[unefined]

Just thought I'd share my recent experience (and current testing) with ya'll here...


My wife and I have been searching for the ultimate screen to go with our new Sony VPL-HS20. So far, we have tested the following:


Sample Name and approx. size


Carada High Contrast Gray - 8"x10"

Carada Classic Cinema White - 8"x10"

Carada Brilliant White - 8"x10"

Da-Lite Cinema Vision - 6"x6"

Da-Lite High Contrast Cinema Vision - 6"x6"

Da-Lite High Power - 6"x6"

Stewart Grayhawk - 2'x3'

Stewart Firehawk - 2'x3'

Stewart Studiotec 130 - 2'x3'

Rustoleum Metallic Aluminum - 2'x2' (hardboard)

Rustoleum Blossom White Satin - 2'x2' (hardboard)

Rustoleum Auto Primer Light Gray - 2'x2' (hardboard)

Misty Evening - 2'x2' (hardboard), 4'x3' (Do-Able)


Soon to be tested:


50% Misty Evening 50% Silver Metallic - 2'x2' (hardboard)

75% Misty Evening 25% Silver Metallic - 2'x2' (hardboard)

50% Misty Evening 50% White Opal Pearlescent - 2'x2' (hardboard)

75% Misty Evening 25% White Opal Pearlescent - 2'x2' (hardboard)

40% Misty Evening 35% White Opal Pearlescent 25% Silver Metallic - 2'x2' (hardboard)


For those of you not interested in spending over a week playing with samples and testing.... or who would just like to hear me rant, below you will find comments on each of the materials tested. These comments are a composite of my opinions, and those of my wife (the ultimate judge). The movies we tested each material with are Matrix Reloaded , American Pie, Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring, and Final Fantasy The Spirits Within. Each test was approximately 10 minutes in length for each film, and generally involved us going through the chapters and pausing it on various scenes. Unfortunately, this is not very scientific, so consider the results to be purely subjective in nature. For reference, all tests were conducted in complete darkness (except for the lighted Sony remote control). The projector is setup with mostly defaults for film mode, Lamp on Low, Iris On.

Carada High Contrast Gray 0.8 Gain
Matrix Reloaded - WOW. Very nice. Dark scenes look amazing on this material. If I were presenting only dark films, this would be the material of choice (and budget).
American Pie - Is it supposed to always look overcast? Crushed whites, dull skintones... overall a very disappointing experience. I couldn't watch the entire movie on this material.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - Once again, the dark scenes look incredible. In the light scenes, you can "see" the gray. Overall, not very appealing.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Not bad. A very dark movie to begin with, this material really helps bring the blacks way down.

Carada Classic Cinema White 1.0 Gain
Matrix Reloaded - Too bright. Everything that should look black looks gray. Isn't Trinity wearing black vinyl? With this material, you'd wouldn't know.
American Pie - What? The sky is really blue? You mean the actors aren't all suffering from a horrible stomach bug? Hey - check it out guys, there's color again! This must be what it was like to watch the first color tv broadcasts...
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - Much better! All the daytime scenes look correct. Too bad the dark scenes look washed out and without detail...
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - I'd give this a neutral rating. CGI is a lot more forgiving material for a white screen than film is.

Carada Brilliant White 1.4 Gain
Matrix Reloaded - Unwatchable. That's it.
American Pie - Brilliant. Like watching a giant television set.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - The daytime scenes look incredible. Very much the "110" Plasma" feel to it. The nighttime scenes look miserable.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Very similar to the CCW above. Not as bad of an effect as on film, but still not great to watch.

Da-Lite Cinema Vision 1.3 Gain
Matrix Reloaded - Much more tolerable than the two white Carada screens. Has a beige look to the material that seems to help blacks without crushing whites too much.
American Pie - Very good. Watchable - not bad in the evening scenes.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - Very watchable. Could use a little help during some of the extremely dark scenes, but overall good.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Best so far on this film. Much better at keeping dark scenes dark, but giving a little more punch to the colors.

