# Panasonic Laser projector



## Bgarrett74 (Feb 1, 2016)

Hello,
Does anyone have experience with the Panasonic laser projectors? How do they hold up? Are they bright? Are they loud? I am looking at purchasing four of the RS11, 12k laser projectors for our school. They are so new that I can't find any reviews on them. I don't want to purchase a $30,000 and have it not meet our needs. 
Thanks,
Brent


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## MNicolai (Feb 1, 2016)

You probably won't have much luck on finding information on durability and such because laser phosphor projectors of this brightness are a recent development and there are very few of them in the wild and the ones that are out there have yet to be exposed to a few years worth of getting bounced on and off of trucks. If you have specific technical questions, PM me your contact info and I can have someone at Panasonic give you a call.

Determining how bright of a projector you need is directly related to the size of your image, the surface you're projecting onto, and the ambient light the image surface is exposed to. I got tired of crunching the numbers awhile back and developed a spreadsheet I use for that that runs all of the numbers for me. If you give me your image area and can tell me what kind of lighting environment your projection surfaces are being used in, I can help you determine if 12K lumens is the right size projector for you or not. It's worth noting that a 12K projector doing a 30' x 17' image in a dark theater isn't far off from being retina-scorching bright.

As for the PT-RS11, my concern would be that it's a 4:3 projector. That may be perfect for your application but for most people it's not at all what they want. Nobody walks into a venue with a 4:3 formatted presentation unless they're told there's no other option. If your plan is to ignore the aspect ratio altogether by blending projectors together in a manner that creates a 16:9 or 16:10 image, then your setup will be friendlier to presenters and non-custom content but I'd wonder if you couldn't achieve the same result with 1 or 2 projectors instead of 4.

If you're using these for projection mapping or custom content, then the aspect ratio probably isn't a big deal at all.

It depends which lens you use but generally this projector has +/- 50% lens shift, which is less than I would want it to have. I prefer projectors with at least +/- 100% vertical lens shift so you can mount the projector at same height as the bottom or as the top of your projected image and use lens shift to optically manipulate the image onto the screen rather than via keystone. Keystoning throws away pixels and can distort your image and should be avoided at all costs.

You can post here, PM me, or call my office and I can help you determine better if these are the right projectors for you, but whether or not they are will be based largely on what it is you want to use them for.


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## Footer (Feb 2, 2016)

MNicolai said:


> You probably won't have much luck on finding information on durability and such because laser phosphor projectors of this brightness are a recent development and there are very few of them in the wild and the ones that are out there have yet to be exposed to a few years worth of getting bounced on and off of trucks. If you have specific technical questions, PM me your contact info and I can have someone at Panasonic give you a call.



Why don't you ask a rep from Panasonic to come here and answer the question so we can all learn about this new technology instead of using CB for sales leads? 



MNicolai said:


> You can post here, PM me, or call my office and I can help you determine better if these are the right projectors for you, but whether or not they are will be based largely on what it is you want to use them for.



@Bgarrett74 if you give us an idea of what you are looking to achieve with this units we all can be of more assistance. For the health of CB, please let us know on this thread, not in a PM. Thanks!


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## ruinexplorer (Feb 2, 2016)

I looked at a couple models of the Panasonic laser projectors at last year's NAB conference. They had one of them with the extreme short throw lens even. I can say that they had a stunning image and are considerably quieter than their lamp based counterparts.

While I agree that longevity and is something that has yet to be determined for our industry, we aren't really sure how you intend to use them. Do you plan on temporary or permanent installation? What specific concerns do you have?


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## Chris15 (Feb 2, 2016)

We've had a pair of PT-DZ670s running in our largest lecture theatre for just under year now.
Getting used for the best part of 12 hours a day, 5 days a week, and some weekend use too.

One of them had to go for a trip back to Panasonic to be reeducated on powering on in June or July, but was turned around fairly quickly and done under warranty.

The brightness seems reasonable to me, we're shooting onto a screen around 5800mm / 230", I wouldn't know the throw distance off the top of my head...


