

Still the effect itself... yea... once all set up and brain adjusted to it... its awesome. So a DLP will get rid of all those problems i think.

Also AMD lists some Projectors here: http://www.amd.com/us/products/technolo ... dware.aspx but not those i had my eye on. But with a changed inf it will work as far as i can tell. Or i should maybe cash out 100-200 euros more to get one officially supported?

Post by **tritosine5G** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 12:38 pm

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnGRHWzG ... r_embedded#![/youtube]
Well, if you are rather into flight simulator's, rather than *quake2*, think about it ... why my setup sounds the best. You don't have much time until *Cliffs of Dover* arrives. Abuot projectors&gear:
-you should choose based on of customer care, acer's is the best i saw, Im getting my second free bulb right now, that 280 usd value already and i won't stop there . hahahah.

...had my share with hd4850 , thx to the hype i could sell it later, but no readon's again. Hopefully this phenom2 is the last x86 processor I ever have to use, thanks to nvidia's cpu plans.

Guy's think outside of the box and use rear projection

Rear projection needs no percfect black behind the screen. It can and will distinct between useful light and polluted light based on incoming angle, outside of 30° it counts as pollution, and will be discarded. Thing's so much more advanced than FP stuff.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 4:06 pm

bros , how about a wiiiiiiiiiiiiide ,slightly curved acrylic screen and 3x projectors.

You can do all that if the microbead screen is cheap

Post by **ERP** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 6:36 pm

tritosine wrote: 3x transparent acrylic sheets with dark finish microglass rear projection foil's on them.

Out of interest where would you find rear projection foil at reasonable prices?

Post by **tritosine5G** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 6:53 pm

Post by **cybereality** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 9:16 pm

Tretboot wrote: Also AMD lists some Projectors here: http://www.amd.com/us/products/technolo ... dware.aspx but not those i had my eye on. But with a changed inf it will work as far as i can tell. Or i should maybe cash out 100-200 euros more to get one officially supported?

Really man, you're going to have enough trouble getting this together at all, the last thing you should be thinking about is buying unsupported hardware and using hacked inf, EDID spoofing, or whatever other tricks they come up with. I mean, it can be done, but do you really want to spend that kind of money and be left out in the cold. Just spend the extra $100 or whatever it is and get something you know is going to work. Its piece of mind.

Post by **Tretboot** » Tue Feb 08, 2011 11:36 pm

I always have a hard time choosing the perfect hardware for me. From what works i found the most positive feedback on the Acer H5360. It seems to be the one most used (or the V700) and could become in the near future cheap to pick up second hand to add in a second and 3rd Projector when people upgrade to FullHD projectors, also it has those lumens that could come in handy if i want to do video mapping like this:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYnH4duX ... re=related[/youtube]

Now that really is a big step closer to the holodeck, if ony there would be technology around to change the shape of the geometry of those boxes on the fly... Damn, i start thinking waaaaaay to big again. Still i wanted to do some light installations in the House with LEDs, a Beamer seems to be able to work out in simulating how it could look and just projecting on some place in the house and playing with photoshop on it could be fun.

Also i got an idea how to paint the room:

I wanted to go with mostly black anyhow. Is this too geeky? It would probably be near porfect for contrast. Also i understand why you recommend rear projection now, you are right, 3 front projected screens will start messing with each other a lot more than rear projection.

I also wonder if you can do something like this with just one 2500 Lumen Beamer when the Summer comes on a normal sized house:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=426GPgetJmw[/youtube]

Post by **tritosine5G** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 4:54 am

also rear projection is much easier helped with black courtain than FP , that might be just enough ( "telescopic" black courtains

insntead of painting the room black or black "hood " for fp screen) you can project thru the hallway, you can put it on the window etc.

if I'd have the chance I'd sure simulate acoustics than curved screen : )))

If you have good material like vikuiti its ideal. That's also higher quality screen than TV screens btw.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 5:22 am

Tretboot wrote: I also wonder if you can do something like this with just one 2500 Lumen Beamer when the Summer comes on a normal sized house:

you dont have to wonder you can't do none of that with 5360 or v700 and bulb . Not until you swap the bulb for some collimated light source lasers, lol.

