[Wardog555]

Hey guys.

I want to ask what is everyone's seating distance and what screen sizes do you use. This can be either a tv or projector.

I'm looking for ideas for an imax experience for my future home theater and I will be using both a 65 inch cx oled and a 1080p projector with a screen size of 133 inches with 16:9 aspect ratio.

I know there's recommend distances etc but what I have found that it comes down to rather a personal preference.

Many thanks

 

[Wayne A. Pflughaupt]

You should be able to find answers at one of these links:

home theater screen size seating distance at DuckDuckGo

DuckDuckGo. Privacy, Simplified.

duckduckgo.com

Regards,
Wayne

 

[Da Wiz]

• It is **** DIFFICULT to produce satisfyingly bright images on a 133 inch wide projection screen.
• You will want to sit 7 to 7.5 feet from the OLED TV to get a cinematic viewing angle
• 1080p projection on a 133-inch wide screen will require a viewing distance of about 13-14 feet. Sitting that far from the screen and speakers means the REFLECTED sound in your room will be more powerful than the DIRECTLY-RADIATED sound in your room. That is unavoidable unless you get a smaller projection screen that allows you to place the screen close enough that the loudspeakers are no more than 9 feet from the main seat. This will insure your directly radiated sound from various speakers will be louder than the more chaotic reflected sound from more distant speakers.
• A big 1080p image is not going to impress you as much as a UHD/HDR image on the OLED TV. If the speakers are the same distance at the OLED TV (7 to 7.5 feet), the directly radiated sound will be louder than the reflected sound by quite a bit... so you will find that soundfield to be quite enveloping compared to sitting 13-14 feet from the loudspeakers where the more diffuse/chaotic reflected sound will dominate what you hear at the main seat.
• Projection is going to disappear because it's almost worthless for HDR content. Today, a good flat screen TV produces brighter and more colorful images than ANY movie theater. Movie theaters know they can't exist on big screen size only. So theaters are beginning to replace projectors with large LED displays that require no projector. This is expensive for theaters because putting speakers behind LED screens is not possible so far. So if a theater changes to a direct view display, they have to put speakers above/below or left/right of any self-illuminating displays. But theaters MUST have this type of display to compete for audiences with home theaters being possible today that look better than theaters.
• You should consider a SINGLE flat screen TV of 85-inches, like the Vizio PQX TV (so far only available in 85-inch size, for $3300-ish) and give up on the idea of the 133-inch wide projection screen.
• You will need a projector with 4000+ lumens capability to make a 133-inch wide screen bright enough, even for SDR content. This will be quite an expensive projector if there even IS a 1080p projector for MOVIES (home theater) with a REAL 4000 lumen output. I just evaluated a JVC projector that produced 3000 lumens (4K resolution) and cost $26,000. And preferred a $2000 Sony OLED 65-inch TV as long as the viewing angles were the same for the TV and projection screen. As projectors get less expensive, the specs for lumens and related brightness and screen size recommendations become more problematic and over-stated. Also understand that if you start with a projector that produces 16 fL for 100% white in 1080p/SDR content, by the time the projection lamp has 2000 hours on it, the on-screen illumination will only be 8 fL, half the light you started with. The recommended range for 1080/SDR content is 12 FL to 20 fL. 8 fL sneaks up on you over time and you don't realize how dim images have gotten... unless you have a flat screen TV around to remind you. That Vizio PQX TV can produce a peak white of up to 850 fL which is absolutely necessary to be able to display the wider range of colors you get with UHD/HDR content. A $4000 projector on a 133-inch wide screen MIGHT produce 16 fL if your screen has more gain than 1.0. If you have an acoustically transparent screen, even if it is rated at 1.5 gain, the REAL gain will be no more than .85... acoustically transparent screens ALWAYS lose light compared to solid screens.
• Sit 8 feet from an 85-inch flat screen TV and you'll get magnificent better-then-cinema images. And you won't have to move the speakers back for projection and forward for viewing the OLED TV. You can keep the OLED for times when you might want to set it up at 7 feet away to keep a big viewing angle. But you may not even care about the OLED once you see the 85-inch Vizio that has almost 800 local dimming zones.

 

[Wardog555]

Appreciate the comments guys. It's really something to think about. One day I hope to get a 4k hdr projector.

As for the screen size it's 133 inches diagonal not the width as you thought. That puts it at around 3 meters wide.

I'll give you the room dimensions where this setup will be. 3.6 meters wide. 4 meters long. 2.7 meters high

The 65 oled will be the primary display especially for 4k content and occasional gaming.

It will be a 5.1.4 Dolby atmos setup to start with and i will be planning for a 7.2.4 for the future.

 

[the kid]

I have a 106 inch screen. I sit ~9 - 9.5 feet away. Looks good to me. I actually wouldn't mind a little closer, but I have others at home to 'tell me about it' for being too close. My thoughts is to sit where the picture fills up my 'straight-ahead- view without having to turn my head to see the left / right edge of the picture.

Not to sound prideful or arrogant, but I have never followed the viewing rules as I am the one sitting in my room and I want to experience the view to what I think it should be.

