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Digital Projection Insight 4K Laser and LED Projectors at CEDIA 2014

12K views 28 replies 14 participants last post by  Seegs108 
#1 ·


When it comes to high-end digital projectors, Digital Projection International (DPI) is hard to beat. At CEDIA this year, the company introduced two new alternative-illumination models—the Insight 4K Laser and Insight 4K LED. Both are 3-chip DLP designs using true 4K DMD imagers (4096x2160) and as their names imply, they use lasers and LEDs, respectively, as the light source.

The Insight 4K Laser is similar in concept to the other laser projectors at the show. The light from an array of blue-laser diodes is split—part of it is used to excite yellow phosphor on a spinning wheel, producing yellow light that is then split into red and green, which illuminate the corresponding imagers. The rest of the blue laser light illuminates the blue imager. The light engine is rated at 20,000 hours to half brightness, and unlike the other laser projectors at CEDIA, it can be replaced.

Also unlike the other laser projectors at the show, this one can output up to 12,000 lumens, which means it can fill a screen up to 36 feet wide in a light-controlled room. It also features 12-bit color, but the gamut barely reaches beyond BT.709. Its two HDMI inputs support HDCP 2.2.

As seen in the photo above, the Insight 4K laser was demonstrated out on the show floor on an 8-foot-diagonal dnp Supernova ambient light-rejecting screen using unfamiliar 4K footage. With 12-bit color, the gradations in the colors of the sunset behind the Eiffel Tower in this shot were super-smooth and devoid of any banding.

The Insight 4K LED, which uses an identical housing as the 4K Laser, was demonstrated in a darkened room on a 12-foot-wide, 16:9 Stewart StudioTek 130 screen, most likely because its peak light output is 2000-3000 lumens. It uses red, green, and blue LEDs to directly illuminate the DMD imagers, and the LED engine can be replaced after its 60,000-hour lifespan has elapsed. Most remarkably, it achieves a color gamut very close to BT.2020; in fact, it's the first display I know of to do so, and DPI claims it's the only projector that can reproduce that gamut and true 4K resolution.

Before the demo footage was shown, a representative went through a PowerPoint presentation, and one of the points he made was that more-saturated colors appear brighter than less-saturated versions of the same colors, even though they measure the same brightness. This is called the Helmholtz-Kohlrausch (HK) effect, and it could well be why most viewers are attracted to more-saturated colors.

The demo footage included the same native 4K content being shown by the Insight 4K Laser on the show floor as well as the trailer for Elysium and clips from Tears of Steel, a very cool live-action/CGI sci-fi short. Unfortunately, the content had not been graded for the projector's wide color gamut, and it looked quite oversaturated to me—though I also recognized the HK effect in my visceral response (ooh, look at the pretty eye candy!). On the plus side, the Insight 4K LED implements 12-bit color, and as with the 4K Laser, subtle gradations were silky smooth with nary a hint of banding.

Despite the oversaturation on the material used in the demo, I'm very excited about both of these projectors, especially the Insight 4K LED. If 4K content is released with the BT.2020 color gamut, this is the only display device I know of that will be able to reproduce it accurately, at least for now. Of course that capability doesn't come cheap—the Insight 4K LED will set you back $150,000! (The 4K Laser is actually less—only $120,000.) But DPI is clearly pointing the way toward the future of display technology, and I'm glad to be along for the ride.

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#2 ·
I'm not aware of a bt 2020 source from Tears of steel.

This is a lossless copy of the short film "Tears of Steel". This directory contains a set of 4096x1714 16-bit sRGB tiff files at 24 frames per second from the regraded 4k render of the film premiered May 26, 2013 at the Seattle International Film festival and released on YouTube 2013 June 2.
sRGB so bt 789 gamut with a different gamma.

but a device with nearly bt 2020 just wow and this with LED and nothing new like laser.
 
#7 ·
sorry forgot the link:
https://media.xiph.org/mango/tearsofsteel-4k-tiff/

xiph.org host a lot of lossless version from open movies like tears of steel.

the normal version on there page are Kbit starved at least in my eyes.

the raw shoots of the camera can be found here (should be totally lossless)
These are VFX plates from the mango open movie. They are 4k raw files in the native format of the Sony F65 digital cinema camera.
https://media.xiph.org/mango/raw/ these raw data can be easily in a colorspace higher than sRGB/BT 709

and I don't know if they hosted a BT 2020 version of the CGI anywhere.
 
#6 ·
Tears of Steel 4K can be downloaded here in .mov (or DCP for those of you that own a movie theater). According to this site "the 4k .mov file is h.264 encoded with Blender, rename to .mp4 and it works fine."