Da-Lite High Contrast Cinema Vision 1.1 Gain
Matrix Reloaded - Very good. The blacks still aren't as black as I'd like them to be, but it is a world of difference.
American Pie - Gives everyone a sort of sickly pale to their skintones. This may be something that can be calibrated around. Other than that, the colors are still more vivid than the previous "High Contrast" material.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - Good material for this movie! While it is a little bit darker than the regular Cinema Vision, it fixes the problems in dark scenes nicely. I could sit back and enjoy this.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Too be honest, I didn't watch much of this film on the HCCV. The few scenes I viewed looked fine. Nothing extraordinary, but very good overall.

Da-Lite High Power 2.8 Gain
NOTE: This is a retro-reflective material. We were viewing from within the correct viewing cone. Ceiling mounted projectors may have different results than our table mounted test.
Matrix Reloaded - One word: No. For reasons that I do not understand, colors look HORRIBLE. Explosions look greenish instead of orange or red. For me, this material is not a fit.
American Pie - Everything looked very bright. Even after altering the brightness on the projector to try and compensate, this material seems to be overkill. Colors were nice and punchy, however.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - There still seems to be some color shift with this material. Perhaps someone can explain how to make the colors look right on it....
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Untested. By this point, we were through with testing the High Power. I know that many people on this forum own and enjoy the high power material - it must be a calibration issue with my setup that caused the color issues...

Stewart Grayhawk 0.95 Gain
NOTE: My Home Theater dealer was kind enough to allow me to demo some very large samples of this material. I admit that the sample size can affect the way images are perceived (by not having a larger field of view to evaluate). As I've mentioned before, my opinions are very subjective, and should be treated as such.
Matrix Reloaded - Very nice. Not much difference between this and the Carada High Contrast Gray. Overall, this material is excellent for dark(er) films
American Pie - I wouldn't say this is my favorite material, but I think Stewart has an edge up on other gray screens. The colors looked much better on this material than Carada or Da-Lite's high contrast screens.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - Very good for most of the movie. Too dark and washed out for the opening scenes in the Shire. Much like going to the theater - a little darker than you may be used to on TV, but something you could adjust to in little time.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - I ended up watching about 30 minutes on this screen. Very nice.

Stewart Firehawk 1.35 Gain
NOTE: My Home Theater dealer was kind enough to allow me to demo some very large samples of this material. I admit that the sample size can affect the way images are perceived (by not having a larger field of view to evaluate). As I've mentioned before, my opinions are very subjective, and should be treated as such.
Matrix Reloaded - Wow. One of the best materials yet for this movie. It gives dark scenes their "blacks", yet skintones are excellent. I could watch this all day. Very vivid with colors.
American Pie - Just a tad dark. A good example is when they are out on the field all the white jerseys look like they need to be washed (which is probably true!). Compared to a white screen, the whites are slightly crushed. On the upside, the skintones are incredible. This is the first gray(ish) material I have seen that can deepen the blacks without ruining skintones and color.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - About 45 minutes into the film I decided I to proceed with further testing. It felt like being in the theater. I am really impressed with this material!
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Brief testing with this film, as by this point I knew I liked the material. Really good black levels, and once again the colors jumped out at you (such as the blue eyes in the helmets).

Stewart studiotec 130
NOTE: My Home Theater dealer was kind enough to allow me to demo some very large samples of this material. I admit that the sample size can affect the way images are perceived (by not having a larger field of view to evaluate). As I've mentioned before, my opinions are very subjective, and should be treated as such.
Matrix Reloaded - And this material costs more than Carada's or Da-Lite's white because? Basically the same. As Tryg has pointed out before, white material is white material. And it shows. Blacks were gray, colors were good.
American Pie, Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring, Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - White material is white material. If you choose to buy a Stewart Studiotek screen, you are either buying it for the a) Name or b) Frame. Not because it is anything a) better b) different.

Rustoleum Metallic Aluminum 7? Gain

Unwatchable due to hotspotting. Lots of fun to spray paint, though! I tried this as an undercoat to a Misty Evening layer, and my wife swears she can see more vibrance in the colors. As a top coat, it is horrible. Very difficult to spray a perfectly even coat of this stuff!

