Black Widow PFG - the Discussion

[bidzer]

wbassett wrote:

Polywall will work. I would prime it first even though you already have SS on it. you want to start with a clean white base anytime you start a new project.

If you don't want to reuse your polywall, then yeah anything will work, hard board, MDF... whatever you feel comfortable with.

What is the lumen rating of the SP-7210?

I don't mind using my polywall but would rather not. Will this paint stick to the following?

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...16605-19-16605

[wbassett]

bidzer wrote:

I don't mind using my polywall but would rather not. Will this paint stick to the following?

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...16605-19-16605

I'm assuming that's the perfectly smooth stuff and not the stuff with bumps right?

First, it's paint. It will 'stick' to anything paint will adhere too. That said, some surfaces need to be prepped in order for it to be properly painted.

Here is an excerpt from the Screen Painting 101 thread, specifically Prep and Painting

If your wall or surface has a very smooth finish or is a synthetic or plastic surface, you must first apply an primer so that the paint screen paint can adequately adhere to the surface. Walls made of particle board or MDF should be thoroughly cleaned with turpentine or paint thinner. This will remove any glue residue and build up on the surface. This may seem like a useless step, and for most applications people don't have a problem- but ask yourself if you want to be that one person that does have a bonding issue or residue lumps. A quick wipe down is all it really takes, only a minute of your time.

So yes it will work with proper prep work. Bubbles are not such a good thing though. If they pop the aluminum tends to show and you get a shiny spot. If you see an air bubble, don't panic, go back and roll it out.

I think it was already mentioned, but this is an application where you actually want to stay away from foam rollers. You can do it with them but they tend to cause a lot more air bubbles.

Basically just roll it. I have no special rolling instructions, nothing fancy... if you can paint a room you can paint a screen. If a screen requires more than that, like special skills, special rollers, and video's, it's probably more complicated than it needs to be. If you don't believe me, contact some of the commercial screen paint companies and ask them how to roll their screen.

Screen painting really isn't as hard as some make it out to be. Just take your time, do proper prep work, and it will be fine. That doesn't just apply to Black Widow PFG, that applies to any paint project from painting a room to an old wooden rocking chair... preparation can make or break a project.

End of Sermon

[bidzer]

wbassett wrote:

I'm assuming that's the perfectly smooth stuff and not the stuff with bumps right?

First, it's paint. It will 'stick' to anything paint will adhere too. That said, some surfaces need to be prepped in order for it to be properly painted.

Here is an excerpt from the Screen Painting 101 thread, specifically Prep and Painting

The polywall has a smooth side and a textured side. I painted the textured side with the Silverscreen. The tileboard looks smooth.



So yes it will work with proper prep work. Bubbles are not such a good thing though. If they pop the aluminum tends to show and you get a shiny spot. If you see an air bubble, don't panic, go back and roll it out.

I think it was already mentioned, but this is an application where you actually want to stay away from foam rollers. You can do it with them but they tend to cause a lot more air bubbles.

Basically just roll it. I have no special rolling instructions, nothing fancy... if you can paint a room you can paint a screen. If a screen requires more than that, like special skills and video's, it's probably more complicated than it needs to be. If you don't believe me, contact some of the commercial screen paint companies and ask them how to roll their screen.

Screen painting really isn't as hard as some make it out to be. Just take your time, do proper prep work, and it will be fine. That doesn't just apply to Black Widow PFG, that applies to any paint project from painting a room to an old wooden rocking chair... preparation can make or break a project.

End of Sermon

I'm probably going to give this a shot. I might have to find a new piece of Polywall though.

[wbassett]

If you put a coat of good primer down you'll be fine.

[tradewinds]

bidzer, you have a source for the 558 yet?

[wbassett]

Tradewinds mech posted a link for it, and worse case someone could send you some I'm sure.

[bidzer]

tradewinds wrote:

bidzer, you have a source for the 558 yet?

Nothing local, 2 home depots to no avail. They had the 555. Looks like it may be mail order time.

I won't be doing any painting until after the Superbowl though!!! LOL

[tradewinds]

wbassett wrote:

Tradewinds mech posted a link for it, and worse case someone could send you some I'm sure.

Yep, $30 for the gallon shipped, not bad but I hate the fact that I may have about 100 oz remaining, maybe I'll paint the rooftop with the rest.

Anywho, maybe we can ask that place to issue a coupon for this site's members. I got a 5% off upsellit-5 when I tried to leave the site, but maybe a good $5.00 off coupon would be nice.

[<^..^>Smokey Joe]

benven wrote:

Hi Smokey, does your statement also hold true for gray screens? Yes, gray is a shade of white. For instance, if you start off with a white paint that has unity gain, ie a Lambertian surface. You then add a pigment or pigment free particles to it to get a shade of gray. You are "absorbing" more light than reflecting. ie a non Lambertian surface. Therefore, your gain automatically goes down and you have a gain of less than 1. That is unless you add "gain" to them to bring them up to 1. In which case, even though you have a measured gain of 1 you needed a little boost to get there. So, are you risking colour shifts with most gray screens?
We won't even talk about off axis viewing because a gray screen with gain, IMO, ins't all that great off axis. That's part of the reason I ditched CGIII, gain of 1.8, for a lower gain, lighter shade of gray screen.

Good question.

With a 0.8~1.2 screen it is unlikely to see much difference, however moving further away either direction and you alter the "L" in Lab enough so that the light that scatters more readily,ie Blue end of the spectrum, will behave differently than the Red end of the spectrum, then the ab functions may drift when viewing off axis.

