3 ms·

That's cool. I did that when I lived alone in an apartment, and it was awesome. When I researched the best projector setup, I read that a gray wall may actuall

That's cool. I did that when I lived alone in an apartment, and it was awesome. When I researched the best projector setup, I read that a gray wall may actually be better than white because it can result in darker blacks. I couldn't try it, though, as I was renting at the time. Have you ever experimented with that?

boring_twenties 5y ago
Not sure about gray walls, but I bought a vinyl screen for my projector and it looks infinitely better than the white wall I was using before, especially blacks. There are other things about the screen that are supposed to improve things (some kind of tiny glass beads on the surface), but also, it's gray.
- sgtnoodle 5y ago
  I suppose you would want a partially reflective surface so that most of the light bounces back toward the audience rather than completely scattering. That scatter would otherwise raise the ambient light of the screen, and therefore make blacks worse. You wouldn't want a mirror like finish either, though, because then any given viewer would only see a narrow beam of the overall image. My guess is that a reflective cone of about 60 degrees would be optimal? That's probably what the glass beads are doing, reflecting the light and defocusing it in a consistent way. I vaguely recall that the optimal wall paint recommended by the internet was not only gray, but also satin finish.
rootusrootus 5y ago
Yes, gray works quite a lot better with a projector than white. But it does also depend a bit on your use case, you would choose a different paint for a very dark room than one with a fair amount of light pollution. Some people get quite involved with paint formulation, and for a while I played that game, but if I ever need to build a bigger screen I'm just going to buy one. Halfway decent ones aren't very expensive now.

3 ms·

That's cool. I did that when I lived alone in an apartment, and it was awesome. When I researched the best projector setup, I read that a gray wall may actuall

by sgtnoodle 5y ago

boring_twenties 5y ago
Not sure about gray walls, but I bought a vinyl screen for my projector and it looks infinitely better than the white wall I was using before, especially blacks. There are other things about the screen that are supposed to improve things (some kind of tiny glass beads on the surface), but also, it's gray.
- sgtnoodle 5y ago
  I suppose you would want a partially reflective surface so that most of the light bounces back toward the audience rather than completely scattering. That scatter would otherwise raise the ambient light of the screen, and therefore make blacks worse. You wouldn't want a mirror like finish either, though, because then any given viewer would only see a narrow beam of the overall image. My guess is that a reflective cone of about 60 degrees would be optimal? That's probably what the glass beads are doing, reflecting the light and defocusing it in a consistent way. I vaguely recall that the optimal wall paint recommended by the internet was not only gray, but also satin finish.
rootusrootus 5y ago
Yes, gray works quite a lot better with a projector than white. But it does also depend a bit on your use case, you would choose a different paint for a very dark room than one with a fair amount of light pollution. Some people get quite involved with paint formulation, and for a while I played that game, but if I ever need to build a bigger screen I'm just going to buy one. Halfway decent ones aren't very expensive now.