# Best Projector



## Call911 (Mar 13, 2012)

Hello All,

I'm looking for the best large venue projector, but am not sure the exact lumens I need. Here's the setup:

Need a projector that can hit a 16' wide 4:3 screen hanging in a 3 court field house. Lights are fluorescents, and natural light is from windows around the top of the field house (not glass, some form of plastic windows, can't see outside but light comes in). 

Projector will be mounted on the back wall of the center court, hitting the screen on the opposite wall. Throw is roughly 100'. 

Same projector also needs to be used in our theaters to how video on our cyc. Proscenium is 52' wide, 20' high. Lip of orchestra pit (where projector would go) to cyc is roughly 50'. 

Is there a projector and lense that can suit both? In the field house we can mount projector from ceiling if needed. It's only used twice a year so we can get the lift out when needed. Projector on stage can be flown as well, but would rather set on the lip. 

Any questions feel free to ask. I'm thinking around 8000 lumens, and looking for under $10k. Any suggestions would be great. Thanks!


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## Footer (Mar 13, 2012)

What kind of content are you showing? On stage, I assume that you will be running the projector without stage lighting considering you want to put in on the end of the stage. 

For lenses, you need a 6.25:1 at 4:3 for the arena. In the theatre at 16:9 the largest your image could be is 22x40. In the theatre you need a 1.25:1 lens. No one lens is going to do this. You will need to purchase two lenses to do these two very different shots. That right there could easily cost you most of your budget. The 6.25 lens is a serious piece of glass, that is not going to come cheap. 

My venue owns a 5k Eiki. I won't use it on a screen larger then 9x12. I have rear-projected my cyc with it and it works... but its not really bright enough to stand up to stage lights. When we need to do anything "real", we have a 10k DLP brought in. 

I would look at getting at least a 10k, if not a 15k.


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## ruinexplorer (Mar 13, 2012)

If one of the venues will only be used once or twice per year, but the other venue will be used often, then you may want to consider purchasing the lens you will use most often and then rent the lens you use once or twice. The availability of rental lenses may then determine the type of projector you purchase. If you are near Chicago, you could check with VER to see what lenses that they have available to help you with your purchase decision. Most likely, you will be looking at the Panasonic PT-DS8500U as VER has carried quite a large stock of Panasonic projectors over the years and will likely have the most available lenses for them.


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## MPowers (Mar 16, 2012)

I asked our in house projector expert this question and here is his answer.


> Michael,
> About as close as I could come for that budget would be the Christie LX700 at $5700 sell price. It is 7000 lumens and 1024x768, so High Definition is a no go. You would need two lenses to get this done at around $4000 for the pair. It’s never a good idea to dual purpose a machine for two venues, and they would probably find it less expensive in the long run (due to labor in set up and tear down time) to simply install two different projectors.
> 
> The NEC NP-PA550W would be a good choice for the theater @5500 Lumens, 1280X800(WXGA) Resolution and $3175
> And then use the NEC/NP-PX800X for the Gym @ 1024X768 8000 lumens @$8600 with a long throw lens.


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## museav (Mar 16, 2012)

Call911 said:


> Need a projector that can hit a 16' wide 4:3 screen hanging in a 3 court field house. Lights are fluorescents, and natural light is from windows around the top of the field house (not glass, some form of plastic windows, can't see outside but light comes in).
> 
> Projector will be mounted on the back wall of the center court, hitting the screen on the opposite wall. Throw is roughly 100'.
> 
> Same projector also needs to be used in our theaters to how video on our cyc. Proscenium is 52' wide, 20' high. Lip of orchestra pit (where projector would go) to cyc is roughly 50'.


Do you want to fill the 52' wide proscenium opening or simply project a smaller video image within that opening? What is the cyc material? What is the content and use for both situations?

That could be a significant difference as a 52' wide image with a 4:3 projector is a 52'x39' image, which is a much different situation than a 16'x12' image in terms of the brightness required from the projector as well as related issues such as the potential vertical offset possible.


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