[Murilo]

Well i have a very dark room nearly a bat cave, and occasionally i will get guests saying its to dark down here.


Is their anyway to add lighting to your area without hurting the picture quality? I have a black built in wall unit that goes back a few feet, but outside of it are light colored walls and ceiling.


I was thinking of bias lighting, or i have pott lights behind the seating area, and was considering adding a dimming switch, they point down to the ground, but at full blast since i currently have only an off switch really when turned on they really nail my screen which i cant have. I dont know if dimming them will really help the issue?


I was also considering dimming night lights in the room, i was hoping i could dim them enough they would hit a small part of the room but not my screen??


Is this even possible, any ideas or suggestions would be very helpful.


Or should i just keep the cave.

 

[Sherardp]

I control my lighting with a Lutron Spacer Ir Dimmers. With this you can set up to 4 scenes. I have scene 4 setup for viewing movies and the lighting is just bright enough to barely see your hand. It actully works out great as I don't always want the lights completely off in the room. Cheap, they work great, and you will get some wow factor with them too. I ordered from Beverly Hills Electric.

 

[airscapes]

I don't have a bat cave but I do like some lighting (as bias lighting). It improves perceived contrast and reduces eye stain. My setup is less then ideal, I have no dedicated room and the screen is portable so the entire setup goes up and down with each use. However my screen is set back a few feet out of the room similar to what you describe and I have accent lights in the front corners of the room behind furniture. These are cans that sit on the floor and shine up. I very low wattage bulbs in them and they do not shine on the screen at all. That said.. you need to put light in the room that will not hit the screen or sine in the views eyes.. if you can mange that your PQ will not suffer.

Din is the ticket .. I can not see my remote with the (side lights) on.. but my eyes do not get tired after an hour of viewing either..

 

[GeorgeAB]



Quote:
Originally Posted by Murilo /forum/post/18151850


Well i have a very dark room nearly a bat cave, and occasionally i will get guests saying its to dark down here.


Is their anyway to add lighting to your area without hurting the picture quality? I have a black built in wall unit that goes back a few feet, but outside of it are light colored walls and ceiling.


I was thinking of bias lighting, or i have pott lights behind the seating area, and was considering adding a dimming switch, they point down to the ground, but at full blast since i currently have only an off switch really when turned on they really nail my screen which i cant have. I dont know if dimming them will really help the issue?


I was also considering dimming night lights in the room, i was hoping i could dim them enough they would hit a small part of the room but not my screen??


Is this even possible, any ideas or suggestions would be very helpful.


Or should i just keep the cave.

There are other areas of the forum that regularly discuss theater room lighting. This section of the forum is for discussing 'Display Devices: Digital Hi-End Projectors- $3,000 USD MSRP and Up.' You may get better information in the section of the forum specifically provided for your type of questions. Downward facing, recessed can lights in the ceiling, over the seating areas, with dimming control, is the usual solution.


That said, you don't have a 'bat cave' if most of your room has light colored surfaces. I wouldn't recommend compromising viewing conditions for occasional complaints about the darkness. The room is darkened for one primary reason- image quality. Aren't these "friends" there to watch a movie when the room lights are turned off? Maybe a little education is in order.


Best regards and beautiful pictures,

G. Alan Brown, President

CinemaQuest, Inc.

A Lion AV Consultants Affiliate


"Advancing the art and science of electronic imaging"

 

[mark haflich]

Despite what my wife might claim, I am not a guest in my house. When I have guests in my home theater, they are the guests. If I prefer accurate reference volume levels and they prefer something less loud, in an effort to treat them as guests I turn the sound down. If some prefer not to be in the total darknes, I turn the wall sconces on slightly. After all the walls are fabric dark. I do not suggest or try to educate them that the video quality is compromised by doing so. My job is to make the experience enjoyable and comfortable for them. When the guests are HT entheusiasts, they love my black pit and that`s the way we watch.


Lighting controls. Allow you to turn lights off and on and if chosen wisely adjust the amount of light. Its all a question of Ht design to allow various lighting scenarious to fill the particular need at the moment.

 

[stanger89]

The best "bang for the buck" (brightness for minimal impact on PQ) IMO is dimmable halogen spots right above the seating area.


Dimmable lets you reduce them to a level that doesn't massively impact PQ. The fact that they're spots minimizes the light spill around the room and onto the screen, and having them right over the seating means you don't have to crank them way up, just to get modest lighting in the seating area.


I've got 6 seats (2 rows of 3) and 6, 3" halogen spots roughly directly over each seat. They're the gimbal type and aimed at the seats. As a result, turning them up just a tiny bit is enough to get out of the feeling that you're sitting with the lights out, but not enough to significantly impact PQ.


I've got mine on Maestro IR dimmers and a scene set up with maybe 20% brightness. I use this for the more social period before a move. For gaming or if we watch TV or something. Of course then the lights go off when the movie starts

 

[erkq]

What about rope lighting hidden under the lip of the riser, all the way around including the steps? It provides soft, dimmable indirect lighting that doesn't light up the screen directly. And, it looks cool.

 

[stanger89]

I've got some of that too, but I think it would be hard to get the bright enough to overcome the "batcave feeling" without throwing a lot of light on the screen, being that it's indirect.


It is cool though

 

[Murilo]



Quote:
Originally Posted by GeorgeAB /forum/post/18152914


There are other areas of the forum that regularly discuss theater room lighting. This section of the forum is for discussing 'Display Devices: Digital Hi-End Projectors- $3,000 USD MSRP and Up.' You may get better information in the section of the forum specifically provided for your type of questions. Downward facing, recessed can lights in the ceiling, over the seating areas, with dimming control, is the usual solution.