 

[david yurik]

I sit 9' from 125" screen. The MLP in the front row is immersive. You don't have to move your head to see everything but you do shift your focus side to side.

The second row eyeball view is another 3' back and works great. It's much closer to the general recommendations from many websites.

Dave

 

[Wardog555]

Thanks to the last two comments that actually answered my question!

I definitely agree on the point when you don't actually follow the distance guides/recommendations.

I'm planing on a 2 meter distance for my 65 inch cx and planing the speaker locations around that!

Appreciate the comments regardless!

 

[bassman_soundking]

I have a 106 inch screen. I sit ~9 - 9.5 feet away. Looks good to me. I actually wouldn't mind a little closer, but I have others at home to 'tell me about it' for being too close. My thoughts is to sit where the picture fills up my 'straight-ahead- view without having to turn my head to see the left / right edge of the picture.

Not to sound prideful or arrogant, but I have never followed the viewing rules as I am the one sitting in my room and I want to experience the view to what I think it should be.

My screen was 106" also, and I sat 9-10ft away also.
My mindset was identical, as long as I see the whole image at once Im not too close.
And as long as I dont get a headache 🤣

 

[nathan_h]

Hey guys.

I want to ask what is everyone's seating distance and what screen sizes do you use. This can be either a tv or projector.

I'm looking for ideas for an imax experience for my future home theater and I will be using both a 65 inch cx oled and a 1080p projector with a screen size of 133 inches with 16:9 aspect ratio.

I know there's recommend distances etc but what I have found that it comes down to rather a personal preference.

Many thanks

I tend to error on the side of trying to reproduce industry stands in my viewing and listening.

(This doesn't mean I always follow the standards. Theater reference level for audio is too loud for me, for example.)

But it's worthwhile to know what those standards are, so you start from a known specification and go from there.

All of the standards are based on geometry, a bit about resolution of sources, and while they may specify an ideal ratio, they also allow for a range of what is acceptable.

(Additional factors like whether it is a 2.4 or 16:9 screen can come into play, as well.)

And a useful discussion:

Home theater viewing angles, distances and sightlines - Acoustic Frontiers

Horizontal Viewing Angles The horizontal viewing angle is the angle subtended by a straight line from each side of the screen to the seating position. The main two standards in the commercial world are the SMPTE and THX specifications as summarized in the diagram below: New cinemas built to THX...

www.acousticfrontiers.com

 

[rdcollns]

I have a 150" projection screen and sit about 11' from the screen. It is 3200 lumens 1080p, extremely vivid, and bright enough to watch with daylight in the room and you can't see any pixels at that distance. We have a large 4K HDR LED screen in another room, and nobody cares, the projector is where it's at. I personally think you want to sit about the same distance as the width of the screen. Your peripheral vision can catch everything, but you still have to turn your head a little to really catch all the action, putting you in the middle of the action. As a side note, I demoed a couple of 4K projectors in my house two years ago. The detail was a little sharper as you would expect, unfortunately the technology wasn't quite there. The images were stunning when everything clicked right, but they had lots of issues with the image in challenging scenes. The image quality (minus resolution) is much better on my 1080p projector. I'm sure it's gotten better and I'll upgrade when my current bulb wears out.

 

[Da Wiz]

Appreciate the comments guys. It's really something to think about. One day I hope to get a 4k hdr projector.

As for the screen size it's 133 inches diagonal not the width as you thought. That puts it at around 3 meters wide.

I'll give you the room dimensions where this setup will be. 3.6 meters wide. 4 meters long. 2.7 meters high

The 65 oled will be the primary display especially for 4k content and occasional gaming.

It will be a 5.1.4 Dolby atmos setup to start with and i will be planning for a 7.2.4 for the future.

The fact that the screen is closer to 10 feet wide is inconsequential... everything I posted still applies.

 

[Da Wiz]

Thanks to the last two comments that actually answered my question!

I definitely agree on the point when you don't actually follow the distance guides/recommendations.

I'm planing on a 2 meter distance for my 65 inch cx and planing the speaker locations around that!

Appreciate the comments regardless!

So your method of solving problems is NOT to use accurate information, but, instead, to ask people who aren't HT pros and who don't have the depth of experience of a 30 industry professional and when you get an answer you like, whether it is right or wrong... that's not the method to use to get good results.

 

[Da Wiz]

I have a 150" projection screen and sit about 11' from the screen. It is 3200 lumens 1080p, extremely vivid, and bright enough to watch with daylight in the room and you can't see any pixels at that distance. We have a large 4K HDR LED screen in another room, and nobody cares, the projector is where it's at. I personally think you want to sit about the same distance as the width of the screen. Your peripheral vision can catch everything, but you still have to turn your head a little to really catch all the action, putting you in the middle of the action. As a side note, I demoed a couple of 4K projectors in my house two years ago. The detail was a little sharper as you would expect, unfortunately the technology wasn't quite there. The images were stunning when everything clicked right, but they had lots of issues with the image in challenging scenes. The image quality (minus resolution) is much better on my 1080p projector. I'm sure it's gotten better and I'll upgrade when my current bulb wears out.