Forget about 2500 lumen , you goin to get 700 in 3d . Thats because the color generation process differs ...

60hz 2D max lumen = 2200 = RGBWY ( rgb+white + yellow segment of color wheel , rainbow color breakup is observable)

120hz 3D max lumen = 700-750 = RGBKK ( rgb+ black +black , no WY is used, rainbow breakup is rarely if at all observable I never seen it)

Then after 700 hours or so bulb becomes like 20-30% darker. LED won't be much help , crazy expensive, and not bright enough.

Post by **Tretboot** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 5:43 pm

Forget about 2500 lumen , you goin to get 700 in 3d . Thats because the color generation process differs ...

I know, but projection mapping will mostly be in 2d i think, not sure if it is possible in 3d? I did order me a eMachines V700 and will start testing things when it arrives. Most imporantly if it works i the room like i think, how big i want the picture and where i want to sit. If all works out right, i can work on other stuff. Also: Since i have to get some furniture and stuff i have the idea to just project some pictures on the wall to get a feeling for how it might look in the room.

You are not getting me off the black ceiling, maybe i will not paint the walls black... but i like the idea. Even if i then later go to a rear projection i think it will not hurt picture quality. That room will become something like my home cinema, or like i said holodeck. I like dark rooms, i always turn the light out when i am at the pc. Its not the room i want to see, i want to be in the digital world!

Post by **tritosine5G** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 7:02 pm

i rather want to control ambient light , quality flight sim s3d will by my bread & butter when it comes to 3d content, imagine that.

Post by **Fredz** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 6:44 am

If you feel a little bit adventurous you can also try to build something like the iDome which seems to be a little bit more manageable than the JDome. Basically it's a 3m hemisphere made from fiberglass with a mirror surface, which is truncated at the base to fit in a standard room and use only one projector for stereoscopic rendering.

Description : http://www.icinema.unsw.edu.au/projects/infra_dome.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

You can find a FAQ about building one yourself here :
http://local.wasp.uwa.edu.au/~pbourke/m ... tml#mirror" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

You won't be able to play your favorite 3D games with this, but there is still support for third-party 3D API or applications like Unity3D, Quest3D, OpenGL or Blender if you want to use or create interactive 3D content. You'd also need a fisheye camera to create 3D videos for this dome.

Here are some photos of the beast :

Standard demo of Unity3D :

The Yo Frankie Blender game :

An image rendered with Povray (anaglyph here) :

Post by **tritosine5G** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 8:01 am

i see the acoustics and ambient light proofing is lacking severely

you can see other manufacturers with properly cut pure aluminium torus screens , it's insanely expensive to do it right

Post by **Fredz** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 8:16 am

Who cares about the acoustics when you use headphones ? And I don't think the ambient lighting should be a problem in a darker room as show in this video :
http://vimeo.com/3914950" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Post by **tritosine5G** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 8:26 am

yeah headphones and sub 60 fps... nah

I can really just wonder when we hit 120fps with cliffs of dover though.

I'll ask if the microbeads are small enough to project approx 3*35" for ultra high brightness.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgy88KGD ... r_embedded[/youtube]

you'd expect a developer with a sys like this though.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 4:29 pm

Curved vikuiti ain't bullshit man

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgLxQBTbrcs&NR=1[/youtube]

Post by **cybereality** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 8:55 pm

Fredz wrote: You won't be able to play your favorite 3D games with this, but there is still support for third-party 3D API or applications like Unity3D, Quest3D, OpenGL or Blender if you want to use or create interactive 3D content. You'd also need a fisheye camera to create 3D videos for this dome.

