144" DIY Home Theater Projector Screen - Carl's Place FlexiGray VS Smooth Finish White Painted Wall
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- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
- For the past 7 years we've been using a smooth finished white painted wall as the projection surface for our Epson Home Cinema 8350 projector and have been perfectly happy with the picture quality. But at the same time I've wondered if using an actual projector screen would make the picture even better. From the research I've done on the topic white screens work best in completely dark rooms. Our media room is in our basement and has no windows in it so it can be completely dark at any time of the day. However Most of the time we watch movies or TV shows we leave some of the lights in the room on so we can see to move around, eat snacks, operate the remote control and whatever. The good thing is we have control of the lights in our room and can leave the lights closest to the screen wall off which gives us a very nice picture even when we leave the lights at the back of the room on. That being said I wanted to find out if using Carl's Place's FlexiGray screen material that everyone online seems to love and recommend would give us an even better picture when we're watching stuff with the real lights on. In this video I take you along with me on my little journey of discovery. I show you how I chose to build the frame for my screen, stretched and secured the FlexiGray material onto it and then compare the picture I get on the gray screen with the picture our smooth white wall produced. I hope you enjoy this video and it helps you with building your own DIY movie screen as well as answers questions you may have. Cheers. :)
Want to build your own DIY home theater screen? Here's where I bought my screen material if you'd like to check out Carl's Place. www.carlofet.com/
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Wanna skip to a particular part of the video? Use the Time Stamps. :)
Time Stamps
0:00 - welcome to my home theater :)
0:56 - measuring for the screen
1:16 - Carl's Place FlexiGray screen material
1:38 - we like having some lights on
1:59 - building the screen frame
5:09 - applying screen material to the frame
6:49 - hanging the screen on my wall
7:56 - time to find out how the screen works
8:18 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with all lights on
9:16 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with rear lights on
11:01 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with all lights off
12:49 - the final verdict
14:24 - Thanks for Watching! Like, Share, Comment & Subscribe! :)
Music in this video - "Apolllo" by Patrick Patrikios from the CZcams Creator Studio Music Library
#DIY, #hometheater, #projectors - Věda a technologie
Wanna skip to a particular part of the video? Use the Time Stamps. :)
Time Stamps
0:00 - welcome to my home theater :)
0:56 - measuring for the screen
1:16 - Carl's Place FlexiGray screen material
1:38 - we like having some lights on
1:59 - building the screen frame
5:09 - applying screen material to the frame
6:49 - hanging the screen on my wall
7:56 - time to find out how the screen works
8:18 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with all lights on
9:16 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with rear lights on
11:01 - white wall VS FlexiGray screen with all lights off
12:49 - the final verdict
14:24 - Thanks for Watching! Like, Share, Comment & Subscribe! :)
It's intriguing 🥰
At last a decent side by side comparison - from what I have seen it appears grey screens are mainly for rooms with ambient light - I personally prefer the white screen image , and with the newer projectors contrast rates constantly improving , I think I will stay with my white screen . Thank you for your time and effort putting this video together .
White screen with dark walls in a light controlled room for sure. I like brightness and colors of the white, but not reflected light from the walls. It's a perfect mix!
Under rated channel. This is the only video helped me made my decision. Going with the cheap white screen ;)
An alr screen is actually best. Went from white to alr for my laser ust, big improvement.
I have exactly the same Polk Speakers. 7.1
Nice build ! And your method to stretch the fabric on the frame is the way to go to avoid any warpage.
My guess is, you should adapt the projector settings for grey screen. Gamma curve, brightness etc ...
Or maybe even calibrate with a sensor. That's the best to have accurate results. Then I bet the grey will provide you the best image.
This is the best wall vs screen comparison video. I feel other videos lean towards the screen because they spent money on it instead of saying the wall is best.
Wall is definitely not the best. Uneven and washes out image.
A video I never thought I needed but here we are. Thank you 👍
I appreciate your honesty! Im in the middle of building my media room and this video totally helped me! Subscribing!
nice comparison .... You have really removed all my confusions. I shall also go for well furnished white wall screen. 👌
Thanks for the honesty!!! Saved me hours and hours!!!
Thank you! Side by side comparison was very helpful and exactly what i was looking for. I actually expected grey screen to perform much better and was leaning towards it before watching this video. Thanks again!