I watched this on my Sony VPL-VW1100ES and it looks very good.
Lol whomever you quoted that from doesn't know how files work. Just because you rename the extension doesn't mean you change the file container type. :rolleyes:
 
#10 ·
I bought my projector in March and still don't have my HT done. I was starting to think I should have waited to buy as fear of a tech jump is omnipresent....until I saw the price tag. Yikes. Condo at the beach...4K laser projector...condo at the beach...4K laser projector...
 
#11 ·
I have wondered, more than once, if the DPI Insight 4K LED projector, is, or was the 4K LED projector that NEC Pro hyped, then mysteriously it disappeared., and DPI's unit popped up. Coincidence? I think not.
 
#16 ·
Last year at Infocom two reps from a manufacturer of consumer/business/education class of projectors (i.e., not ultra high end HT or digital cinema) told me that the unofficial info they had from TI indicated that there would the consumer class 4K DMD chips available in 2015.
 
#25 ·
Larger glass optics would have been needed. That would have brought the projector out of Planar's/Runco's targeted MSRP/profit range. This is why a smaller 4K DMD makes sense. I think people will be outraged if they see a modern 4K projector without CIH through zoom functionality in the $5000+ market. A smaller DMD will facilitate the needed requirements for relatively modest optics so we don't have to pay a crazy high amount for the projector.
 
#26 ·
Of course, there are tradeoffs, and the PD8150 was designed before CIH setups were common (they still aren't really). Would the necessary optics really be THAT much larger? We're talking a 2.3% increase in zoom here. Maybe some of the more expensive lens elements we're re-used from something with significantly higher production?
 
#27 ·
Not sure. You'd have to speak to an optical engineer who works for Minolta, Zeiss or another lens manufacturer. All I know is it must cost more than we think otherwise someone would have introduced a .95" DLP model in the under $10000 market with it. I think building a DLP projector in general costs more considering all the "fees" that go along with them. Because these manufacturers usually don't build and design their own optical engines, lenses, processing boards, ect so they buy an OEM design, which costs more than it would cost to manufacture one yourself (R&D not included in that price). The middleman wants their cut. TI also gets a generous cut for every DMD they sell, though I expect that's built into the cost the OEM charges. These OEMs include stock lens options and most don't include enough zoom to do CIH.

BenQ and Vivitek are really the only players left in the DLP market who design and manufacture their own projectors. Though, Vivitek is just a lower branch of Delta. Delta manufactures tons of the OEM design projectors I'm talking about. Your PD8150 is a Delta OEM design that Planar put their own flare into. Mitsubishi, Marantz, and certain Sharp DLP projectors were all in-house designed but they don't make home theater projectors anymore. So what I'm saying is that it might be cost restrictive to have a large enough lens in the under $10000 DLP market that can give us CIH because of middleman and royalty fees associated with the typical DLP projector. This is why we see Epson, JVC, and Sony do this easily for under $10000. The design, micro-display, and light engine "fees" aren't added into the MSRP as much because the cost to physically manufacture each unit is less for them so they have more wiggle room on what extras they can include.
 
#28 · (Edited)
Larger glass optics would have been needed. That would have brought the projector out of Planar's/Runco's targeted MSRP/profit range. This is why a smaller 4K DMD makes sense. I think people will be outraged if they see a modern 4K projector without CIH through zoom functionality in the $5000+ market. A smaller DMD will facilitate the needed requirements for relatively modest optics so we don't have to pay a crazy high amount for the projector.
This makes a lot of sense but it is possible to have slightly better zoom ranges without really expensive optics. I had a BenQ W9000 which had a 0.95 DMD and a limited zoom range. However it was possible to remove a plastic stopper on the cog wheel that significantly increased the zoom range. I dont remember exactly how much but it could easily do zoom for CIH. I dont understand what the stopper was for because I didn't observe any negative effects on pq even at the zoom extremes. So it is possible to make a sharp 0.95 DLP whith a decent zoom range without prohibitly expensive optics. Why hasn't anyone done it and why did Benq put the stopper there?? I dont get it.

Edit: Did find the new zoom range and it wasnt as good as I remember, but still good enough for CIH. New throw ratio was 1.48-2.0.
 
#29 · (Edited)
BenQ had the stopper in there for a reason. I would venture to guess you weren't using much, if any, lens shift. If you were using anymore than a little you'd see why the stopper/cog was there. When you use zoom you take up more surface area on each of the optical pieces in the lens. So when you took out those pieces you effectively squashed basically all of the lens shift capabilities. BenQ had those pieces in there so end users had more flexibility with installation. So yes, it can be done "on the cheap" if you're willing to sacrifice other parts of the lenses capabilities. You see this done in the under $1000 DLP market. Most of the Optoma projectors have no lens shift capabilities. This is to keep optical size to a minimum so the lens can be made extremely cost effective.
 
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