[DrJarmin]

I have got my new projector cabled and mounted in the ceiling.

I am planning to project onto a white wall in my lounge.

The wall has been plastered and sanded and is now perfectly smooth and ready to paint.

Is there any paint anyone would recommend? I was thinking some sort of matt brilliant white emulsion.

Any pointers?

Thanks

[kbfern]

Depends on lots of things:

Room colour of other walls, ceiling, floors.

Do you have windows and what covers them(curtains/blinds) etc.

What projector are you using.

White is Ok but a grey screen could be better.

[RL123]

Use grey if you can get away with it. People used to use Dulux Ice Storm 5 but it's now been renamed to Grey Steel 2. I used it for my screen and the improvement over matt white was very obvious. Whites are just white but black levels definitely improved

[dovercat]

I use Dulux light & space absolute white rich matt, with Lumitec technology. My room is a batcave, if your room has light coloured walls you maybe better off going for a neutral grey as mentioned above.
Dulux light & space absolute white rich matt is closer to true white and higher gain than most other white matt paints. It has values of RGB 249 250 247 (aim higher numbers equal brighter, numbers as close as possible to each other equals neutral white). CIE xyY 0.314 0.332 94.9 (aim D65: x0.31271 y0.32902, Y higher equals brighter). Lab 98 -0.75 +1.27 (aim L lightness 0 to 100 higher equals brighter, a +red/magenta-green/cyan & b +yellow-blue as close to 0 as possible).

[DrJarmin]

Thanks for all the replies. Sounds reassuring. I was half expecting to be told a screen was mandatory.

To answer the questions...

The projector is a Sony VPL-HW10.

The room is quite dark - i.e not too much natural light which all comes from one direction, and the ceiling is low.

Having yet put the floor down, but will be a light colour. All other walls and ceilings white.

Not sure if the windows will have curtains / blinds as the main window is actually a bifolding door the width of the room.

Sounds like if I go for a Dulux white as proposed below it should look great. My first projector so nothing to compare it to.

[small358786]

Originally Posted by RL123

Use grey if you can get away with it. People used to use Dulux Ice Storm 5 but it's now been renamed to Grey Steel 2. I used it for my screen and the improvement over matt white was very obvious. Whites are just white but black levels definitely improved

As car as I know the old Ice Storm 5 is still on the Dulux paint mixing machines
I looked at Xmas time at work and it was on there then when I considered using it.

[dovercat]

Originally Posted by DrJarmin

Thanks for all the replies. Sounds reassuring. I was half expecting to be told a screen was mandatory.

To answer the questions...

The projector is a Sony VPL-HW10.

The room is quite dark - i.e not too much natural light which all comes from one direction, and the ceiling is low.

Having yet put the floor down, but will be a light colour. All other walls and ceilings white.

Not sure if the windows will have curtains / blinds as the main window is actually a bifolding door the width of the room.

Sounds like if I go for a Dulux white as proposed below it should look great. My first projector so nothing to compare it to.

I would go with a neutral grey paint rather than the dulux white, as a grey will reduce the effect of room reflections. Light from the projector hits the screen and is reflected off, it then hits the ceiling, walls, floor and bounces back on to the screen. So when an image with bright and dark parts is being projected, the light from the bright parts gets reflected back onto the screen by the room and washes out the dark parts of the image.

With a white screen the light from the projector and subsequent reflections from the room are all being multiplied by 1. With a grey screen the first desired light is being multiplied by 0.8 or less (depending on how dark grey the screen is) and then the subsequent reflections from the room are also being multiplied by 0.8 or less. So just counting one reflection, white gives you 1x1=1 from the projector, then 1x1=1 from the room, grey gives you 1x0.8=0.8 from the projector and 0.8x0.8=0.64 from the room. So grey screens reduce the effect of light coloured rooms washing out the simultaneous contrast of the image.

A grey screen since it reflects less light from the projector has a darker white and black level, you tend to see white as relative, it looks white because it is the brightest thing, black level is less relative especially in dark scenes, a grey black can reduce the apparant image contrast. So grey screens can give the illusion of more contrast.

In a batcave, black walls, ceiling, floor, etc... room reflections are not a big issue. Using a white screen being higher gain than grey, enables higher contrast/ lower brightness iris settings on the projector to be used. White is also the most forgiving for screen texture (painted wall) and color accuaracy, a grey screen needs to be truly neutral to not effect the color accuarcy.

[Andrew Dade]

I use the absolute white too, works well for me, matt dark green walls around screen area, can be almost bat cave if I desire but most of the time family friendly

[DrJarmin]

One other point I forgot to mention....

Given this is in our main lounge, rather than dedicated A/V room, I need to 'accommodate' the wishes of She Who Must Be Obeyed.....

[eddiem74]

Consider the BWUK DIY mix.

[kbfern]

BWUK= SWMBO=

[DrJarmin]

Ouch! My head!!!

Thanks for the link - but that was painting onto canvas, no?

Absolutely no clue how to get those paints in Hong Kong. I am going to try a white wall with some dulux paint.

Then if that fails (not sure how I can judge!) go for a light grey. SWMBO is happy with that....

[dalboy]

Just to add, I use the light and space Dulux matt white.

Havent tried anything else so cant compare it to anything but it looks great! No complaints here.

[small358786]

Just be aware if you project onto a painted wall it will show every single imperfection in the wall as well as brush/roller marks.
Tried it briefly myself before I had a screen and I dont think I could live with it permanently.

[dovercat]

Originally Posted by small358786

Just be aware if you project onto a painted wall it will show every single imperfection in the wall as well as brush/roller marks.
Tried it briefly myself before I had a screen and I dont think I could live with it permanently.

I used a sponge rather than a roller or brush to paint my wall screen. I also found grey mixes alot less forgiving of imperfections than white, which is one of the reasons I settled for white. Many fabric screens have texture while a white or perfectly flat grey wall can vanish.

[Member 310233]

I went for boggo Dulux white matt, although if I had thought a little more about it, I may have tried a grey for better blacks. My PJ is plenty bright so I steered clear of the lumitec.