I had the exact same thoughts. I keep seeing comparisons on how CineGrey has so much more contrast than Matt White and I was planning to purchase some grey material to affix to a projector screen if I needed it but seeing the comparison now I think I will be ok with just the Matt white seeing as my screen will be located in the basement where I will have a lot of control over the lighting.
Grey is crap. An alr screen is best.
Thank you so much, for your time and effort boss. 💖
Thanks for doing this. I would prefer the plain white painted wall.
great comparison
i never go the projector route because i dont like pitch black room for it to work
good to know the grey screen gives room for some ambient light at the seat and had similar result to a pitch black room with white screen
Thank you. Saves me tons of time to do the wall screen ;)
Wonderful & saved a lot of effort for me. Will keep the white wall👍🏻
Now I can confirm my order with white screen! Thanks!
I'm gonna start pulling my face skin to the corners so they wrinkles will go away. Man, this channel is totally underrated! Thx for the info on the screens and skin. Rock on!
Thanks for sharing this.
Great vid! If nothing else it gives your media room a more finished look. I have a similar setup (bare wall even) and I'm looking at a DIY screen so thanks for making this :)
Yes! That's it! You're so right. There was something about having the screen on the wall that felt satisfying but I couldn't put words to it and you hit the nail on the head. It really does finish the room off and make it feel complete. Thanks for watching and for the comment. Cheers man. Best of luck to you on your own screen. :)
It also depends on the type of projector you have, the lumens and general specs. My media room has 3 walls painted charcoal black and the wall I use as my screen is painted light grey. So far I've only owned dlp projectors and was very satisfied with the results.... until my last dlp projector died. I got myself a new LED projector, in theory, with the same amount of Lumens my previous dlp projector had, but the results are completely different.
With my older dpl projector I had a warmer picture overall, blacks were ok, but not pitch black, meanwhile with the led projector, everything seems darker; now blacks are really black and whites aren't actually bright enough. So I had to fiddle a lot with the brightness/contrast/hue setups to achieve the overall colour range I wanted, but still not satisfied. That's why I might switch back to a white wall.
Great video, thanks.
Thanks for a very honest video. The white wall looks a lot better.
I shon my projector on a painted white wall and it was perfect. Doing the same for my new theater room with a 4 meter screen. Great video cheers..
Was it a dark color wall?
@@evangelaakins7428 people use them to get the deeper blacks.
Great and honest review, thanks!
White matt screen is better than any other screen period.Tried and tested by thousands .No brainer with lights off or on.The other grey and silver screens don't outweigh the benefits of white matt wall
I agree the pure white wall is the best. Is it just me or are those speaker towers to reflective and causing light bounce?
great one.. really helped to nail the decision... white wall it is...!!!
Great vid. Thank You!
Thanks for the video. I think they both looked great but I think I prefer the brightness of the just the plain white wall.
The painted wall looks more like a bright tv whereas the frame looks more like the movie theater. It's the frame for me!!
Great video. This made me realize I like the Plain white wall instead, just my preference
Thank you you save me a lot work ...
Thank you so much for your efforts time and money , i feel gray screen is not big deal instead i will definitely go with white wall as always its easier and cheapest with best quality
Very good video, however based on what I saw... I think I prefer the white. Thanks for your valuable video /information
Cool! One thing I might suggest is painting the back wall black, now that you have the new screen. While it might make little difference when actually watching content, since it's dark in the room anyway, at least when the light is on the room will look super professional. Anyway, thanks for the great video and analysis!
Or he could paint the other walls gray or black to absorb the light from the screen
We have bay windows so the fact that the gray gives a crisper image is hopeful ☺
wow👍👏great media room in basement + a library + those computer lights👏 Nice recliners as well... watching this video makes me to feel your passion...you've done a nice experiment..it was definitely hard work to assemble and put it with perfection. I am watching these black diamond screen and wondered what material they use & did all research,, saved screenshots....
I was confused about white, grey and black options...I'll go with white:
1. If anyone amongst you have a media room/home theatre..you're already cutting ambient lights...and white gives you better colours...the grey/black may give you bit better contrast & little depth but overall...white wins..also, depends on projector too..
2. The black is good for space kinda movies but it won't give you natural tones ..like take a example of a hero or heroine skin tone... compare it yourself and you'll find .. what is natural and what is dark
3. On you tube people put holywood movies with VFX... majority of VFX are done in grey or dark shades .. because in one frame there are so many layers...so, in black screen those become more dark...whereas white gives vibrancy and as far as grey is concerned...lol...it's grey...it's best and worst of both screen experience...just that grey stands out when there's no movie played in theatre and it looks good for interior decoration purpose
One more thing...black diamond screen is costly and good...I'm not disputing it .. all I'm saying is white is great for media room/home theatre where there's no ambient light...