Let's talk about lumens... I have never seen a projector that would produce remotely close to 3200 Lumens when calibrated to be accurate unless the projector costs more than $10,000. Any less expensive projector that the manufacturer says has 3200 lumens, that will be a giant lie. Epson just successfully sued a manufacturerer of cheap projectors who were claiming stupidly high lumen values for their projectors that sell for less than $1000. Until you have put a light meter on a 100% white test pattern, you won't have any idea how bright or dim your screen is. I walked into a theater where the guy told me that the projector and screen were chosen because they would deliver 20 fL with a fresh light bulb and a partially closed iris, and still produce 12 fL with 2500-3000 hours on the lamp. It turns out, he overestimated by a bit... he had 4 fL with a 3000 hour lamp and 8 fL with a new lamp. It should never go below 12 fL for 100% white.

I have a $25,000 4K projector, an $8000 4K projector, a $4000 1080p pixel shifter UHD compatible but at 3K, not really 4K. None are purchased by me, but they are here in my theater room and are able to be used any time, just by turning one of them on. The brightest projector (the $25,000 one with laser-phosphor light engine powered by numerous blue lasers to produce red, green, and blue light) can produce about 50 fL on an 82-inch wide 16:9 screen with 1.0 gain. There is also an 85-inch LCD/LED TV that can produce 3000 nits, which is 900+ fL (remember, the $25k projector produces 50 fL for comparison) for 100% white in UHD/HDR mode. NOBODY wants to watch ANYTHING on a projector here. The projector's light output is FAR below the TV's light output. The TV can produce about 50% more colors than the projector because it can reach 3000 nits that the projector can't HOPE to get close to. Between the black blacks of this TV (almost 800 local dimming zones) and the high luminance capability, the TV with a good UHD/HDR source makes the projectors look pitiful when displaying the same content side by side. How do you get RGB from only blue lasers? Some of the lasers are reserved FOR blue light. All the others are aimed at a small rotating disc that is coated in a phosphor that glows brightly yellow when hit with numerous blue lasers. That yellow light is split into green and red light. This is how cinema projectors have been made for 10 years or more. But some started appearing 5 years ago as home projectors.

Projection is dying as we speak. Every week another theater or two removes their projector and installs a direct-view LED screen. In 10 years, there will be few or no projectors in movie theaters in large geographic areas around the world. Projectors are ENTIRELY unsuitable for displaying UHD/HDR content impressively. If a projector produced enough light to hit 900+ fL on-screen, there would be so much light reflecting around the room that the projector would wash-out its own images.

 

[Wardog555]

So your method of solving problems is NOT to use accurate information, but, instead, to ask people who aren't HT pros and who don't have the depth of experience of a 30 industry professional and when you get an answer you like, whether it is right or wrong... that's not the method to use to get good results.

I was asking for real world experiences to get ideas. It's not only just following a guide even though they are helpful to know.

I've since changed my plan from 2 meters as that's a bit too close for 133 inches.

I saw your suggested distance of minimum 13 feet but that is literally the maximum length of the room itself

 

[MiraEdorra21]

No matter which size of LCD your using, this chart will be helpful to everyone.

​

 

[Wardog555]

No matter which size of LCD your using, this chart will be helpful to everyone.

View attachment 175721
​

Lol this is severely outdated. It's impossible for me to sit that far from any tv in my house for a 64 inch according to this guide. It even mentions CRT technology!

 

[rvsixer]

Do I really need to replace my 65" LCD @ 78" viewing distance with a 19" LCD ???

 

[rdcollns]

Let's talk about lumens... I have never seen a projector that would produce remotely close to 3200 Lumens when calibrated .....

No idea how many lumens my under $1K 3200 lumen projector actually outputs. The measured output is completely irrelevant as I can watch it in daylight and it works great, and at night I dial it way down and it looks even better.

I love the idea behind calibration and color accuracy, but I am talking strictly about the experience in our house, and comparison to friends, neighbors, etc. I doubt I know anyone with a display of any kind that costs over $10K, let alone anyone who would hire someone to calibrate their display for them. In my experience, the color, depth, brightness of my cheap projector match the quality of most LED displays and certainly hit a quality level where guests are always impressed. I did a fair amount of work tweaking the settings to get them dialed in, but only using my own eyes. The black levels are obviously not as good, but once you start watching they are definitely good enough that you do not notice at all. The best part for me, though, is that the projected image is far more pleasant to watch. There is something fatiguing about watching a light source beaming straight at you, vs watching a projected image. I don't see myself ever switching over. That, and there is probably no way to bring an 85" display down the stairs into my current theater room, let alone 150", which is the size I really want. Maybe when they improve the tile TVs, they'll find a way to make them less fatiguing as well, but it will likely never be affordable, let along fit in a little box UPS will conveniently ship. I've been using projectors for over 20 years now, and have converted a number of people to do the same. I don't know anyone who has switched back to panel displays for their primary movie room.

Time to get back to my baseball game, the players and strike zone are life size, this is great.