Essential Install April 2017 | Page 33

Essential Install | Projectors And Screens DID YOU KNOW: The original script for Ghostbusters was set in a future where Ghostbusters were everyday fi gures like paramedics and fi remen Panamorph lenses available from Habitech deliver the director’s vision direct into the home Also available from Invision is Screen Innovations (SI), perhaps best known for its Black Diamond, ambient light rejecting tech promoting the ability to offer cinema is a wider range of conditions and rooms. Key products include the 7 Series Zero Edge in Black Diamond, which combines another key technology from the company with the Black Diamond material. Available in custom screen sizes and confi gurations up to 150in, the set up is designed to offer a very price competitive solution when compared to super larger TVs. SI also offers Slate, a lower cost alternative to Black Diamond which can deliver a 200in screen in standard sizes, larger on request. More recently the company has announced acoustically transparent versions of its Slate and Pure screen platforms. “We created Slate AT and Pure AT to give our customers the best of both worlds; the best picture and the best sound,” says Ryan Gustafson, CEO of SI. “Pure, and Slate have solved the problem of image quality with the sharpest image reproduction in the market by managing the texture pattern down to nine times fi ner than standard white or grey materials, maintaining image uniformity. Merging Slate and Pure with our acoustic perforation technology has truly created the best of both worlds, picture and sound.” Habitech is another distributor which has seen the opportunity in the home cinema market increase. As well as also offering access to the DLA-Z1 from JVC, The company partners with Projecta HD Progressive Screens to deliver a platform worthy of the JVC’s abilities. In order to accurately refl ect the smaller 4K pixels, screens n eed to be microscopically uniform. Habitech says Fibreglass, woven fabric and conventional vinyl surfaces are too ‘bobbly’ for the job, whereas Projecta’s HD Progressive vinyl screen surface is designed to be consistently more even, presenting each incoming pixel with its own mirror-fl at launch-pad meaning each pixel is resolved back undistorted. Multiply the result by eight million (8,847,360 to be exact) and viewers get 4K in full effect. Habitech is also keen to ensure widescreen is not forgotten, with around 70% of major motion pictures produced in a format about 35% wider than standard 16:9. To cope with the aspect ratio of about 2.30:1 and higher and avoid the dreaded black-lines some systems use to cope, Panamorph lenses are on hand to help. With a series of UltraWide lens options for Epson, JVC, Sim2 and Sony projectors, Panamorph can remove the black bars from UltraWide screens, reactivating wasted pixels to realise the full resolution of 1080 or 4K projectors 4K-enhanced home cinema 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio Fully motorised optics Wide lens shift and display UltraWide movies in their original format. Worth noting is that most standard 16:9 screens wider than three metres cannot easily be installed in UK homes due to ceiling height restrictions. Quite apart from giving home cinema enthusiasts the real deal when it comes to aspect ratio, installers can choose UltraWide screens to overcome this physical shortcoming. In these situations, Panamorph lenses are key. Shannon Townley, CEO and president of Stewart Filmscreen explains: “As our industry goes into a dynamic, high- resolution, high-performance phase it’s exciting to see technology evolving to meet demand and to meet future needs. Within the AV integration community, commercial and residential boundaries are increasingly converged, which is creating incredible opportunities for integrators to deliver an exceptional entertainment or viewing experience. Stewart Filmscreen has helped deliver those experiences day in, day out, for 70 years and we take great pride in working closely with our partners to help them exceed their client’s expectations while delivering the seemingly impossible. “We urge our partners to see the future and be the future; deliver the exceptional experience your clients deserve. As we say at Stewart Filmscreen, our products enable our customers to deliver unrivalled image fi delity that makes memorable, exceptional experiences possible for any application imaginable.” On the technical front, the company has developed Phantom HALR, a high ambient light rejecting projection screen material that delivers image fi delity and uniformity, designed to resolve the dilemma of where a system can be placed and still deliver the performance needed. Screens made of this material, however are not just about rejecting light, they can be created in sizes up to 40 feet tall and 90 feet (12.1-meters by 27.4-meters) wide without a seam, something the maker says is unique. Phantom can also be perforated for acoustic transparency, which includes Stewart Filmscreen’s proprietary Cinemaperf or exclusive Microperf X2 THX Ultra technology. Shannon adds that as 3D surround sound systems become more prevalent, choosing a screen with high- quality, effective perforation patterns becomes even more important. Lots of technical movement at the moment means companies need to move fast to take advantage, Shannon argues: “REC 2020 Color Space and High EH-TW9300 Distributed in the UK by AWE Europe Ltd [email protected] +44 (0)1372 729 995 www.awe-europe.com 10th-11th May 2017, Sandown Park, Surrey. Sponsored by April 2017 | 31