So...IMO...no more confusion on my side...I'm going with white ...
Thanks for this video and happy holidays 😔👏✨🎉🖖LLAP
PS: We love movies and this kind of set-up is luxury...for a budget, white screen works wonders...it's apt...and even movie theaters have white... lastly, once you watch movie...the sound ..the visuals...you forget everything and enjoy the audio-visual experience on 120 " screen... enjoy ✨ happy holidays 🕺🎥🎹👍🙏
Thanks for the effort
That work on AutoCad to plan precisely is admirable. Hope to see more of interesting projects like this.
Sir, will you make your own review/unboxing of ps5 in your future videos? It'd be quite nice if you do.
That's the purpose of Gray. to provide saturation so u can adjust brightness, color, contrast to your liking without washed out light colors
Either way, the process of the DIY construction is worth it. You see ! You can do it all by yourself. Nice.
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for your net project, you can learn how to cut out "wanna" & " gotta" & "havta", which are a bum's words.
You can do it ! YES ! You can, & all by yourself.
Great video. I used flat stock Menards Dutch boy ceiling white paint. $25 a gallon on sale. Works excellent. Screen size 9’ by 10’ overall wall size.
Consider checking first how a ALR fabric works before setting this up, you might want to rotate the frame 180 degrees as the ALR fabric is just a series of triangles* that redirect the projector light and remove the unwanted polarized reflected light...
Hey you made an interesting video and I watched the whole thing! 😃👏👏
My prediction was that the gray screen would be better, or maybe I was just thinking “that better be amazing for all that extra work!” LOL, good job on this one 👍
Thanks Terin. It's only taken me 7-ish years to finally make an interesting video. 😂 The extra work was actually fun to do. I enjoyed it. Thanks for watching the whole thing. 🙂
Grey screen. I painted my wall with the mix I had found online. It's incredible. 240 in screen.
got a link? :)
Thanks for the video.
You're welcome. Hope it helped you decide what you wanna do.
Enjoyed the video! I had actually been looking at a panasonic pt-rz470. Someone asked me if I wanted it for $300 and seems like a fun project. The one knock on it I've seen is that the darks just aren't dark enough.
Do you think the gray screen an it's "overcast" look might be enough to balance out a projector that doesn't do blacks as well?
Something that isn't often mentioned is the screens gain.
In a narrowish room like mine a high gain will be fine as everyone is front of screen, all light forward.
But in a wide with people at side you want light to reflect to them or will be dull, so low gain.
Thanks for doing that for us now we know
I didn't see a playlist on your channel showing what your home theater was comprised of.
What projector do you have? How long have you had it? Looks like a nice one. Have a review of it?
great great video!!!!
Great video ! You just got a new subscriber 👍🏽
Thank you. 🙂
Great video. Currently I have a 100" fixed white screen with black backing. I only have a 1080p projector now. But planning on upgrading it to a 4k projector. So I thought, why not paint my wall and go big!! I'm still undecided as to whether to paint my wall or buy a bigger screen. I know I have to fill in the existing screw holes in the wall and prepare it. Undercoat, primer then 2 X top coat of special screen paint. But I do like the black velvet border around my screen. But will I notice it without? Any thoughts? Great video. Shane from NSW Australia.
Nice comparo. Confirms my experience: brightness trumps all. Just the reality that projectors aren't generally bright enough, and color accuracy is a distant second in importance.
Just to help - you should only consider grey/darker screens the brighter your projector is. - and thanks for the video! :)
Exactly what I was looking for. I wanted a projector setup on a budget and I will just paint my wall in a very slight grey. That is basically it. However, I want to give it a black border so I have no fringing light.
Sounds awesome. Cheers man. :)
I have the same projector as you going to a 92 inch elite screen. I actually ordered sample packs of the screen material from carls. It was hard for me to decide also. I liked the black levels I got with the flexi grey but I didn't like the whites not looking as bright. It bothered me a little bit with movies but it really bothered me when I watched a hockey game. So I just decided to keep my white and start saving 4 a new projector
Thanks for sharing your experience. For all the testing I did in this video I had the color mode on the projector set to Cinema. I'm now trying it on Dynamic as it's much brighter than Cinema. I thought about re-shooting everything on Dynamic but I don't think this would change my findings/opinion. The white wall would still be brighter. I do like the way things look on the FlexiGray with our projector on Dynamic though. Colors look good and brightness is much better than on Cinema. One of the next things I want to do is upgrade our projector to 4K.