Rustoleum Blossom White Satin 1.x Gain

Not bad, but hard to spray. I won't be giving individual movie comparisons, as this is a white "material" just like an of the professional ones. Not 1/10th as good as the pro materials, but the same color! I strong advise against spray painting any screen unless you have extensive experience (read: years in da 'hood). I do not. It did not come out well. End of story.

Rustoleum Auto Primer Light Gray

Great grey color. Unfortunately, plagued by the same problems as the above two - nearly impossible to spray. Helped a little when used as a base coat on a Misty Evening test. It helped lower black levels ever so slightly.

Misty Evening

OMG. First off, even though CMRA and I have not seen eye to eye on some things, if we ever meet in person I owe him a beer! This stuff is incredible! Ok, maybe not incredible, but when you factor in price it comes pretty close. I will let my wife's comments sum it up "That looks better than any of the others, why do we have to buy a screen?". Now, she said this before I put the Firehawk up, which she agreed was marginally better.
Matrix Reloaded - Looks great! Not quite as dark as the firehawk, but skintones look good. Defintely watchable. As a mater of fact, we did watch about an hour of it before moving on with the testing.
American Pie - Excellent! Blue skys, white jerseys. Better white levels than the Firehawk on this film, but not quite as good in the dark scenes such as the party. I love the colors on this screen! Very vivid.
Lord of the Rings Fellowship of the Ring - It could stand to be a tad bit better in the darkest of scenes, but it really shows off in bright scenes. The opening scene in the Shire was as vivid and beautiful as on my 51F500 Hitachi.
Final Fantasy The Spirits Within - Very good. This material seems to bring out colors in CGI in ways the other variations of gray can't come close to. The blue eyes (soldiers helmets) that I mentioned earlier looked almost 3D.



Conclusion? I haven't one yet. As you can see, I have more samples to test out. I can say this - if you have $2k burning a hole in your pocket, go buy a Stewart screen and enjoy it. If you have

 

[Scott B]

Try putting the HS20 in high lamp mode and re-test the grey screen samples. You may very well prefer the results. Grey screens should not dull colours or darken whites. It sounds like you are seeing the effects of decreased ft-lamberts.

 

[unefined]

I tried increasing from low lamp mode to high lamp mode and the differencce was hardly noticable.

 

[chuckvb]

Great post! I'm thinking of a Z2 and your evaluation is great.

PS where do we get the "Misty Evening"?


Thanks.

 

[Tryg]

keep up the good work! thanks for the review!

 

[unefined]

chuckvb - Misty Evening is a Glidden paint available at Home Depot. Price is about $7.50/qt or $15/gallon. Silver Metallic and White Opal Pearlescent are Behr brand glazes/specialty paints also available at Home Depot.


Tryg - Thank you for your killer reviews. Much of my inspiration for this came from reading your shootouts. Now if only I had a Silverstar sample to compare everything to!

Update

I finished painting the first coat of the 5 new mixtures on hardboard samples tonight. If they are dry in the next few hours I'll test them tonight, but likely it won't be until tomorrow that I test them. In case anyone was interested, I chose those combinations because I was too cheap to buy the Faux Glaze some of the other folks here are using. Preliminary results on the tests look good..... as in, my wife is thinking about painting our bathroom in ME + White Opal 50/50 mix.

 

[calvin940]

Any reason why I shouldn't/couldn't just paint this misty evening right on my gyrock wall at the front of this room rather than getting some type of "screen" material?


Cheers

Calvin

 

[unefined]

Calvin - If my walls were not textured I would paint directly on the wall. In our case, we are going to go with a blackout cloth + ME combination (or ME variant). I have some sample blackout cloth that I will be testing various painting techniques on to figure out how to get it on smooth. Hopefully it works out...


Tomorrow I plan on taking screen shots (using the same projector settings and same scenes from DVD) of the Carada, Da-Lite, and Stewart samples. I will also have the same settings with the Misty Evening and ME variants. Since I have never done this before, is it better to photograph the screens individually (as Tryg did in the White, Gray, Silver review) or all at once (as he did in the big shootout thread)? I only have one more full day with the Stewart samples, so I'd like to get some decent shots of these to help illustrate my comments. Any ideas, Tryg?


