After years of planning and remodelling, I finally get closer to the home theater of my dreams... one important piece that still was missing, was the screen...
Now it arrived at my German residence, imported directly from the US. A Seymour AV Premier Frame screen, 130" wide, Cinemascope format (2,37:1), with ultra black velvet borders, curved to further improve immersion and correct the slight pin cushion effect which the ISCO III anamorphic lens adds. The screen surface is acoustically transparent, so I can place my three identical Dynaudio Contour S1.4 speakers for LCR behind it. The four Velodyne DD-12 subwoofers, forming a single bass array (SBA), are also hidden behind the screen.
Although neither the subs nor speakers nor the projector and the anamorphic lens have been fine tuned, the system's performance is already promising. I am overwhelmed by the increase in immersion which I attribute to a number of factors:
- The viewing distance is just a little above screen width - therefore, the field of vision is almost entirely filled with the moving picture.
- The curvature of the screen, although the far ends only protrude a little more than 5" adds to increase immersion.
- The homogenious sound field (3 identical speakers for LCR) and the sound coming directly from the screen, not from above, nor below, nor from the outside left or right.
- With this extreme level of visual and acoustical immersion, the effect of my D-Box motion simulation system increased further. As one has lost the fixed visual reference points (see point 1), movement of the seat feels much more real and involving. Now I can understand that someone being more delicate could get motion sick in such a setup...
Can't wait until I find the time to set up my second projector for the Dolby 3D system, although in the current setup, 2D already has a kind of 3-dimensional look and feel.
As I had ordered a 25"x25" sample piece of the screen material for testing, I was so surprised to what extent the new screen did improve viewing, listening and movement quality and overall pleasure if used in full size!
Great US product!
Highly recommended!
Cheers!
Markus
P.S. Needless to say that the audio amplification is exclusively handeled by Bryston, if you don't count the four 1KW RMS class-D amps in the Velodyne subs: one SP-3 and three 6B SSTs are in charge here.