YES, my exact same experience (I have a light grey painted wall, not a screen). Colors and blacks are great on the grey wall, scecially while watching movies, BUT whites aren't ever really bright escecially while watching hockey games! That's why I' switching back to a white wall.
now that you have the new gray screen you can set the white balance and brightness settings of the projector to compensate for it and it should look better and closer to what you like.
Exactly
Did you alter the projector brightness to make the grey pop a little more? I usually dimm my brightness until black JUST turns black. I think with the grey screen this might happen At a slightly brighter setting
I have one of those under $300 1080p led Chinese projectors and the blacks come out more grey like and it's very noticeable when I play games like Batman arkham Knight etc. Would getting a grey screen help regarding this issue?
Seems like a matter of taste, I am team white wall. I project on a white wall. The blacks are some what faded but the brighter colors and warmer tones make up for that(in my opinion).
Can't wait to see it in person! Stupid covid is going to mess up our annual Super Bowl party!
How many Lumens on your proj?🤔 Also did you recalibrate your proj after hanging the screen?
Is there adjustable hues? Whether the projector or media device.
Muchas gracias por compartir, me ayudaste con todas mis dudas!!! 😁✌
I have a beige/tanned wall. The warm colors look natural and beautiful while keeping the blacks black. I like it better than white, but most people may think looking at a beige screen is strange lol.
LoL.....this is feng shui 😔🤣
Same here. I thought I was going to hate what I was going to project my Benq HDR projector onto since I have glossy beige wall, but like u said the image comes across as natural, beautiful and keep the blacks black.
@@tintinfromindia2103 hahaha just saw this, my bad.
great vid... just would have loved you to play with the projector settings such as setting the picture to dynamic and color temp to warm to balance out the look of the white wall... I feel like you would have likes the results more than 60%
You don't get a darker screen to boost brightness (dark colors absorb light rays) you do it for the higher contrast capabilities... Which were significant in your example!!
After making this video I turned the brightness on my projector up and it looks great now. For this video though I wanted to compare the picture with the projector on the same brightness setting to see the difference between the grey screen and white wall while leaving everything else the same.
All you need is a very, very lite almost white grey screen to have a very good brightness to ebol to enjoy ando do not forget to adjust the brightness of your proyector so you can really enjoy all your movies, programs tv show, enything you won't to see, greetings from Guadalajara Jalisco Mexico ();-)
So csnt you simply add the brightness over the Grey screen?
Projectors are getting so good now that getting a projector screen would be a big waste of money. I went to a guy who repairs Projectors for a hobby on the side of his engineering. The brightness of the projectors are so bright that using a screen wouldn't make a big difference other than adding looks to the room. I was about to buy a very expensive screen for the projector until I watched this video, and the truth is that projector screens are a scam. I'm so glad I went to someone who knows a lot about these things instead of a store. This guy doesn't scam and tells you the straight-up truth. He had every light in his house on while the windows were open, and I could still see the projector clear as day without the screen.
have you try to fix the colour from the video player or pc ?
Great video!!! Thank you for the details. What type of paint do you use on your wall? I think, if you would have painted your wall with the gray color, you would have experienced the same as your screen, right??
The paint was just a flat white latex paint. I imagine if I'd used a flat grey latex paint of a similar shade as the screen the results would be similar to the grey screen material.
Great video! I really don’t want a screen cluttering up my room. I’m only planning to have some casual movie watching in the room.
But… how smooth is a smooth finish lol I live in a 170 year old home and I’m thinking the walls aren’t that straight. Do you think I’ll notice?
Really helpful thank you; Go Bills!
I have Epson tw7100 (hc3800), 3000 ansi lumens, light treated room, dark grey curtains, dark purple walls, only white ceiling, but about 1.2m over screen so not so much reflection from screen. I tried silver screen just for curiosity (only 1sq meter testing material), and at the end i decided that i will stick to plain white screen, cause colors are better on it, especially if you light control room and dont have too much or any white parts around. Im here cause im looking to make bigger screen, currently projecting on 106" but i want to go full size my room accepts and thats 130". I cannot buy another expensive screen at this size, cause where i live home cinema is exotic sport, no screens to buy locally, i paid huge shipping cost and customs for current screen, so im leaning to DIY screen. I was hoping i will see how white material from Carl's Place performs, but instead i learned how to stretch screen on frame :) Great video btw, nice effort :)
Isn't the grey side of the sreen supposed to be on the front instead of the backside?