This is why we need an open-source 3D driver. So we can implement all this wild stuff that none of the major players are going to bother with: spherical projection, ortho-view head-tracking, support for experimental displays (diagonal parallax barriers, etc.).

Post by **Fredz** » Fri Feb 11, 2011 7:39 am

Yes that would be a good thing, but who's going to start developing it ? As I said before, I'll gladly help if you or anyone else start something like this, but it's hardly a thing I would try to implement alone myself. That's too much work for a single person.

Post by **tritosine5G** » Fri Feb 11, 2011 9:59 am

I say let's do some curve fitting for 50" RP screen and H5360, Maybe with thinner acrylic , bending is no problem at all , *fully optional* . I want 3x 50" RP.... Throw 's just 1.7meter by default but there are optical means to help that and FXSPRO likes short throw, and with 3.1 gain, brightness will be immense, even with glasses on .

then with 50", really seamless ppl can use a whole length slice . This is already quite a length and just 64cm height... But a good sound system also gains big momentum in this scenario

Post by **Tretboot** » Fri Feb 11, 2011 9:35 pm

iDome, wow, looks interesting! Also the use of a mirror would enable you to project a bigger picture if you have a small room.

I hope i will recive my projector tomorrow and can start doing first tests and see wich room will be best for it.

Thanks for all the input!

Post by **tritosine5G** » Thu Feb 24, 2011 5:38 pm

Post by **PalmerTech** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 1:44 pm

I figured I would pop into this thread to let people know that I found something very, very cool: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papasan_chair" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I just got one for free by random chance, mine is about 4.5 feet wide, and just under 2 feet deep. The wicker and bamboo frame is very lightweight and sturdy, and a nearly perfect spherical cut. I got a large piece of tight woven bedsheet and laid it inside, and tried using my ShowWX laser projector on it and sitting about 3 feet away... WOW! This is absolutely insane! Once you get to about 2 feet from the back of the bowl (About how far most of us sit from our monitors, I imagine), the image literally covers my full FOV, I cannot see the side of the image if I am looking forward. Just for fun, I decided to hold my hands up and compare the FOV of the curved display to my 80" DLP projection screen; It is the same size as my 80", if I was viewing my 80" from 4" away.

The nice thing about the ShowWX is that it has a very, very high pixel fill ratio. Even though the resolution is low (854x480), you cannot see even the slightest bit of a pixel, thanks to the fact that it is a scanning display. The even better part? No distortion at all! Since I am not using a spherical mirror to make focusing possible, thanks to laser projection, I am not dealing with any distortion.

I think I am going to be making a dome, either using this as the actual base, or maybe the mold for a fiberglass or paper mache replica.

Post by **Likay** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 2:22 pm

Really cool! Perfect usage of a bamboochair. I'm curious!

Post by **cadcoke5** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:09 pm

PalmerTech, when you say you, " I got a large piece of tight woven bedsheet and laid it inside." do you mean you glued it to the frame? I assume there were seams. Can you tell more about this process?

Joe Dunfee

Post by **PalmerTech** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:46 pm

I actually just used some tape on the backside for this initial test. There were no "seams", since the sheet covered the whole dome, but there were some lines where I had to fold it over, thanks to the curvature. It was by no means a long term solution, just something to throw together in a half hour so I could try this out.

I am probably going to try paper mache using the chair as a mold next, and use Bondo spot putty to fill in the wrinkles, sand it, and paint it light grey.

Post by **3dvison** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 4:35 pm

Hey PalmerTech,

Can you tell me what the max rez. is the ShowWX can take as an input and scale down to it's native rez. ? Or can it only take it's native rez. or lower ?

Post by **PalmerTech** » Tue Mar 15, 2011 8:09 pm

The max it will recognize via VGA is 848x480, or lower. I am not sure about component, but I suspect the same, as they have not released a "real" component cable, even though the iPod connector cable uses the component video signals.

I would love to try a ShowWX+, which is 50% brighter, but the new 720p model was being shown off last year, might be coming out this year.