[mcspongy]

I want to improve the black levels on my epson. From quick read of other threads I think a variable ND glass filter is what I need to try. I am projecting onto DIY white screen approx 100" diagonal and lamp has about 200 hours on it.

I've not had pj calibrated but I remember reason in review (here and elsewhere) that greens were excessive on this model, so should I go for some kind of colour-correcting filter? In truth my greatest wish is to improve the blacks though.

Thanks for any advice....hoping Gary L reads this.

[True Romance]

Thought the blacks were pretty good on the 3200?? You may get better results with a grey screen which should improve the blacks (this is what I use).

[mcspongy]

Thanks TM. From reviews I read the TW3200 black level wasn't bad for an LCD pj but it's still probably it's Achilles heel.

Grey screen would definitely help but that will be last resort as I've now got bits of Devore pinned to my screen frame (admittedly I could unpin it all if necessary) and I don't want to take the screen down. Because I have reasonable light control in the room, i.e. dark coloured walls, and Devore covering at screen end of the room I always hoped white screen would be better option. I can understand you defo need if you had lots of ambient light though.

[Gary Lightfoot]

Hi mcspongy,

An FL-Day filter will dim the image in a similar fashion to an ND2 filter, but it also helps add some more red (by cutting green and blue) - usually UHP lamps are red deficient. The only thing is you usually need some greyscale calibration to ensure the colour isn't too pink (and calibrating with it in place improves the on/off contrast). If the image you're getting isn't obviously green then an FL-Day may be the wrong choice unless a calibration is going to be done. You could however experiment with the different presets to see if one looks green/blue and use the fl-day with that one, but a decent glass filter can be quite expensive to experiment with and find you can't use it.

What I did was get a 'swatch' of Lees filters and go through them all to see which one worked best, and then bought the glass equivalent. I like Hoya HMC glass filters because they work well with no obvious detrimental effect on the image. Resin or plastic filters tend to give the image a milky look because they scatter a lot of light within the filter and reduce on screen contrast.

A variable ND filters should do the trick so you don't have to guess which filter is going to be best for you.

If you fancy trying calibration, you could get yourself the necessary hardware and software (hardware is quite cheap and some software is free), and have a go yourself. It can be a lot of fun as you learn, and the results can be very satisfying.

Gary

[mcspongy]

Hi Gary

Thanks very much for your suggestions. I'm happy with the colours apart from the blacks as it were. I'll try a variable filter and report back.

(Think ill leave calibration to the pros....although I am considering a career change!)

[Gary Lightfoot]

One more thing - have you set the contrast and brightness using a test disk? The brightness control is what sets the black level correctly (contrast does the white), and if that's set too high, your blacks will look greyer than they should.

Have a look at the 'basic projector calibration' link in my sig for more info. Setting them correctly can make a big difference if they're a long way out to start with.

Look forward to hearing how you get on

Gary

[mcspongy]

Yes used the AVCHD download (or whatever it's called) - quite recently as I finally finished putting the devore up around the screen and on the adjacent wall (had put Devore panels on ceiling a few weeks ago, our to just over 1m from the screen wall).

Ive used DV Essentials DVD for my tvs before and found the flashing patterns on the download easier to use. I set the colour using the blue filter from the DVE but gather this method is not that accurate (and not worth using the red and green filters).

I've ordered a 58mm Hoya ND2 off Amazon £12.15, so now just need to decide how to fit it - pj ceiling mounted. I'll buy some pringles next food shop! Thanks again.

[robh2002]

Originally Posted by mcspongy

Yes used the AVCHD download (or whatever it's called) - quite recently as I finally finished putting the devore up around the screen and on the adjacent wall (had put Devore panels on ceiling a few weeks ago, our to just over 1m from the screen wall).

Ive used DV Essentials DVD for my tvs before and found the flashing patterns on the download easier to use. I set the colour using the blue filter from the DVE but gather this method is not that accurate (and not worth using the red and green filters).

I've ordered a 58mm Hoya ND2 off Amazon £12.15, so now just need to decide how to fit it - pj ceiling mounted. I'll buy some pringles next food shop! Thanks again.

I had the same issue (ceiling mounted) and just used a few blobs of blu-tac to fit the lens. Worked a treat. Let us know how you get on with the ND filter and the Devore together...

[mcspongy]

Well I fancied some pringles anyway lol. Please forgive the poor quality of the pics, but I've taken some before and after shots (bearing in mind I am holding the ND2 filter in front of the lens with one hand, and wobbling the camera with the other....if there appears to be a blur in the bottom left corner, that'll be the edge of the filter/my finger!) to show the effect.

These are using the exisiting settings for my room's night-time viewing, and not recalibrating the brightness or contrast for the filter (I ended up increasing brightness by 1 after I have now fitted the custom pringle-cap-filter to the pj).

Pretty happy with the results given the cost. Subtle improvement.

What this has highlighted, aside from my ridiculously poor photographic skills, is that "bone" was clearly the wrong choice of colour for the sofa bed, but that was WAF.

[Guap]

Hey mcspongy

Thanks for the links, will have to get round to calibrating my projector before I get a filter. I can definitely see the improvement in the pictures though. Nice.

[The Fatty]

Hi Mcspongy - your images are not the best as the camera will be adjusting to the darker images. Can you take some more with the filter only half way across the lens so we can get a true comparison?

I got an ND2, ND4 and ND8 filter, none of which work very well at all!

[mcspongy]

Have a look through this earlier thread:

HD33 + ND2 Filter

I have a rubbish camera (or rather I am rubbish with the camera), but its very inexpensive to buy a filter to test, and some more suggestions on the other thread from Gary iirc.

[The Fatty]

is the epson cinema filter an FL-Day filter?