Thank you for the honest video! Me going the cheaper route!
Any suggestions on PAINT? From Lowe's or Home depot
I would say you would need a higher Lumens Projector, maybe 3000 or 6000 or up....to project on a gray screen, for a brighter image.👍
I painted my wall using the popular gray combo of paints. The skin tones are too blue and it seems all the highlights are the same. I might go back to white for good skin tones.
in my experience , i paint the segment of the wall a eggshell dark grey and set the projector to blackboard mode ,thats the best result i had
Stop playing with the cleet. 😂
Good job, needing to make myself a projector screen haha, darker = better? 🤔 lighter = better? 😂
you try ALR material from carlofet?
Thank you for this great educational vid. Which white paint do you recommend using? White flat or semi gloss? Behr premium white? Also, Is there a difference in using Digital HD paint for projector vs just white premium behr paint?
Do some research on paint that's specifically designed for use with a projector.
@@smileychess That question is after research. If you have answer that’d be great. Coz ad suggests Ultra HD paint, but people in their reviews say it looks same as a regular premium white matte, which does the same job.
@@TheBabaiful Unfortunately I don't know more than you. I'm just aware that such paint exists. Best of luck to you.
The white screen seem to give a true'er presentation
Older vid but I'm still going to comment. I hope you reply. Thank you for your effort, I reckon I would go for the white wall personally. So What paint ? Matt , semi gloss or full gloss ?? Would the gloss give too much rearward reflection ? This stuff is new to me. I am Handy however. This would save a costly mistake knowing which paint not to use. Thank you.
Thanks for the question. If I remember correctly had had the wall painted with a flat white, so a matte finish. It wasn't glossy at all. Not sure what having a glossy finish would do but I imagine the flat matte finish is best.
Proper 👍
White wall is definitely the best
What paint did you use on the wall? I like the brighter image as well and am about to smooth my wall out and paint it.
I just used some basic flat white paint. Nothing special.
I recomend a grey metallic mate car warp foil. CZcams has some videos regarding this. Search for Car wap projector screen.
Heard that before if you have a darker screen you need a higher more expensive projector to compensate vs lower light cheaper projector. If you want better blacks.
For this video I wanted to see what the difference was without increasing the brightness of the projector to get an apples to apples comparison. Afterward I did increase my projector brightness and it looks great on the gray screen.
I wonder if the white wall is better than a slight greyish color like this blend, silver screen paint (32 oz each), 1 sample size of black (8 oz), and 1 sample size of pewter (8 oz), it might merge the 2 world together and give you the best of both world bright and has some good blacks, im testing it now
How did your test go Mainard?
I've been toying with the idea of white or grey painted wall too.... ive searched and it seems something called 'steel grey 2' here in the UK could be the best bet. But it is a reasonable dark grey. I know they do other shades... so i might go lighter. My LED projector is only 2200 lumens max... i use the brightness at around level 7 of a max of 10... and on an off white painted wall, looks very good. But i can only project in a multi use room which has lots of ambient light. So in daytime, it's super washed out. Not a big problem as we only really watch at night when we're not working etc. How did you get on with your painting then?
im right at that point of chosing! i think diference will be minimal!✌️✌️
Can’t blame the screen when you can make adjustments to the color from the projector. Juuuust saying there could have been more comparisons with those settings. Movie, sports, etc
changing to grey might require recalibrating projection. ?
black drapes / black wallpaper / black surround enhances image.
Blue is safe on our eye
I would have liked to see a ALR screen being used with the lights on
9:07 Well, in that comparison shot, right side video itself is darker. Just look at the white wall just below the ceiling. And looking at other parts like speakers, looks like the video on the right has more contrast?
Same in your dark room comparison. Room itself is darker with the screen. Trying to justify your purchase?
To use a grey screen you need to have the VP at eye's heigth due to angle of rejection you cant have it to the ceilling
I have the exact same projector
Im gonna start working on a theater room soon. Its gonna be pitch black with black walls and a screen.
Thx for this, I wish I saw this video before i wasted money on a grey screen, I ripped it out and went back to white wall with frame. The grey screen just did not work, it darkened the screen and especially at angles like an early 2000 projection TV.
Very helpful