Are solid projection screens better than transperant?

Home Theatre Knowledge Base Article

1st April 2011 Home Theatre   

Are solid projection screens better than transperant?

A Huge misconception people have on Audio Transparent projection screens are related to the perforated audio transparent screens of the past. In the past years, a perforated screen would be a last resort due to loss of image quality and deterioration of sound caused by the perforations. All this has changed with products like the SmX CineWeave™ HD.

Here are a few good reasons why a transparent movie screen is favorable over a solid movie screen.

The first reason is speaker placement. With a solid movie screen, you have to put your main speakers on the left and right and the center channel on the top or bottom of the solid movie screen. This is known to cause an unwanted detectable top or bottom imaging of dialogue in movies. Other words, the dialogue coming from the center channel on the top or bottom of the solid screen sounds as if it's coming from the top or the bottom of the movie screen.

With an Audio Transparent screen, you can now place your main speakers and center channel directly behind the movie screen to get audio imaging the way it was intended to be from Hollywood. With your speakers behind the audio transparent movie screen, a persons dialogue in a movie is actually coming from the direction of their mouth opposed to coming from below or above the entire movie screen.

For people with limited space, a solid movie screen usually means having to sacrifice screen size due to having to place the speakers on the sides of the solid screen. An audio transparent movie screen gives you full flexibility to go as big as your room allows by being able to put all your front speakers behind the movie screen.

Another important reason why transparent movie screens are favoured over a solid movie screen is audio reflections. A solid movie screen in front of your movie theater creates one unwanted large reflective wall for audio. Since the Solid Movie screen can not be treated with any acoustical treatments, it ends up being a solid wall you must have in your theater which can be really bad for audio. With aTransparent projection screen, your entire front wall behind the Audio Transparent movie screen can be acoustically treated giving you an optimum sounding room.

Perceived sharpness in video quality. The weave of the SmX gives your projected image a perceived sharper image. This works great for people with soft projecting projectors like CRT or LCOS technology.

Keeping your speakers behind the movie screen is the same method main stream public movie theaters use. Why expect anything less in your home theater?