We are looking uniformity across the width here.

The problem is not so much the spot measurement, which could equal a flat spectrum but the incedent light reflections.
This is hard to measure though, even with an i1pro as they like to be flat to the surface for the probe to work.

Still we are getting anal here, the spot spectrum result of the PFG is as good as alot of pay for screens.
Getting the spectrum flat solves 98% of calibration issues with the screen, ie lowers the push pull effect of trying to dial out the error with your PJ.

[tradewinds]

Good point. My PJ (SP-7210) is unable to get to 65K on a white unity gain screen, so hopefully what slight variations from 65K the Black Widow PFG brings will work in concert. But, I agree, we may be splitting hairs on something that cannot be detected with the plain old eye.

[wbassett]

benven wrote:

It would be interesting to make up some PFG with the Auto Air Aluminum (AAA) product. I still have some left over. Although, I would have to use the Behr 4850 white paint as the base. This paint is awesome guys. I think it would be as good if not better than the other white paints you have tried. The good thing about using the AAA is it does help with spraying as it was designed to be sprayed. Just a thought, Or is that 2 thoughts?

Ben like mech said we're actively looking at this right now, and thanks for passing it along!

I called the company and this is basically the same as what I originally was using but mine ended up discontinued... which was aluminum, a binding material, and water. That's it.

I called Createx today and they said yup, that's all that's in the Auto-Air Aluminum.

Like you said, this is designed to be sprayed so a couple things right off the bat:

• No need to strain it prior to being used.
• Definitely sprayable
• Will probably be able to be sprayed with a Preval Sprayer too for those that want to go that route
• For those that want to roll, it will act as a natural thinner to latex paint and help it go down very smooth.

I do want to say before anyone runs out and buys this, we need to test it and find a base white that is more in like with our specs. We only did basic testing with the original because why waste time on something that was discontinued? We could have worked a base out but why? (In hind sight, if we had then this would be a simple substitute is all... but as they say hindsight is 20/20 right?)

So right now we know HE558 works, and we'll get an easier method out shortly but it will be the same method and performance, it won't be a total redesign or complicated method.

[mechman]

wbassett wrote:

I do want to say before anyone runs out and buys this, we need to test it and find a base white that is more in like with our specs. We only did basic testing with the original because why waste time on something that was discontinued? We could have worked a base out but why? (In hind sight, if we had then this would be a simple substitute is all... but as they say hindsight is 20/20 right?)

And I'd like to add that the original aluminum paint pushed blue (I hate saying that but for lack of better terminology) with what we've mixed it with. That includes some of the blue deficient whites we've tried. So this may take us, and my pocketbook , a while to figure out!

mech

[bidzer]

I was just @ Lowes to see what they had and all I saw was this in a gallon:

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...-30&lpage=none

[tradewinds]

bidzer wrote:

I was just @ Lowes to see what they had and all I saw was this in a gallon:

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...-30&lpage=none

Yes, Home Depot also said they carry other brands as well as Ace. The problem will be the base white to use if one goes with another brand.

[bidzer]

I'm trying to see what's the recommended application to try this on? Plywood? Polywall? Wilsonart?

[wbassett]

Bidzer see post#52

[benven]

wbassett wrote:

Like you said, this is designed to be sprayed so a couple things right off the bat:

• No need to strain it prior to being used.
• Definitely sprayable
• Will probably be able to be sprayed with a Preval Sprayer too for those that want to go that route
• For those that want to roll, it will act as a natural thinner to latex paint and help it go down very smooth.

All good points. But, you need to be careful rolling this product. It does create bubbles when used in higher AAAaint ratio. Using it 3:1 may not be issue. I'm just passing along my experience. Good luck!

[wbassett]

I've rolled from 3:1 all the way to 6:1, even using the dreaded foam rollers and it's not that bad. Just go slow and take a little care and it's a breeze.

[Chris Nitro]

Hey guys, awesome job on everything that you guys come up with to make the best screen possible. I'm in the same vote as some others here in that the Henry 558 is unavailable in my area. I'm not sure how it works for buying the stuff online and shipping up here to Canada. I'm still a few weeks away from deciding what I want to do for the screen. I will keep up to date on this thread to get updates and if anything easier to get becomes available. Thanks again for the hard work guys.

Once I get the walls up and mudded I plan on putting on some coats of Kilz2 primer and setting up the projector. I will watch a week or two with just the primer on to get idea on final screen size that I want, then final option for screen paint.

[Harpmaker]

bidzer wrote:

I was just @ Lowes to see what they had and all I saw was this in a gallon:

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...-30&lpage=none

I notice that this is a fibered roof paint. I don't know if the fibers can be filtered out or not.

For whatever reason, none of the Lowe's stores in my area sell this.

[benven]

OK. Just mixed up a 7:1 ratio (60 mL:10 mL) Behr 4850 to AA Fine Aluminum. Rolled it on a flat white base test panel. It is still drying. Preliminary opinion....it's blue and it's dark. Well see when it's dry. But I'm already thinking it's not for me.

[mechman]

benven wrote:

OK. Just mixed up a 7:1 ratio (60 mL:10 mL) Behr 4850 to AA Fine Aluminum. Rolled it on a flat white base test panel. It is still drying. Preliminary opinion....it's blue and it's dark. Well see when it's dry. But I'm already thinking it's not for me.

Wow, makes a blue deficient white look blue! This sounds like a challenge!!!

mech