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## Bgarrett74 (Feb 3, 2016)

I do have a demo set up next week with Panasonic here at the University of Iowa. They are bringing the RZ12k and the RZ6780-6500 lumen laser projector. I think it will be good for me to see them in person but I always feel like I don't have enough time to really put them through their paces in a demo for a day. I did talk to a guy who said that they did a shoot out with the RZ12 and the DZ21k and the RZ12 was just as bright as the DZ21k. 
We are using the projectors in our new large venue that will be complete this May. I have 27' of depth from the projector lens to the black RP screen that I will be shooting on in rear projection mode. I am going to edge blend three of the RS11 in portrait mode. I am going portrait mode to get the height of 27'. I am going with the RS11 because I don't really need the higher resolution and since it is a 4x3 aspect ratio, it gives me more width per projector to cover a 53'x27' image. Each projector will be 27'x20' with 10% overlap in the portrait mode. I will be using at short throw zoomable lens to achieve the image. The lens is the ET-D75LE6 1-1.2:1. After calculating the math I will be at 22 lumens per square foot. Not exactly the lumens I want but I don't see any other laser projectors on the market that is brighter than 12k lumens. I will be using Watchout to do my edge blending. We don't really worry too much about aspect ration around here because most times we are projecting on scenery or large RP screens. 
Any comments would be great.
Thanks
BG


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## rphilip (Feb 4, 2016)

FWIW I just got a bulk email that says Epson is announcing a 25k laser projector a the ISE show. Doesn't seem to be on their website yet however.

If you've got a ton of money Christie showed off a modular laser projector up to 60k Lumens at NAB last year, Digital Projection also has some laser projectors but I don't remember if they go beyond 12k.

Philip


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## MNicolai (Feb 4, 2016)

Lens Selection

Looks like you've got the math right, though my results are that you would need a 1.33:1-capable lens for a 27' throw to get an image height of 27'. The 1.2:1 would be work at 24' but at 27' would fill your screen with 3' of excess in the vertical. The excess in the horizontal doesn't matter because you'll blend them together.

When selecting a lens you want to remember that you want to be on the bottom end of the throw ratio with the widest angle as much as possible. In this case you could lose 10-20% of your lumen output by being zoomed in on the lens. This is because the natural function of most lenses is that as you zoom in, the aperture closes down, reducing your light transmission permitted to travel through the lens elements. In a short throw lens this is less pronounced, but in a long throw lens you could lose 50-60% of your brightness by being at the narrow end of the lens' zoom ratio. You may be able to press Panasonic to give you their aperture data for this series of lenses. The formula is pretty simple:

(F1/F2)^2 = % of remaining light permitted through lens
F1 = Lowest f-stop aperture
F2 = Highest f-stop aperture

So let's say your lens had an f-stop of 2.3 at narrow, and 2.6 at the widest. (2.3/2.6)^2 = 78.25% --- the same image area is 78% as bright at the narrowest zoom as it is bright at the widest zoom. Your results may vary, but these f-stop values are in the neighborhood of similar short throw zoom lenses I've seen by manufacturers who do publish their lens data.

--

Image Brightness

12K/ea is in the ballpark of being appropriate. With a target contrast ratio of 10:1 and ambient light levels of 2fc at the screen and 10% light loss in the lens, my result is dead-on at 12082.5 lumens required for that image area, producing 69 nits of brightness on the screen. For reference, if you want to get licensed to stream The Met opera events in your theater or cinema, 55 nits is the minimum allowable brightness. Your average consumer TV is usually 300-400 nits, which is higher because you have to compete with daylight coming in through windows and standard room lighting. In your case, if your RP screen is good at rejecting ambient light and you don't let your stage lights wash all over your screen, 69 nits should be adequate. If your stage areas are typically lit up as bright as the sun, then you may want to consider something brighter so you have some headroom to blend the appearance of your scenery surfaces with the appearance and brightness of your performers, set pieces, and props.

Small footnote: All of my calculations all assume you have an RP screen with a gain of 1.0, which is likely not the case. Do you know what the screen gain is for your RP screen(s)?


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## Jacques Mersereau (Mar 30, 2016)

We just had a Panasonic 12K laser come in for a demo. This right in the middle of our busy season, so only about half an hour with it.
It is about as quiet as our 6K DLP Panasonics. The image was really nice and sharp. They are not cheap, but you still get what you pay for.
Our other Panansonics, PT-DZ66IOU have been solid workhorses. 

For the Video Studio, we have about a 32'x18' image (screen),
and I would not describe 12K at that size projection as 'almost adequate' for keeping up with "well focussed and planned" stage lighting. We use Sony EX3 cameras
and at 12K the image reads pretty decent. When we upgrade to Sony FS7 or Canon C300MkII, (better in low light) it should be pretty good.

We also had one of their 16K DLPs, I wasn't there for it, but the report are it was like a jet engine the fan sound was so loud coming out of it.
We do lots of acoustic recording so that killed that.

HTH,

Jacques


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