Any particular movies / scenes that ya'll would like to see comparisons of? I don't have a huge DVD collection, but I do have some of the recent and popular films (LOTR, Matrix, Blackhawk Down, Santa Clause, etc.) I'll do my best to honor requests made before tomorrow evening.

 

[GreggPenn]

Since it sounds like your favorites boil down to the Firehawk and ME paint, I would like to see comparisons between those two screens.


Please take a shot from a bright scene and a dark scene for each material. (If possible, I'd like to see the HCCV also).


Personally, I like seeing the entire, dedicated shot. If we want a side-by-side, we can lauch both images and view them together that way.


Thank you for your extensive, informal review. As I'm waiting on an HS20 myself, I really was glad to read it!


gp

 

[unefined]

Gregg,


I'll probably use a few shots from Matrix Reloaded and Santa Clause 2. I find the early scenes in Santa Clause 2 where they are in the workshop really test a materials ability to show colors with depth and vivid detail. Please keep in mind the size of the samples I have - the HCCV will not be nearly the size of the Firehawk and ME. Also, tomorrow I will have 5 more ME variants ready for testing, each 2'x2'. My current testing plans, while subject to change, are something like this:


Test 1 ("Everybody join in")

Carada samples (3)

Stewart Samples (3)

Da-Lite samples (3)

Large piece of ME (1)


Test 2 ("Just the gray's now")

Carada High Contrast Gray

Da-Lite HCCV

Stewart Grayhawk

Stewart Firehawk

Large piece of Misty Evening


Test 3 ("Now the whites")

Carada Classic Cinema White

Carada Brilliant White

Da-Lite Cinema Vision

Da-Lite High Power

Stewart Firehawk


Test 4 ("Let's here it for the misty's in the house")

Misty Evening (large panel)

5 variations on Misty Evening (2'x2')

Note: This test may need to be split up, due to the large size of the panels. Head to head competitions may be the plan going forward.


Test 5 ("And now a moment for our special guests")

Misty Evening (large panel)

vs.

Stewart Firehawk

vs.

Da-Lite High Contrast Cinema Vision



Any other requests? For what it is worth, photos will be taken with a Canon S200 digital camera. It's only 2MP, so don't expect much. I will tweak with the settings tomorrow evening to try and get the best possible photos, and then post the settings that I use for reference. I'm not a photographer, so if I do something wrong don't hesitate to correct me

 

[ftlee]

unefined,


THANK YOU for all of your hard work! I am thinking about getting an HS20 in the near future to hold me over until 1080P DLP arrives. If I read your review correctly, you liked the "Stewart Firehawk 1.35 Gain" the best. Is this right?


P.S. Do you think the HS20 puts out enough light to light-up a 138" screen?


Thanks,


Frank T. Lee

 

[ftlee]

I was just browsing Stewart's site and found this information:

Quote:

Recommended Tips For Best Performance Results FireHawk is a high performance screen material. Therefore, for best results, Stewart Filmscreen Corporation recommends a minimum projector throw distance of 1.6 times the screen width and placement of the projector above the viewers (ceiling mounted).

If I was to use their 138" screen, what would be the mounting distance needed for the HS20?


Thanks,


Frank T. Lee

 

[scoob5555]

unefined-

Excellent work thusfar! You'll make a lot of DIY people happy with this review, as Tryg has done for all of us. Seems like you're on the right track with the screenshot ideas so far. Be sure to use a tripod. And with a digicam you can take as many shots as you want, then decide how to present them (dedicated shots or huge combos). Both certainly have their place as we've seen with Tryg's reviews.


I'm anxious to see how you like the variations on the ME theme. I'm still using my ME+ screen (a variation combining ME and ddog), but soon will be converting to the SD/MM LFS. And since I've always been enamored of the FireHawk, I can't wait to see the shots with the FH and ME/ME variants.


We're all "staying tuned."

