CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

**AnalogRocks**

I know to get the benefit of high gain material a Tarus type curved screen is preferred but what if instead of building the monster curved screen you layed the high gain screen material flat and bounced the projector of a curved mirror?

Would this defuse the hot spotting?

I'm thinking backwards today and this just occurred to me.

nautikal · Joined: 31 Jul 2006 Posts: 116 Location: Rockville, MD

I don't think so. The hot spotting has to do with the angle at which the light leaves the screen. The torus directs light from the corners back at the viewers rather than to the sides, which reduces hot spotting. In actuality, the entire screen is a hot spot, but it is uniform. If you don't curve the screen, you will still get hot spotting. Correct me if I'm wrong though.

**AnalogRocks** · Posted: Thu Dec 13, 2007 3:52 pm Post subject:

Yeah that's what I was thinking, however I thought if you sent the light in at an angle and it bounced back at a different angle then what would happen?

garyfritz · Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 12088 Location: Fort Collins, CO

Short answer: whatever yer smokin', AR, I want some. Laughing

Longer answer: no. What nautikal says is right. The curved screen reflects the light back to your eye. A curved mirror like you're talking about would just cause the light to spread out over a larger area (with a concave mirror) or a smaller area (with a convex mirror). Then the flat screen would work the same as it always does -- it would be roughly equivalent to moving the projector farther away (concave) or closer (convex). See the below pic for a comparison of flat screen, curved screen, and curved (concave) mirror.

**AnalogRocks** · Posted: Sun Dec 16, 2007 1:35 am Post subject:

papalek · Joined: 08 Mar 2006 Posts: 1536 Location: Longs SC

**AnalogRocks** · Posted: Sun Dec 16, 2007 6:51 pm Post subject:

GIGO yep.

What about the retroreflective screen? They sound pretty cool. Makes me wana project onto a school crossing sign to see what happens.

snkby · Joined: 12 May 2007 Posts: 134

that it rejects ambient light far better than a flat screen or a screen curved in only one axis.

like nautikal said.........the entire screen is one big uniform hotspot.

and the other thing about torus is that it -really- makes things look 3d for some reason.

i remember my first torus and having the windows98 -pipes- screensaver on and walking around the corner into the theater and flinching/ducking when the pipes came at me!! :O lololololololol

a drawback that may or may not be a problem has to do with the way a torus also directs sound back at the audience.

but this has a lot to do with how much curve and what the room is like and where the viewers are etc.

in my situation it was not a problem when viewing but would echo a conversation if you were standing closely in front of it.

the next screen im building in the very near future is going to be a torus with boc.

**AnalogRocks** · Posted: Wed Apr 16, 2008 4:10 am Post subject:

I am still in the process of getting my Wilsonart D354-60, I thought I had it nailed down 2 weeks ago but they screwed up my order again. I've been playing phone tag with the lady at the store for 2 weeks.

I'd like to try a torus but with my luck I'd order the material's and then see them someitme next milenium.