Carada, Da-Lite, Elite, Seymour AV And Stewart Screen Material Test Results

Wow!! Nice report!!!

Yes. Excellent work Jeff.

Screen Excellence too. I've heard their EN4 weave is very fine and almost looks solid but that the screen has a yellowish tint.

... and maybe Vutec too.

W. Jeff. Between the Carada Brilliant White material and the Elite CineWhite which one do you prefer? And thank you for taking the time to do these screen sample evaluation. They are really helpful.

Thank you W. Jeff. I'm contacting Carada for a Criterion 2.37:1 aspect ratio screen.

I have various screen samples from different screen companies, including Carada, Da-lite, Stewart and Elite. I really like the Studiotek 100 but besides the price I'm afraid of the warning that it can only be used in a batcave.
The Studiotek 130 sample I can see sheen or sparklies on really bright scenes and the Elite CineWhite I like because of price and it looks similar to the Carada Brilliant White. I like the black backing to but I don't know if it offers any advantage over the Carada's.

Drop me a line Monday. I can help.

I can assure you that there is NOTHING yellow about any of the Screen Excellence Enlightor (EN1, EN2 and EN4K) materials.

In fact, EN4K has just recently passed ISF certification (for colorimetry and uniform field of white at all points on the screen - on and off axis). Expect Screen Excellence factory to begin promoting this certification in the first Q of 2010.

You are always welcome to contact me offline here for screen swatch samples which include audio and video testing curves.

Good listening and viewing!
John

Here's a little photo that will show you a close up shot of the Screen Excellence Enlightor Series of AT screen fabrics (generally: EN1 = 1080 material, EN2 = 720 material and EN4K = 4K material.) also shown is a piece of traditional vinyl micro-perf for comparison.



Good listening and viewing.

"Screens with gain may perform better than that observed if the projector is mounted closer to the observers eye level."

The preceding quote taken from your otherwise excellent report is not 100% accurate. It is absolutely accurate for retroreflective screens, such as the Da-Lite High Power. It is not quite right for angular reflective screens, such as most of the other screens in your report. Angular reflective screens exhibit the greatest gain at screen center when the angle between the projector's line of sight above screen center and a line perpendicular to screen center is equal to the angle between the viewer's line of sight below screen center and a line perpendicular to screen center. In other words, if the viewer's line of sight is 10 degrees below screen center, a projector position 10 degrees above screen center will produce the greatest gain at screen center. Anything closer to (or further from) the viewer's eye level will produce less gain.

Your statement is true for both types of screens only when the viewer's eyes are at screen center height (which may?? be true for your theater). In the general case, in which the viewer's eyes may not be at screen center height, your statement is not true for angular reflective screens.

You don't have to take my word for this. If you move your measurement device below any angular reflective screen at an angle below screen center equal to the angle of your projector above screen center, you will find that to be the point of maximum gain for a point at screen center. (Angle of reflection equals angle of incidence.)

Thanks Jeff, very useful.

Do you plan on reviewing the SI Black Diamond screens? They appear to be a better solution than the studiotek 130 for rooms with ambient light.

D.

Interesting report - any idea what might explain, for the Seymour AT fabric, why it measured at 0.94 gain, but their site says 1.2? Or am I misreading that?

Ya looks like lots of the manufacture gains are off.