That said, you don't have a 'bat cave' if most of your room has light colored surfaces. I wouldn't recommend compromising viewing conditions for occasional complaints about the darkness. The room is darkened for one primary reason- image quality. Aren't these "friends" there to watch a movie when the room lights are turned off? Maybe a little education is in order.


Best regards and beautiful pictures,

G. Alan Brown, President

CinemaQuest, Inc.

A Lion AV Consultants Affiliate


"Advancing the art and science of electronic imaging"

I am aware of the other forums, i searched them, i was going to put it in one of the other forums such as theater construction or theory where they talk about light, the issue is and reason why I put it here, (I noticed someone else in my search posted this topic here as well about lighting in his area) is because a majority of those other forums were plasma and lcd users. I have a plasma and light conditions for it, but specifically i wanted to consult the projector forum because it is the projector setup i am concerned about. And yes the main concern was degradation of picture quality which this forum is primarily concerned about as you mentioned.


Your right i dont have a full bat cave but again the wall unit which is a few feet deep where my screen goes in is pitch black above, behind, and below it, in the darkness i cant see the screen in the wall unit.


If it is going to affect picture quality i think i might have better piece of mind not using lighting, I was trying to see if their was a way to use it without affecting pq at all. Im going to try a dimmer i purchased today in the back area, but i think any lighting is going to hit the screen, or to low of lighting wont do anything. But i think airscape and strangers methods and ideas are worth a try.


As for the stair lighting, that is interesting our stairs do light up as we walk on them, but unfortunately they are very bright.

 

[Murilo]

Well I ran a test setup tonight. Level 3 dimming is what is needed for it to actually brighten the area anything lower barely does anything. The thing is level 3 lighting hits the screen a bit, however displaying a black pattern on my projector did not yeild any issues with black levels. The problem however is if i do upgrade to another projector with better blacks which im planning to do this year, will it be affecting the picture then?


Not sure what i should do, it would be nice if i just told them to deal with it

 

[Murilo]

Well after testing level 3 brightness, i turned all the lights off so it was pitch black put on level 3 brightness which is very dim but some light at the back of the room level 2 was barely any light, the light just barely touched a bit of the screen, it was hard to tell if it was reaching the screen at all or not.


Now I turned my projector on put it into whisper mode, and shut the iris down to 0 to make the dimmest picture possible and put a full black patten on my screen with the dynamic iris on as well.


I could not see any raise or washout or tell the lights were hitting the screen, blacks looked the same, i stood stairing at the screen 2 inches infront of it, and had her turn it to level 3 then off, i noticed no difference and could not even tell when she turned them off and on when i stood right infront of the screen.


So would it be safe to assume i can use level 3 brightness without sacrificing picture quality? If i cant notice it standing 2 inches infront of the screen with a full black pattern in the dimmest mode my projector can do and couldnt tell whether she had the lights on or off as i stared at the screen which was 2 inches infront of me, im assuming i should be good, and no negative side effects? Is their anything else i should check? The blacks my projector produced in the dimmest mode possible did not seem affected at all by the level 3 brightness at the back of the room. With the projector off though i could see the light was just barely and i mean barely touching screen, but since the projector blacks in dimmest mode possible were still not affected, again should I assume im good to go for the lights without sacrificing picture quality?


The level 3 dimming lights are also about 20 feet away from the screen.



Again anything else to check or opinions before i go ahead and order a dimmer switch and stuff would be helpful.


Thanks.

 

[Murilo]

Can anyone reply to the last question/post at all, before i go ahead and add a dimmer light, things to consider, anything?

 

[airscapes]

If you can't tell the difference, and the wife can't tell the difference then you are good to go!

 

[Dark Rider]

You may want to also consider the Lutron Maestro IR dimmers if you don't need the extra scenes provided by the Spacer series. They're a lot cheaper, and they can still be controlled via ir remote (on/off, up/down all in sequence, or 1 scene at customized levels). I just put in the Maestro IR's and really like them, since I didn't need more than a single scene. At someone else's suggestion, I'm now adding macro's to my Harmony remote to bring up the lighting when I press Pause or Stop and go to my Scene 1 (theater mode) when I press play.

 

[Murilo]

Actually am using that dimmer right now, but have to switch to x10 because i can use my IR543 to control it with an emitter ran to it. My nevo remote does ir over wifi.


Do they (maestro) do rf as well? Somehow mx-810 also dimmed it fairly reliably but not always 100 percent, i had to have my remote pointed at it sometimes.


Problem is im big into automation, not having to point the remote, i like to touch one button on my nevo and let the room come together. Screen drop, lights dim, components fire up, so with the x10 i can plug in the ir543 receiver, and put it in my component cabinet, then run an emitter to it from my nevo base station, and it will reliably control the lights without having to point the remote, apperantly the ir543 controls x10 lights over home electrical system.


I actually had one cheap x10 switch like 10 dollars from smart home that was working over the ir543 but then stopped a few hours later. I need to purchase a more expensive one.


I dont think the lutron series has a component like the IR543, and unfortunately the light switch is way out of reach to run any sort of ir emitter to it.

 

[Dark Rider]

Lutron makes both an IR version and an RF version of their Maestro line. The RF version is a little pricier, but still reasonable, approx. $70 IIRC.

http://www.lutron.com/hwi/pdfs/SpecS...l/048-013a.pdf