 

[unefined]

ftlee - According to projectorcentral, the mounting distance required for a 138" screen would be 21.2' maximum, 17.5' minimum. As for whether or not the HS20 can light up a 138" screen... I really couldn't tell you. How far back are you sitting? 138" is a large screen. I know that when I pumped it up to ~115" in my tests I had to be back at least 15' to keep from moving my head side to side. That's just me. If you go 138", please share you experience(s) with the rest of us! My room will handle 118" pretty well, so that's what I'm going with.


Also, ftlee, I do like the Firehawk best.... but by the smallest of margins. I watched the Firehawk vs. ME for about 2 hours and there was only small improvements on the firehawk. I feel that the Firehawk can bring the blacks down perfectly, but at a slight cost to how clean the whites look. The ME performs remarkably well. Before I started this, I swore I wanted to BUY a screen. I told my wife "We'll test out the samples from Carada, Da-Lite, and Stewart, and buy one". Now I'm looking at it from a entirely different perspective. When we first started testing the Carada samples my wife clearly preferred our beige/tan wall to ALL of the samples!?! When I put up the Doable board with ME on it my wife went nuts over how good things looked. So... we're going to build a screen now, finish the theater, and if in 6 months we want to upgrade we'll buy the Firehawk material from Daniel on AVS and redo the screen. I really, honestly, could not believe how well the ME performed against samples that would cost me over $1k more.


With regards to the SD/MM screens - I tried a poor man's SD/MM by spraying Rustoleum Metallic Aluminum on the back of plexi, and trying both Rustoleum Blossom White Satin and Misty Evening on the front of the two pieces. Honestly, the RMA + RBWS combination looked EXACTLY like the Carada White screen material (blended in perfectly), the ME seemed to have ever so slightly more depth to the color.... but nothing incredible. I believe that a true SD/MM screen would rock, but out here in the Rockies it's not easy to find 5'x10' pieces of plexi for a reasonable price. Going the SD/MM route, including materials and sprayer, will cost me about $75 less than buying the Firehawk material from AVS.


scoob- I've read a lot of your posts (and CMRA, and MM, and Tryg's) and I hope that this review shows a fair comparison between the pro. and diy screens. Once I post the screen shots I give it about 8 hours before someone chimes in that XYZ screen would look perfect if I'd taken the time to Avia for it first. Or that ZYX screen is best with setting ABC. For better or worse, I'm going with factory defaults and not changing the settings AT ALL for the screenshots. I don't want to tweak for an hour for each sample, just to come to a similar conclusion.


I will also post some closeups (if macro mode is working) of the different ME variations to go along with the screenshots. One of them, the 40/35/25 mix, looks very promising.... nice silvery color, just a little bit of sheen. Tonight it will be my first victim... er.. test.

 

[JDLIVE]

Interesting stuff. I know it would take some extra time, but it seems not re-adjusting contrast and brightness for the different materials would affect your impressions.

 

[unefined]

Quote:

Originally posted by JDLIVE Interesting stuff. I know it would take some extra time, but it seems not re-adjusting contrast and brightness for the different materials would affect your impressions.

You make a good point. I may do some Avia work on the Firehawk vs. Misty Evening, since they were my personal favorites. I guess I'm just not interested in doing a calibration for each of 20 samples. I did try tweaking with the Contrast / Brightness to make the white screens look a little better, but there didn't seem to be much that would really help. I agree with Tryg's comments in the past that the "perfect" screen is a matte white screen. Unfortunately, it doesn't look the best to us. I know that some of the materials with a gray tint (HCCV, Grayhawk, Firehawk, ME) can benefit from proper calibration. The bottom line for me is that as long as I go with a current model LCD projector I will have to either sacrifice some of the brightness for better black levels (read: gray screen), or accept the limitations of the PJ with regards to black levels and enjoy slightly more vibrant color reproduction. As all things HT related go, it is a personal choice.

 

[GreggPenn]

Quote:

Originally posted by unefined Gregg, I'll probably use a few shots from Matrix Reloaded and Santa Clause 2. I find the early scenes in Santa Clause 2 where they are in the workshop really test a materials ability to show colors with depth and vivid detail. Please keep in mind the size of the samples I have - the HCCV will not be nearly the size of the Firehawk and ME.

I'm not sure if Matrix Reloaded is the best choice. If it has normally colored scenes in it then yeah. But, I think I read that the movie has a lot of green tinted scenes. I think it would make sense to avoid posting picks of any scene that has deliberate "coloring" (even if directly compared).


Where screen materials aren't full-sized, it probably makes sense to place samples on neutral background (i.e., matte white), for a comparison. Tryg and some others have done this for smaller samples and I think it may be to only way to get an idea how a smaller piece of material is performing.


I don't blame you for not wanting to calibrate for each material.

 

[GreggPenn]

Quote:

Originally posted by ftlee unefined, P.S. Do you think the HS20 puts out enough light to light-up a 138" screen? Thanks, Frank T. Lee

Here are a couple of threads that may help your decision....

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...hreadid=350642
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...hreadid=354042


The first thread talks about another person wanting to go big with his HS20. The second shows an easy way to calculate foot lamberts to determine brightness. My take (from these threads) is that you'll be O.K. -- though maybe pushing it a hair as the bulb ages.


Also, the PJCentral distance calculator is wrong for the HS20. It has a 1.3 zoom, not 1.2. Interestingly enough, the max (zoomed) numbers are correct. However, the unit can go smaller than indicated at any given distance.


To figure the correct low numbers, divide the high ones by 1.3.

 

[unefined]

Just a quick update - I did not have time this evening to do a complete comparison of all of the samples, as my digital camera was low on batteries (lack of planning on my part). I did get some photos of the Firehawk vs. Misty Evening vs. Doable board since I will be giving back the Stewart samples tomorrow. I still really like the Firehawk...


As for the photos, they will be up in a day or so. I need to find my CF card reader which has walked off in the process of remodeling for home theater.


I would also like to add that the Misty Evening mixed 50/50 with Silver Metallic produced some very favorable results. Noticably darker blacks than plain Misty Evening, although it does cost me a bit of the white level. I would say that of everything I have seen, this is the closest to the Firehawk.


I have a question for anyone who may read this: Is it reasonable to think that I could paint the blackout cloth and then put it on a frame without cracking? If not, what would you do?


A) Paint blackout cloth with Misty Evening / Silver Metallic blend, then stretch onto frame and mount.


B) Paint lightly textured wall with Misty Evening / Silver Metallic and wait till the dust settles from the HT remodelling to buy a Firehawk?

 

[GreggPenn]

If not choice B, then apply your material to the frame first!


Then paint it.


Make sure to go with thin coats -- and don't apply too many. Latex paint is very flexible (but I'm not sure how the metallic will affect it's consistency).


BTW:

I just got back from seeing the HS20 on a Firehawk at a fellow AVSer's place. Dedicated theatre. Ceiling mount. 92" diagonal 16:9 screen.


I have just one thing to say about the Firehawk. Sweeeeeeet! (O.K., O.K., you want more)?


First of all, whites are really well within acceptance (on this gray screen). If you are a perfectionist, you may look at whites and say I want a bit more. But, you'd have to be looking at the picture -- and not the movie -- to notice this.


Overall brightness is in a great range at this size (with the HS20). Brightness begins to fade when picture is increased 10" wider. (You should consider other choices if much wider than 100" and are using an HS20). On the other end, this setup provides great blacks, noticable increase in color and depth. No hotspotting. No viewing cone (i.e., uniform even off angle). Great even with some ambient light. Very, very nice setup.


I've seen the Firehawk with the SIM2 Domino 30 and the HS20. The SIM2 sells for 4 times as much as the HS20. On this screen, the HS20 looked 98% as good. (I've also seen the HS20 on matte white. The grey screen has much more depth).


Conclusion: Buy the HS20. Shoot it on a Firehawk. Go "Ga Ga"!


Had to edit this post (twice). Geeeez. There was confusion on the screen type. Since the frame of the screen says Firehawk, I'm sticking with that as what I saw.


gp